Page 5 of The Ashpaw: Part One

Now he was truly confused. Darion ignored the angry hisses of the Ironcoats as he reached for Kyntha, taking her hands in his.

They were cold and trembling, so he raised them to his lips. “I swear to you, I do not know which obligation I have left unmet.”

Her eyes finally rose to meet his, lashes long and fluttering as she replied. “I hear no lie in your words.”

With a smile, he kissed her fingers, and then lowered them back down as he turned towards the priestess. “So what does this mean?”

“It means,” she said slowly, bowing and holding out her hands to calm the growing unease in the small crowd. “That Alpha Darion simply has a debt he must fulfill before the courting can commence.”

Then she looked at him. “Best you resolve it swiftly.”

* * *

Once the Ironcoats had been properly assured this was simply a misunderstanding, that Darion had come with pure intentions and the fault lay only in his memory, the Sabletail alphas retreated to the Council Chamber at the castle.

Pitchers of ale and a platter of meats, cheese, and fruit were left on the table, the Solvekh leaving them to their privacy as they discussed the matter at hand.

“I am displeased,” Darion’s father said, his tone so heavy it nearly suffocated. “What debt could you possibly have left unpaid?”

Darion sighed, cradling his head in his hands as his elbows hit the table and he thought.

The clan could only be maintained through strict hierarchy, and unfinished obligations eroded the trust necessary to keep balance. To keep roles defined. What good was the word of an alpha who never fulfilled his promises? To be untrustworthy sowed division and resentment, and from there a challenger would grow and clans would be rewritten.

He only needed to look at the Bloodmoons to see what a change in leadership could wreak.

“I haven’t the faintest idea, Father,” Darion finally said. “You know I would never be so careless.”

The alphas sat in silence, until one of his uncles finally asked, “And what of your wolf?”

Everyone looked up at this, their faces turned towards Darion. The beast whined slightly in his mind and thumped his tail, like he remembered something.

But the only promise a wolf could make was to mark a human. The power carried in an alpha’s bite was capable of turning one into a wolfkin themselves, a bite that would then need to be confirmed as a man to bind them to his clan.

Clans needed Solvekh, or turned humans, to survive. Not just with numbers and bodies to fill out their ranks, but also with their wombs and seed. Even after turning, they were still more fertile than Lurvekh.

Had his wolf done such a thing? He was normally very conscious in his marking, choosing the strongest human men for their army. Those found on their side of the river who were brave—and foolish—enough to enter wolfkin territory on the night of a full moon in search of glory.

Glory that afterwards would be found serving Clan Sabletail.

The selection of Solvekh domestic laborers—she-wolves, mostly—he left to his uncles and father, while his brother Eidan refused to mark anyone at all.

He hadn’t even crossed the river before. Well, except for…

He gasped, sitting straight up.

“The girl…” he whispered.

His father raised an eyebrow. “What was that?”

“The battle ten years ago, where I nearly died… a human girl tended my wounds. I…”

The alphas groaned in unison. “You marked a child?” Eidan asked. It was rarely done, only when the parent was needed and they did not wish to separate a family. A child on their own, though, was irresponsible. “What were you thinking?”

“I barely remember doing it!” he barked. “I was but a pup myself, brought back from the brink of death…”

He couldn’t even recall the girl’s face, remembering only the halo of honey hair and the scent of the rags she’d used to dress his injury… slightly floral and sweet.

“This was ten years ago, surely we would have found her wolf by now,” Karn said, his arms crossed and eyes down on his cup. “The humans are quick to banish the made.”