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Demetrius stood. “Sterling of SnowFang challenged Alan of FrostFur forsilveringWinter. They made it known to all of us what caused the challenge, and we all know what preceded it. Do not try to make yesterday about something it wasn’t. It didn’t go the way you—or most of this Council—wanted it to go. Accept it.”
Murmurs and nods. The RedRise Alpha—sitting on a couch with his mate, because the RedRise were like that—nodded, cheek in his hand, one ankle over one knee. “Alan was an idiot for using silver, although can you really blame him for what he thought would be an easy solution to the problem?”
“A problem you lot convinced yourselves existed,” Garrett commented.
The Council bristled about the pesky human speaking out of turn, but nobody wanted to chastise him for it. It’d acknowledge he had something to say.
Demetrius waited until the Council had collectively smoothed their pelts before he continued with his presentation. “One of our scouts, who we had assigned to observe the Mortcombe residence in Clare, alerted us of a brewing attack. We arrived too late. The wolves were not FrostFur, as many have suspected. They were a mixture of local wolves—from the unofficial pack that calls itself IceEar—and enforcers sent by the GranitePaw.”
Whispers through the crowd. Kyle did not react.
“Why would the GranitePaw risk something like that?” the RedRise Alpha asked.
“Because Sterling and Winter declined an offer to join GranitePaw.”
“That makes no sense,” the RedRise said, almost bored.
Demetrius waved it off. “That detail does not matter, nor are the GranitePaw’s actions the subject of this meeting. Garrett has made it known to me that while the GranitePaw violated his human privilege, he and his son will deal with the GranitePaw in their own way, in their own time. My point was that the GranitePaw violated a human’s privilege and courtesy territory. And had AmberHowl not arrived, would likely have faced no consequences for the transgression.”
Kyle moved to say something but the RedRise Luna said, “Your actions are not before the Council. You’ve been accused, it’s been acknowledged, but not presented. Go on, AmberHowl. But hurry to the point, please.”
“The point is our failings as Elders,” Demetrius said. “Yes, AmberHowl took Winter, saved her life, presented her under a new identity as Summer to protect her from GranitePaw, SilverPaw, and FrostFur. We presented her as Summer, First Beta Searle’s mate. It was an open secret in AmberHowl. At least a dozen of my pack knew the truth, with many more suspecting. The FrostFangare also knew she was alive, and in fact, she went to Norway a month ago.”
Demetrius nodded to Mikkel and Kaarina, who gave himleave us out of thislooks.
Demetrius gestured with his hands and continued his deliberate speech. “Our species is dying, Elder Council. And we, as Elders, have failed to see the thousand cuts we bleed from. It is too easy for us to fail. It is too easy for us to point to the First Law as an excuse to not enforce the Fifth. And it isveryeasy for us to do this without question or challenge. Now, I will move on to the most glaring examples of how we trade the Fifth Law for the First.”
Marcella passed Demetrius three scrolls.
I closed my eyes for a moment.
“These,” Demetrius held the scrolls in his hands, “are scrolls from the hand of Elder Luna Autumn of SilverPaw.”
Daniel had jumped to his feet and was white, then turned red. My grandfather also went as white as snow.
“This is what you were looking for,” Demetrius told him. “This is what you feared existed. And they sayexactlywhat you fear they say.”
“I—” Daniel started to say.
“I am speaking.”
Now the Elders started to shift and get interested.
Demetrius, speaking slowly and deliberately, outlined the series of events that had led to this moment. How my father had summoned Sterling, the brideprice, how I had dragged AmberHowl into it, and the price AmberHowl demanded for their help. He also stated that he had deliberately removed the mating acknowledgement from the brideprice packet and destroyed it.
So he was just going toadmitit? That was a new one.
Demetrius moved on to Anise, Jerron destroying the research, the damage to the Archives, and the first safe deposit box, all while Daniel had permitted my brother to do these things. The Council broke out in snaps and shouts at the damage to the Archives, demanding to know why Daniel hadn’t reported it sooner, while Daniel denied all of it.
But Demetrius ground it deeper by revealing Jerron had still been Alpha at FrostFur. He also revealed how and why I’d sought out Spring, and that Spring had given me my mother’s journals, the key to the second box, and ultimately, the scrolls. He made it clear that the scrolls and journals had been sealed under my mother’s seals, and untampered with since leaving her hands.
Marcella read each of the scrolls my mother had left.
A bird tweeted, then shut up.
I closed my eyes. Sterling pulled my hand to his lips and kissed it, while Jun and Cye gasped.
Demetrius looked at each Elder in turn. “The BlizzardFall war wasn’t over territory. It was over Autumn. But the SilverPaw and FrostFur were too ashamed to admit that and instead made up lies about silver and firearms to justify their butchery. And Rodero, the Chronicler, committed that version to our official history. As easily as this Council, not a year later, negotiated a deal so a wolf would never be obligated to acknowledge his true mate or the existence of the son he sired on her, or to face any punishment for abandoning them. That she-wolf and her son were stigmatized and abandoned. As easily as I, twenty-five years later, erased the evidence Sterling and Winter are true mates. And I can do it, not because the Law says I can, but because none of you will stop me. Even if a small, no-prestige wolf was able to find their way to you, even if they pled their case, you’d hesitate to bring it to this Council. How many times have you looked the other way when one of your peers violates the Fifth Law?”
