Page 71 of Wolf's Reckoning
We walked to the hallowed ground, where I’d stood only the night before, getting an ash mark carved into my skin. Like then, a fire was already burning, but this time it was to celebrate the end of something, not the beginning.
A pyre—not for a body, but for a legacy.
The druid stepped into the glow of the flames and raised their arms. The smoke curled around us like the mountain was exhaling.
“By the Goddess Luna’s will and the Hollow’s law,” the druid intoned, “we bear witness to the passing of one leader and to the binding of the next.”
They turned to Wolfe. “The ash marks grief, but it also binds memory to duty. The flame consumes the past, but it also lights the path ahead.”
They reached into their satchel and withdrew a shard ofblackened pine—charred wood from a long-dead tree at the heart of the Hollow.
“This is your mark,” they told me. “The final rite of mourning. You carry it until the next death…or until you no longer need reminding.” They pressed the shard into my palm, and it burned—hot, sharp, a bite of pain that grounded me more than any speech ever could.
When I opened my fist, seeing only ash, the druid nodded.
“Then it is done,” they said. “You are no longerjustthe alpha’s daughter.” They turned toward the fire. “You are the flame that follows.”
The ash still pulsed in my hand, warmth radiating through my skin like a second heartbeat. The druid’s words hung in the air, thick with the weight of history, as the fire snapped and hissed behind us.
But they weren’t finished.
They turned slowly, robes catching the orange light, and faced Wolfe. He hadn’t moved—broad, still, unblinking. He watched the druid like a predator, unsure whether to trust the hand being extended.
The druid tilted their head. “And you,Wolfe.”
The tone of their words struck like a bell.What was that undercurrent?
Wolfe didn’t flinch, but I saw it in the way his shoulders were squared. The way the firelight flickered in his eyes.
“You returned not as a claimant, but as a servant,” the druid said. “You did not demand to lead the Hollow. You earned the right to take it. Through action. Through defense. Through sacrifice.” They stepped forward. “Our laws are clear. The Hollow requires a leader. Not just bybloodline, but by Luna’s will. And the Goddess, it seems, has chosen her leader for this pack.”
I saw Wolfe’s jaw twitch when the druid saidseems.
The druid reached into their robes once more, producing a band of old, weathered leather stitched with silver thread and marked with a carved emblem I recognized instantly—the Blueridge Hollow crest.
“This was your father’s,” the druid said, speaking to me, but their eyes never left Wolfe. “Passed to him by his father. It does not sit on blood alone. It rests on the one who leads.”
They extended it to Wolfe. A challenge in offering’s clothing. Wolfe didn’t hesitate. He stepped forward and took it in silence. The leather disappeared into his grip like it had belonged there all along.
“Then let the Hollow witness,” the druid called, voice rising. “Alpha Malric is gone. His flame has passed. And in its wake stands Wolfe of Blueridge Hollow. By the rite of bond, the right of might, and the will of the Goddess Luna—so it is spoken, so it is bound.”
A low, collective howl rose behind us, causing me to jump. I hadn’t known they were there. Pack members tucked in the shadows, spread throughout the woods, answering the call.
It wasn’t celebration. It wasallegiance.
My pulse thundered in my throat. Wolfe turned his head toward me, looking at the gathered pack, the firelight turning his eyes gold.
We stood side by side, and I knew Blueridge Hollow would never be the same.
Chapter 18
Wolfe
The leather bandwas still in my hand. Old, worn, but heavy in a way no strip of hide should be. It smelled of smoke.
Of history.
Of blood.
