The cart rolled up the hill at dawn, and my father did not say a single word to me the whole way.
I sat in the back with my satchel between my feet and watched the Vey gate get bigger.
The Vey gate was iron and old stone, and it sat on the hill like it had been there before the roads were.
Two guards stood at the posts. Neither of them looked at me like a person.
Rusk: You're late, Hobart.
The Beta's name was Rusk. He was built like a door and he looked at me the way a man looks at freight.
My father climbed down and had his hat off before his boots hit the ground.
Hobart: The road was bad, Beta. We came as quick as the cart would allow.
Hobart: Tamsin. Get down and stand straight.
Rusk took the paper and read it, then walked a slow circle around me.
Rusk: The paper's here. The debt's here. The girl's here. That's the whole business, so stop bowing.
Rusk: She's thin. Alpha wants a wife, not a fence post.
Hobart: She's strong. She works. She can cook and count and ride.
Rusk: I didn't ask you to sell her twice.
Rusk laid the paper on the tailboard and handed my father a pen.
His hand shook so hard he had to hold his own wrist to sign.
He had signed my brother's fate in his study without shaking at all.
I watched his name dry on the page, and something in me went quiet and hard.
Rusk: She belongs to Vey now. If she runs, the debt comes back doubled, and the boy goes to the council.
Hobart: Understood. Understood.
Rusk: Say it to her, not to me.
My father finally looked at me. Not sorry. Just tired, like I was a chore he had finished.
Hobart: Do as you're told and your brother eats.
He climbed back onto the cart and flicked the reins.
The cart rolled back down the hill, and I watched until it was small.
Not one look back. Not even that.
Rusk: Alpha's not gentle, and he's not fond of liars. So don't lie in his hall, and don't lie in his bed.
My face went hot and my hands went cold at the same time.
Rusk: Go on. He's waiting. He doesn't like waiting.
The gate opened with a noise like a knife being drawn out of a sheath.
I picked up my satchel and walked in by myself, because nobody was going to carry anything for me again.
At the top of the hall steps stood a tall man in a dark coat, half his face scarred pale in the morning light.
He looked at me for one long second. My stomach did something that was not only fear.
Then he turned and went inside.
The gate shut behind me with a sound I felt in my chest.
I had walked into the wolf's house on my own two feet. Now I had to find out what kind of wolf he was.