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The Alpha rejected me in front of four hundred wolves while I was carrying his child. I had known for thirteen days, and I came to the ceremony with the words ready behind my teeth, a carved wolf in my pocket, and a plan to tell him after the oath. Then Elara walked onto the dais in a white fur cloak, and Merek opened the Luna ledger, and I understood that the words would stay where they were. The great hall smelled of tallow and wet wool. Frost had grown across the windows in white ferns, and the fires did not reach the center of the room. Four hundred wolves stood in their winter coats, and every one was looking at me. Roman sat in the Alpha's chair with his hands on the arms. Elara stood at his right in the white cloak, and the Luna silver was already at her throat. Merek stood at his left with the ledger open in both hands. I had washed my grey dress twice and slept in rags. It was the best thing I owned. Now it felt like something I had stolen. "Rhea of the lower village," Roman said. "You are not my mate." The hall went quiet. The bond pulled once, hard enough to lift me onto my toes, and then something inside my chest tore. The silver mark on my wrist went cold. The pain came up my arm, and I put my hand on a chair to keep my feet. "The healer's ledger says you cannot give the pack an heir," Roman said. "Blackmoor has not had a child in twenty years, and I need a Luna who can." His hand tightened on the arm of the chair. His wolf looked out of his eyes, gold swallowing grey, then looked away. Two years ago he had kissed me in the herb room and said I smelled like rain. Then Merek told him I was barren, and he stopped coming, and the pack began to talk about a northern bride. "I am sorry," Elara said. "The pack needs a Luna who can give it children, and you understand why." "Your father holds the north pass and forty riders, and that is what the pack needs," I said. Elara smiled. "Your father held no land and no riders. What did you think would happen?" "I thought the Moon did not lie, and I was wrong about two things." The hall stirred, someone laughed at the back, and someone else told them to be quiet. A woman in the front row said, "She was always too thin." The words went through me like a stone through water. "The ledger is clear," Merek said. He was a small man with soft hands and a careful voice, and he had been healer for thirty years. "The Moon does not lie." He held the book open so the pack could see the page. My name was at the top in his neat black hand, and under it the word that had ended my life: barren. Merek had told me that six months ago. Roman had stopped coming to the herb room after that. Then, thirteen days ago, I missed my blood, and the herb woman put her hand on my belly and told me I was carrying a child. I could have said it. The words were there, small and bright: I am pregnant, and I have known for thirteen days, and the healer is wrong. If I said it, Roman would come down from the dais. Elara would step back, and Merek would open his mouth and find nothing to say. I did not say it. If I said it, Roman would keep me because of the child and not because of me. The pack would call me a liar, and Elara would still stand at his right. I had spent two years loving a man who did not choose me. I would not spend the rest of my life as his duty. "Did you know?" I asked Merek. "I know what the ledger says," he said, and that was all he would say. "That is not an answer to what I asked." "Do not make this harder than it already is," Roman said. "I am not the one making it hard." The hall waited. His eyes were on me, and his wolf was there behind them, and for a moment I thought he would come down from the dais. "Have you anything to say before the pack?" he asked. "No," I said. "Then it is done." His voice was flat. "You will leave Blackmoor before dawn." "You should go, because the north road is open and the pack will have an heir by spring," Elara said. "The ceremony is closed," Merek said. Roman came down from the dais. The hall went quiet again as he stopped in front of me, close enough to smell the pine smoke in his coat. He took my wrist and turned it over. The silver mark lay against my skin, pale as frost. "You will not speak of the bond again, and you will not come back," he said. He let go. The mark did not fade, and it went cold, like a coin left out in the snow. I understood that the Moon had heard him. He turned his back and climbed the dais, and the pack closed around him like water. That was when I saw the page. Merek had left the ledger open on the table beside the Alpha's chair. One page stood out from the rest, whiter than the others, the ink still black at the edges. My name was on it, and beside my name, in the same neat hand, Merek had written the date of my examination. It was the day Roman stopped coming to the herb room. But Merek had not examined me that day. He came a week later, locked the stillroom door, and told me I was barren before he touched my belly. The page was a lie. It had been written before the lie was needed. I walked toward the doors, and the pack parted for me. The guard on the other side opened one, and the cold came in like a blade. On my way past the table, I took the page. No one saw, because Merek was speaking to Elara's father and Roman was looking at the fire. The paper was thin and warm from the room, and I folded it once and pushed it into my sleeve. The yard was full of snow, and the wind had covered the tracks from the gate. I went to the room behind the kitchens and put my few things in a cloth: a comb, a knife, the carved wolf, and the herbs I used for fever. I left the dress on the bed. The gate guard was old. He looked at my bundle and did not ask. "The road is bad tonight, so keep to the pines." "If the bell rings for me," I said, "do not open it again." He looked at me for a long moment. Then he opened the postern and stepped aside. I walked out onto the north road. The pines stood black against the snow, and behind me Blackmoor keep burned against the sky. I put my hand on my belly. There was nothing to feel yet, not really, but I felt it anyway. Then the bell began to ring, one stroke, then two, the alarm bell they rang for fire or war, and behind it a man's voice shouting my name. I ran.