The Spring Between Us

Chapter 77: Mira's Betrayal

I did not move.

The yard was silent and Inge was standing in the middle of it with her hands folded and her face grey and the word Mira was still hanging in the air.

"Say it again," I said.

Inge's chin came up. "Mira put the wolfsbane in the barrel. She took it out of her own jar and she put it in the barrel and she gave the barrel to Sten's warriors. I know because I was in the kitchen that night and I saw her go out with the jar under her apron." She looked at me. "I have been carrying it for two weeks. I told the Council hall it was Wren because the Council man told me to and because I was frightened of him. But it was Mira and it was always Mira."

The yard made a sound.

Mira was not in the yard. Mira was in her hut behind the well with the door shut.

I went.

I went out of the gate and round the pack house and down the slope to the hut with the crooked stovepipe and the smell of sage, and the whole pack came behind me and stood in the yard and did not say anything. I did not knock. I opened the door and went in.

Mira was sitting at her table with her hands in her lap and her bag on the floor beside her and her round face grey. She looked up when I came in and she did not look surprised.

"Luna," she said. "I heard the vote."

"Did you hear what Inge said?"

"I heard it." Mira's hands were still in her lap. "The whole canyon heard it. She was shouting it in the yard."

I stood in front of her.

"Mira," I said. "Did you put the wolfsbane in the barrel?"

Mira looked at me for a long moment. Then she said, "Yes."

The hut was very quiet. The kettle on the stove began to sing and she got up and took it off the heat and set it down and sat down again and did not look at me.

"Tell me why," I said.

"I did not know it was going into the barrel." Mira's voice was steady and it was not the voice of a woman who was frightened. "I knew it was going out of this hut. That is what I knew. Ruth came to me four days before your mother died and she asked me for wolfsbane and I told her no. And then she came back the next day and she said the Council man wanted it and that if I did not give it to her there would be a healer from the Council in this canyon by the end of the week and she would not be the healer of this pack anymore and she would be put out of the canyon with her sister's family." Mira's hands were in her lap and they were still. "So I gave her a packet. A small one. Enough to make a wolf sick. I told myself it was a small thing and that it would not kill anyone and that I was protecting my sister's family."

"And then my mother died."

"And then your mother died." Mira's voice cracked. "And I found the wolfsbane in her body and I knew what I had done and I did not tell you. I told you there were traces and I did not tell you how much and I did not tell you that I was the one who had put the poison in Ruth's hands. I have been carrying it for a month and I have been sitting in this hut every night thinking about it and I have not had the courage to say it."

The door opened behind me and Sten came in and Berik behind him and Cal behind Berik.

"Luna," Sten said. "The pack is in the yard. They have heard what Inge said and they want to know."

"They are going to know." I did not take my eyes off Mira. "Mira. The packet you gave Ruth. Was it the packet Ruth gave me the night she sent me to poison the Çöl spring?"

Mira's face changed.

"Yes," she said. "It was the same packet. Ruth gave it back to me after you poured it out and she told me to put it back in the jar and I put it back in the jar." She looked up. "And then two weeks ago Ruth was dead and the Council man was in the hall and there was a vote and a warrior was dead on the south rim and I was frightened. And I took the jar out of the box and I put a handful in the barrel and I took it out to the warriors who had turned their backs on you."

"Why?"

"Because I wanted the Council man to see that the pack was not safe. I wanted him to see that wolves were dying and that the canyon was coming apart and that the Council would have to leave. I thought if a wolf of this pack died of wolfsbane in the creek bed then the Council would see it and the Council would pull the Council man out and the inquiry would end." She put her hand over her mouth and took it away again. "And then Arne died. Helle's husband. A man with children. And I sat in this hut with the jar in my hands and I knew I had killed him."

I stood in the hut with my hands at my sides.

"You put the wolfsbane in the barrel," I said. "You put it in the barrel and a man died and you let me stand in the hall and accuse Wren and you let Inge stand up in the Council hall and name her. And you sat in this hut and said nothing."

"I could not say it." Mira's face was wet now. "I have been the healer of this pack for thirty years. My mother was a healer in the Çöl pack and her mother before her. If I had said it in front of the pack I would have been put out of the canyon and my sister's family with me. And I was frightened and I was ashamed and I told myself that it was Ruth who put the poison in my hands and that it was the Council man who made Ruth do it and that it was not my fault." She looked at me. "And it was my fault. Every bit of it."

I turned and went out of the hut.

The whole pack was in the yard. The sun was going down over the mesa and the lanterns were being lit and the faces of forty wolves were turned toward the door of the healer's hut.

I stood on the step.

"The healer of this pack has confessed," I said. "She gave wolfsbane to Ruth four weeks ago and she put wolfsbane in the barrel that killed Arne. She is not a murderer. She is a frightened old woman who has been a healer for thirty years and who was used by a Council envoy and a Beta and who made a choice and a man died of it."

The yard was silent.

"Mira will stand in front of the Council at the autumn gathering and she will say all of it and the Council will rule on it. Until then she will stay in her hut and she will not leave it and there will be a warrior on the door." I looked at the yard. "And I am going to say one more thing and then we will go into the hall. I have been betrayed by a wolf I trusted. Not a warrior and not a Beta. The healer who has been in this pack since before I was born. And I am not going to stand here and tell you it does not hurt, because it does. But I am going to tell you what I am going to do about it. I am going to take her to the capital and I am going to put her in front of the Council and I am going to let the truth come out in the open hall where nobody can be bought and nobody can be frightened and nobody can hide. And then I am going to go and find the grave of the first Luna, because the Council has been lying about where she is buried for forty years and I am going to find out why."

The yard stirred.

Sten said, "Luna. What grave?"

"The Council's healer has found a discrepancy in the burial records," I said. "The first Luna is not in the grave the Council recorded. There is a false stone in the Çöl graveyard with a stranger's name on it. And I am going to the autumn gathering with the first volume and the stone and the false stone and the record, and I am going to put them in the open hall and ask the Council why it has been hiding the grave of the woman it murdered for forty years."

Cal said, "Then we go to the graveyard tonight."

"No," I said. "We go to the graveyard tonight and we take the Council's healer and the clerk and a lantern. But first I am going to go and put a warrior on Mira's door."

I went back to the hut.

Mira was sitting at the table where I had left her and she had not moved.

"I am going to the capital," I said. "You are coming with me and you are going to stand in the open hall and say all of it. And I am going to do a thing I have not done since the spring." I looked at her. "I am going to trust you one more time."

Mira looked up.

"Why?" she said.

"Because you are the only wolf in this canyon who knows what wolfsbane does to a body and where it hides and how much it takes and what it looks like when it has been in a cup. And because the Council's healer has found a false stone in a graveyard and I need a healer who has been in this canyon for thirty years and knows every grave in it." I put my hand on the table. "But Mira. If you lie to me again. If you hold back one thing. If you do not tell me everything you know about every grave and every body and every cup in this canyon. Then I will put you in front of the Council myself and I will not say a word in your favor."

Mira put her hand over mine.

"I will not lie to you again," she said. "I will tell you everything."

"Then get your bag," I said. "We are going to the graveyard."