Chapter 9
958 Words
Sera POV
The Nightfang council hall was older than the pack house.
You could easily tell it when you walked in. The ceiling was low and dark with age and the long table in the centre had been there so long it had grooves worn into the wood where hands had rested for decades of hard conversations. The walls had no decoration except a single Nightfang banner at the far end.
I liked it immediately I walked in.
Ralph had told me about the meeting two days before. A trade negotiation with two neighbouring packs over eastern border routes. Routine on the surface. Underneath it was the meeting for positions that get established and people decide what they think of you and those decisions tend to stick.
He didn't tell me I had to come.
He didn't tell me I didn't have to either.
He just mentioned the time and the location and left the information sitting there for me to do what I wanted with.
That's Ralph for you, he wouldn't want to make things inconvenient for you.
I spent the next two days in the fortress library learning what I need to know about the pack.
I arrived at the hall before anyone else.
I wanted to see the room before the room saw me, I mean before everyone arrival. I walked the length of the table and noted where the sight lines fell and which seats had the light behind them and which ones faced it.
I chose a seat at Ralph's left.
Pack members filtered in over the next twenty minutes. Most of them greeted me with the same matter-of-fact ease I had been finding all through Nightfang territory. A nod. A morning. An absence of careful politeness that means people have been told to be nice to you.
Then Dabby walked in.
I knew who she was before anyone said her name. She had the bearing of a woman who has been the most competent person in most rooms for a long time and knows it and has stopped pretending otherwise. Somewhere in her fifties. Silver threading through dark hair she wore pulled back tight. Her eyes moved around the room and catalogued everything in them in about four seconds.
Those eyes landed on me.
She sat down directly across the table.
She smiled. Polite and thin and not quite reaching the careful eyes.
Ralph came in last. He sat at the head of the table and the meeting started and I watched and listened and said nothing for the first forty minutes because I was still learning the room.
Dabby presented the trade figures. She was good. Thorough and precise and she knew the numbers, which signify that she have been working with them long enough that they feel like a norm to her.
The representative from the eastern pack pushed back on the border route proposal. He wanted the northern pass kept open through winter which would cost Nightfang in patrol resources. The back and forth went in circles for twenty minutes.
Then Dabby looked at me politely for a challenge without actually making it look challenging
"Perhaps our new Luna would prefer to observe today," she said. "These negotiations have a long history and the context can take time to understand."
The table shifted slightly, everyone eyes are now on me waiting to see what next.
I looked at Dabby.
She looked back. Waiting for the graceful retreat. The modest smile and the small nod and the step backward that would tell her everything she needed to know about who I was.
I let the moment sit for exactly one breath.
Then I opened the folder I had brought.
"The northern pass negotiation has been ongoing for three seasons," I said. My voice was bold, "Nightfang has made the same concession offer twice and had it declined twice. The eastern pack's insistence on winter access isn't about trade efficiency. Their southern storage capacity is down forty percent since the flooding last spring. They need the route kept open because they have a supply problem they haven't disclosed at this table yet."
Everyone kept silence which was a sign they were into my observation.
The eastern representative's gave obvious face and I couldn't tell what that means.
I continued.
"If Nightfang offers a joint storage arrangement through the cold months in exchange for a formal route-sharing agreement with fixed patrol cost distribution, you solve their actual problem and secure the route on your terms rather than theirs. They'll take it. They need it more than they're showing."
I closed the folder and the table was completely quiet.
Ralph had not moved. He was looking at the eastern representative with the mild patience of a man who already knows how the conversation ends.
The eastern representative cleared his throat.
"A joint storage arrangement," he said slowly, "could be worth discussing."
Dabby was looking at me with something more honest.
The meeting ran another thirty minutes and ended with the framework of an agreement that Nightfang's previous position had not been able to reach in three seasons of trying.
As people gathered their papers and pushed back chairs Dabby stood and walked around the table. She stopped in front of me.
I stood and waited.
She looked at me for a moment "You prepared," she said.
"Yes I did," I said.
She nodded once and walked out.
I exhaled.
Ralph appeared at my shoulder. We walked out together into the corridor and his voice was low when he spoke.
"How did you knew about the flooding," he asked.
"My father's trade network covers the eastern territor
ies," I said. "Information travels to Redfang."
He was quiet for a moment.
"I know," he said.
- Writer
