The Moon Choosing happens once in a life, on the flat stones above the tree line, under a moon so close and so white that every wolf in the ring casts two shadows. You have been standing in the middle of those stones for a long time. Willem said the word no in front of four hundred wolves, and then he walked out of the ring, and the stones are still ringing with it.
The pack does not move. Somewhere behind you a child is crying and being hushed.
Then the black wolf comes through the crowd, and the crowd gets out of its way, and behind the wolf comes the Alpha King with the crown on his head and his robe open over a bare wet chest, silver rings catching the moonlight.
"He said no,"
Corban Wolfhart says, loud enough for the whole ring, and he does not even look at Willem, who is halfway to the trees.
"That is a word a wolf only gets to use once."
He stops in front of you. Up close the scar across his throat is a silver line, old, and the wolf sits down at his hip and watches you with the same gold eyes he has.
"The law, then, since he has spent his word. A rejected mate leaves a claim open, and an open claim goes to the crown."
He says that flat, to the ring, and then he drops his voice until only you can hear it.
"I am claiming you. Say it where the pack can hear, or say nothing and I will walk back the way I came."