Lydia looks at the binders, then at Cassidy, then at the ground. Something in her shoulders releases slightly.
“For anyone who still has doubts, Cassidy’s presence has only helped the pack,” I state, following up Brynn’s speech. “And she is my fated mate. Fate doesn’t make mistakes.” I glance sideways at her, and we share a subtle smile.
“If you wish to revise your vote, do so now,” I’ll count the ballots and announce the results at dusk,” Brynn says, concluding the session.
Brynn setsthe last ballot aside and leans against her staff as she stands.
Cassidy grips my hand tightly, her shoulders tense, her teeth worrying her lower lip.
"Twenty-three in favor," Brynn says. "Four opposed."
I thought the vote would be close, but Gideon’s betrayal helped Cassidy’s case a lot more than I thought.
My wolf leaps to the surface, ready to howl his victory, but I hold him back, and I settle for throwing my arm around Cassidy’s shoulders in a side hug.
Cassidy stands beside me absolutely still, but when my arm goes around her, she buckles and leans against me with a large sigh of relief.
"Dr. Cassidy Ellis is recognized as the Blackmoore Pack Luna,” Brynn announces.
She looks at the council and raises her staff once, and the council kneels.
All of them. The younger members first, dropping to one knee with the clean certainty of people who made their decision days ago. Then Marek, deliberate and without hesitation. Then Lydia, whose expression is still complicated but whose knee hits the ground without pause. Then Reid, Tomas, the Calloway twins, the rest of the council in sequence.
Last, Ronan. He holds the standing position longer than everyone else, just long enough to make the point, and then he kneels. Slowly, and without warmth, but he kneels.
Cassidy smiles and bows her head respectfully. We look at each other, her eyes deep and raw, and our bond does something it hasn't done before it deepens into something more than desire, something rooted in true affection.
I turn toward the center of the gathered wolves and raise both our joined hands above us.
"Cassidy Ellis," I say, loud enough for the outer ring, loud enough for the trees. "My fated mate. My chosen partner. My Luna."
The howl starts at the inner ring and moves outward in a wave—council members, enforcers, younger wolves, elders, the full assembled pack taking it up in a single, rising, unanimousvoice that breaks open the evening air and rolls up into the mountains. The sound of a pack when something has been settled in the bones of it, when the question everyone has been carrying finally has its answer.
"Luna," I say, quietly, for her and not for anyone else, taking her in my arms in an embrace.
She pulls away with a laugh. "Don't make it weird.”
I almost laugh. "Too late."
The howl runs its course and settles, and the clearing comes back to itself, and Cassidy Ellis, wildlife biologist, scientist, and the most stubborn person I have ever met in thirty-four years on this earth, is a core part of my pack's ritual ring with a Luna Braid down the left side of her face and both feet on the ground and doesn't look even slightly overwhelmed.
She looks exactly like someone who belongs here.
Because she does.
37
CASSIDY
The council restructuring takes several days.
Long, working days, filled with long sessions at the central table in the war room, stack of pack law binders, cold coffee going unnoticed at elbows, and the fatigue of building something carefully.
I sit at Alden's left through most of it, which feels strange for approximately at first, and then stops feeling strange because there's too much work to spend energy on how things feel.
The Kieran trial procedure is the first thing I push for.
"Pack law precedent on internal treason defaults to Alpha judgment," Marek says, during the second morning session. "The Alpha renders a decision, the council witnesses it."
