Chapter 167: Childhood Bride

Maddie Pov

The gravel on the ridge was cold against my back and the tiny sparks from the iron piece were totally gone. I sat up slow and my head felt very light. Calix had his hands on my shoulders and his face was right in front of mine.

"Maddie, breathe," Calix said and he rubbed his palms against my skin to warm me up. "Just look at me and keep your eyes open. You went completely white for a minute and your skin is freezing."

"The candles," I said and my teeth clapped together hard. "I saw the candles by the altar. There was a big stone table and a book with a gold chain on the cover. My mother was standing right there beside the king."

"The old man is over there," Calix said and he pointed his finger toward the grey rocks. "He has been sitting there watching you since the light cracked open. He has not moved an inch."

Kai was sitting in the dirt three feet away. His long grey coat was torn near the shoulder from the blast and his silver hair was messy, but his grey eyes were totally wide open. He was staring at me like he had never seen me before.

"You saw the old king. He stood right across from you with the bone knife and he took the copper cup from your mother's hands to catch the drops."

"I saw my mother too," I said and I pushed off the gravel to get to my feet. "She was holding my hand and she made me drop my blood on the stone page. I remember the smell of the ink and the cold air in the big timber hall."

"Do not stand up yet," Calix said and he kept his palm flat against my shoulder blade. "Your legs are still shaking. Just sit on the rock until the dizziness goes away."

"I am fine, Calix. I can stand up on my own feet and look at him."

"She needs to hear the rest of it, young Alpha," Kai said and he rubbed the dry ash off his knees. "She only remembers the beginning of the night because she was too small to understand the trouble. Her mother did not take her to the peaks to hurt her or throw her away."

"Shut your mouth, Kai." Calix growled the words and his voice got very thick in his throat. "You have said enough words on this ridge tonight. We are taking her back to the cabins and if you follow us down the path I will use the iron on you myself."

"I want to hear it. If my mother put my blood on that contract, I want to know why she did it before the winter gets here."

"It was the winter of the great freeze," Elder Thomas said and he walked closer with the torch flame. "Every pack in the north was hunting for the white fur line. They wanted to clean the valley out completely so they could take the timber land and use the water for their own herds."

"They wanted us dead. They wanted the line gone so nobody could claim the high ridge."

"They did," Kai said and he stood up from the dirt and shook the dust off his shins. "Your mother knew she could not fight twelve pack leaders alone, Maddie. She came to my father's house because the peak wolves had the most spears. She knelt in the snow and asked for three hundred guards to protect your borders so you would see the spring."

"So she sold me to you. She gave you my name so your pack would come down the hill."

"She saved your life," Kai said. "My father agreed to protect the white fur line on one condition. You had to be promised to our house to keep the bloodline inside our territory. If we were going to lose our own wolves in your woods, we wanted the power tied to our name."

"She was seven years old," Calix said and he stepped right between me and the old man. "You took a child to a stone altar and forced her to sign a paper. That is not a contract, Kai. That is a theft and the valley does not respect it."

"I did not force anyone." Kai did not move his feet as he spoke. "Her mother brought her to the circle. She signed the parchment with her own blood because she wanted her daughter to live until the spring. She wrote the letter herself and sealed the box with her own iron ring."

"That is the letter I found in the iron box," I said.

"Yes," Kai said. "The letter says to tell you the truth when the gold light wakes up. Look at the paper in your boot."

I reached into my boot leather and my fingers hit the dry page. I pulled it out and my hand was shaking so much the edges crinkled loud.

"There are no wedding words here," I said and I held the paper toward the torch.

"Turn it over, Maddie," Kai said.

I turned the thick paper over under the orange light of Thomas's torch. There were dark red marks on the bottom of the sheet that looked like dried blood. There were two names written in the old script. My mother’s name was on the left side and Kai’s name was on the right side.

"This is a northern contract," Elder Thomas said and he leaned his head down to read the lines. "It has the seal of the Twelve Alphas."

"It is a binding contract," Kai said.

"We have the gold mate bond," Calix said and he grabbed my left hand tight. "The valley earth gave her to me. Your old contract does not mean anything now."

"The mate bond is for wolves, young Alpha," Kai said and his thin lips turned up into a small smile. "It belongs to your shifts. But the law of the high peaks is for the human soul. The contract was never broken by a court."

"We will break it tonight," Calix said.

"You cannot break it with a knife," Kai said and he took one slow step toward the edge of the steep cliff. "The old king died that spring but the ceremony was already finished according to the ancient law. The Twelve Alphas signed the stone book before the snow melted."

"What does that mean for me?" I asked.

"It means the marriage was never dissolved, Maddie," Kai said and his voice stayed completely flat against the wind. "Under the ancient law of this entire region, you are technically my wife right now. You belong to the North Peaks and you belong to me."

"She belongs to WolfTrail," Calix shouted.

"The stone book says different," Kai said.

The paper slipped out of my fingers and fell into the grey dirt. Calix roared loud and his body launched itself across the stone circle toward the old man’s throat, but Kai shifted into a large grey wolf before the claws could hit his skin. He jumped over the side of the steep cliff and his shape disappeared into the dark pine trees below.

I stood by the flat stone and the wind felt very cold against my face.