Chapter 41

I had watched Henry and his horse race through the finish line before the gravity of it all sank in. I wanted to leave. I wanted to run as fast as my feet would carry me—and I did. The crowd was behind me, and so was everyone else. Somehow, the noise in my head stilled, and the dread in my bones stilled. In the emptiness of the field I had run to, I had found peace.

This was the farthest I had ever been. My wolf had taken me here when we ran away. It was the edge of the second farm, the one on the eastern side by the small creek that passed the meadow, the pack house about thirty-eight kilometers behind me, and so was the festival.

The noonday sun was right above my head. The meadow’s flowers were bursting with blues, pinks, and bright reds. Butterflies, insects, and little birds of all kinds flitted about. It felt perfect.

I lay down in the middle of it all,