Pearl blinked too fast.
“Nothing.”
Karesh’s eyes lowered to her hidden arm.
Pearl smiled badly.
“Really.
Nothing happened.
I just bumped into a root.”
“A root with fingers.”
Her smile died.
Karesh waited.
Pearl swallowed.
She wanted to tell him.
For one weak moment, she wanted badly to tell him because he was strong and quiet and he listened even when she talked too much.
But if she told him, it could cause trouble.
Vasha would know.
Odette might be blamed.
Rauvan might get involved.
Pearl did not want to make everything worse when Odette had just woken up.
So she shook her head.
“It was nothing.”
Karesh’s face did not change, but his eyes became colder.
Pearl knew he did not believe her.
Before he could ask again, she saw Odette coming from the inner path with Rauvan.
Her whole face changed.
“Odette!”
Pearl ran before Karesh could stop her.
Odette barely had time to turn before Pearl reached her and threw her arms around her carefully, like she wanted to hug her but was scared she would break.
“You are awake,” Pearl said, and then burst into tears.
“You are awake.
I thought you would never wake up.
I kept asking and asking, and Karesh kept saying your body would choose, which was not comforting at all, but he said you were alive, and I believed him because he does not seem like he lies much.”
Odette stiffened at the sudden hug.
For a second she didn’t know what to do with her hands.
Then she slowly, awkwardly, wrapped one arm around Pearl’s back.
The smaller female was shaking.
“I am awake.”
Pearl cried harder.
Odette looked helplessly at Rauvan.
Rauvan looked like this had nothing to do with him.
Useless male.
More beasts were staring now.
Odette finally realized why.
She was clean.
That was all it took.
In Thorn Hollow, the females had known she was beautiful.
They hated her for it, avoided her for it, whispered about it behind her back.
But here, most of the war-pride had only seen a mud-covered, bloody, half-dead female dragged from a dying hollow.
Now they were seeing her properly.
Silver-white hair with black tips.
Long legs.
Proud face.
Amber eyes with a red ring around them.
A body too graceful for the bruises still fading on her skin.
Several males stared too long.
Rauvan’s scent cooled.
He didn’t say anything.
He didn’t have to.
The warning was clear in the way his posture shifted — shoulders slightly forward, head tilted just enough to show the line of his throat and the dark markings across it.
Mine to look at.
Not yours.
Those males looked away immediately.
One of them — a broad wolf male — didn’t look away fast enough.
Rauvan’s scent dropped several degrees in an instant.
It went cold and sharp, like fresh snow over blood.
The wolf male immediately dropped his eyes and turned away.
Her jaw ached from how hard she was clenching it.
She had hoped the hollow female would be plain at best.
Ugly at worst.
Something easy to dismiss.
But this?
Clean, sharp-featured, with that strange red ring in her eyes and silver-white hair falling down her back?
Vasha’s stomach twisted with something ugly.
Fine, she thought.
Let them all see how beautiful she is.
Let them watch when she fails.
Then she smiled.
Not because she was happy.
Because she had an idea.
Odette was beautiful.
Fine.
Let everyone see it.
Let everyone see the strange hollow female Rauvan had carried, washed, hidden, and taken to Maeruth.
Then let everyone see her fail.
Vasha stepped forward.
She made sure her voice carried.
“If she is awake, then she can prove she can feed herself.
Every new beast proves they belong on the road.
Unless…” Her smile turned sharp.
“Unless Rauvan wants to keep her like a pet now?”
The resting ground went quiet.
A few females exchanged uneasy glances.
One of them actually looked at Odette with something close to pity.
Odette looked at her.
Oh.
This one again.
Vasha smiled.
“Every new beast who walks with the pride proves they can survive the road.
Male or female.
Hollow or hunter.
Unless Odette is too precious now?”
Pearl’s face went pale.
Odette looked at Rauvan.
He said nothing.
That told her this was real.
A tradition.
A test.
Wonderful.
She had woken up, washed, met a strange hyena male, been dragged to a terrifying mother, learned her blood was broken or cursed or whatever nonsense that was, got stared at like a rare dead thing, and now she had to prove she could feed herself.
Amazing morning.
Vasha lifted her chin.
Her golden eyes glittered with something vicious.
“The wounded need bitter fever fruit, red resin pods, and scent-hiding leaves.
They grow past the black-root slope.
Bring them back before nightfall.
If you can.”
Pearl gasped and grabbed Odette’s arm without thinking, her fingers digging in.
“Black-root slope is dangerous,” she whispered.
“Even the hunters don’t go there alone.”
Odette did not answer.
She was still looking at Vasha.
A few females exchanged looks.
Some of the males went quiet too, and that told Odette enough.
Vasha had not chosen those things because they were needed.
She had chosen them because there was a chance Odette would not come back.
Myra smiled faintly.
“Do not worry.
If she is useful, she will return.”
Sira added, “And if she is not, the forest will decide.”
Vasha’s smile did not reach her eyes.
“Exactly.
The forest is fair.
It does not care how pretty you are when you’re bleeding.”
Pearl’s grip tightened.
Odette felt it.
For a moment, anger rose in her throat so sharply she almost tasted blood.
Vasha was not only trying to kill her.
She was doing it in front of everyone, sweetly, cleanly, with the pride’s own rules wrapped around her claws.
Odette looked at Rauvan.
So did everyone else.
Rauvan’s face did not change, but the air around him did.
The nearest males lowered their eyes first.
Then the females stopped whispering.
Even Vasha’s smile stiffened, because Rauvan’s gaze had moved to her face, and there was nothing soft in it.
He knew what she was doing.
He knew, and he was letting it stand.
That scared Odette more than if he had refused at once.
Rauvan finally spoke.
“Pearl goes too.”
Pearl’s ears flattened so hard they almost disappeared into her hair.
“Me?”
“You came with her.”
Pearl looked like she was about to faint, but she did not let go of Odette’s arm.
Odette turned to Rauvan.
“She is not trained.”
“Neither are you.”
That shut her up for half a breath.
She hated when he was right.
Rauvan looked at her.
His eyes were cold, but this time there was something harder beneath the coldness.
Expectation.
Judgment.
Warning.
“You want to walk with the pride.
Walk.”
His voice was calm, but everyone heard what sat behind it.
He was not protecting her from the test.
He was not saving her from Vasha.
He was putting her in front of the whole pride and forcing the answer out of her body.
Could she survive, or had she only been lucky?
Odette understood then.
If she refused, Vasha won.
If she went and died, Vasha still won.
And if she came back alive, every beast staring at her would have to swallow the truth.
Her fear did not disappear.
It only turned sharp.
“I will go,” Odette said.