Chapter 387: A Hufflepuff in the Wolf Den [bonus]
Around eleven the sun finally hauled itself over the eastern hills. Wind funneled through the mouth of the valley and rattled a few ruined doorframes.
The commotion had drawn the werewolves out of the broken houses. They emerged in twos and threes, keeping their distance, each standing in his own patch of ground. Dozens of pairs of clouded yellow eyes fixed on the clearing. Nobody made a sound.
Every werewolf in the mining village watched the same thing. Their leader, Fenrir Greyback, standing before a black-haired boy, not daring to twitch.
The young werewolf came around from behind him, head down, testing the ground with his toes before committing each step, eyes flicking sideways to Greyback again and again. Watching the shoulders, the hands, checking whether those claws showed any sign of rising.
A wary animal, braced to take a blow or duck one.
Nobody was born that cowed. The place itself broke in every newcomer the same way.
Werewolf hierarchy needed no written rules. It recognized whose teeth were sharper. The strong stood in the center, the weak hugged the walls, and there was nowhere to argue the point. The newest arrival was the weakest by definition, reading faces even to cross open ground.
Lucius stood at Regulus's flank, the tension gone out of him. Minutes ago he'd been gripping his wand, dreading that Regulus would strike and the errand would collapse. He didn't know what Regulus intended, but the errand was secure. After that display, Greyback wouldn't make trouble if you loaned him a hundred more measures of nerve.
His chin came back up, the customary Malfoy reserve settling into place. He stood on the winning side and the glow carried. He glanced at the ring of watching werewolves with undisguised distaste. Livestock, the lot of them.