The Wolf in His Arms (The Runes Trilogy) Read Online Free PDF Page B

a crime. This judge had been
lenient on him before, but Collin knew this time was different. His signature
style—his graffiti art—was recognizable and now could be traced to him for
dozens of murals he’d painted all over the city. Yes, this time he was in
trouble. No probation. No slap on the wrist.
    “Mr. Stalinski,”
the judge began. “This is not your first time in my courtroom.” Her words fell
stern, without emotion. She looked down at the papers before her. “Given your
academic achievements, I’m inclined not to send you to juvenile detention.”
    Collin
felt his heart soar.
    “However...”
    And
then fall.
    “I feel
that you need some motivation to place your considerable abilities to good use.
You need direction. I sentence you to three months at Cornerstone Boys
Reformatory School.” She smiled. “I think there’s hope for you yet.” She
slammed the gavel down.
    Collin
looked back at his mother; her eyes filled with tears, her face shattered with
disappointment, failure. “Mom,” he said as the bailiff placed his hand on Collin’s
shoulder to direct him away.
    *           *           *           *
    Cornerstone
Boys Reformatory School loomed like a cathedral on a river bank in the outer
suburban sprawl of Detroit. The sky and water behind the school blazed red as
the prison transport bus arrived, and Collin prepared to step off the bus. He
looked at the dark silhouette of the four story building and shivered. Part of
him was glad he had been shipped outside the city where no one would see his
wrists chained, see the rough company he was in.
    Cornerstone
was built as a Catholic boys’ school, closed due to finances, and taken over by
the state as a reformatory. The program was endowed by a philanthropist who
hoped “to reform the self-esteem and therefore public value” of the adolescent
boys sentenced there. He and the three other young men on the transport
shuffled down the walkway to the building. The Spanish Mission style, orange
brick building looked like it belonged on a hillside in California. Collin
looked up to the headstone over the doorway. Carved in the stone were the words
“Enter shackled. Leave unfettered.”
    Collin
made his way in, stopping at the guard station. He entered a room with the
other boys, stripped off his clothes and personal items, which were bagged, and
changed into the white shirt and blue pants that were his wardrobe for his
stay. He was assigned a roommate, Tony, one of the young men who arrived with
him. After they were checked in, they were herded by guards into a small room,
what Collin guessed had once been a chapel. A man in a blue suit, white shirt,
and red tie stood at a podium in the front of the room. As Collin, Tony, and
the third new inmate, Mark, sat, the guards waited in the aisle, with their
arms folded over their chests.
    “Welcome
to Cornerstone Boys Reformatory School.” The man at the podium smiled. But Collin
noted his smile was not warm. It was a wide smile, but not friendly. The man’s
dark hair was swept back against his head, without a single strand out of
place. His green eyes bore down on them keenly.
    “I’m
Proctor Roth. I ensure that things run smoothly here at the school, that your
needs are met, and that you take the curriculum here seriously.” He walked
around the edge of the podium and stepped down from the raised stage and sat on
the top step, his feet on the step below. “We take your education and your
reform very seriously.
    “Cornerstone
never takes any cases that we would consider, let me say, irredeemable. Every
student in here has committed some small offence, but is likely on his way to
ruin, throwing away talents that society will find useful.” He turned to
Collin. “You’re academically gifted as well as have a—shall we say
penchant?—for art.” He turned to Tony. “You’ve been in a number of
fights...you’ve never started them. But you’ve finished them. If you could