[Nogrod]

Oh my, what an ending to the last Dance! It sure ended happily, but there are things within it that look somewhat bothering...

I mean: the thing that astonishes me most is to see Macalaure still among us living-deads. The more I think of it the less sense it makes. No ranger to stop the wolf from killing him, his death would leave basically no trails as he didn’t suspect openly anyone and revenge (on Celuien) would be understandable reason enough, and he’s good (if someone hadn’t played with him before, now s/he would have been proved it)... So why Rikae is dead instead of him? Why to leave a dangerous opponent alive if one had the perfect opportunity to do away with him? (Mac: if you're innocent, kudos to you!)

Who, being a wolf, might have been afraid of killing him? The only one that comes around might be Naria as Mac changed his judgement in the last moments of the last Dance from

question mark. Could be anything.

To

I'd like to add that I have just upped my suspicions of Naria by a LOT.

So might that have been enough for a wolf Naria to back off and not kill him as it might have pointed towards her? Or is someone trying to frame her here?

Or then Mac is wolf himself. Wolves have been killing their mates many times previously to gain trust (my grandfather has done that too). It is probably one of the boldest strategies but if the bluff succeeds the first Day after the death of the wolf’s “friend” it usually gives the fellow-killing wolf almost an immunity for a long time. I wouldn’t put it past Mac to go for it and this would be the perfect timing: not too early (too many innocents against you) but not too late either (people would be more ready to consider a wolf-on-wolf kill). Mac’s behaviour – with apologies of being a bit too tense – might talk of a nervous wolf killing his mate?

But then Naria might fit the description of wolvery from two fronts. My earlier suspicion of her as the quiet wolf whom the cobbler really tried to save with all cost against Farael’s “lynch the silent” campaign still stands – as she would have been the most obvious silent here anyhow. But also if Mac is innocent, then she was perhaps the only possible wolf who would have had a reason not to kill him. For others killing Mac would have been easy and reasonable. The problem surely resides here: not killing Mac and going for someone else would have been a good kill for the wolf then... But if the wolf did it that way, it must have felt confident, very confident... confident enough to have Mac around one more Dance at least and not to be caught by his eye.

So if it’s not Mac or Naria, we probably should go towards those Mac felt most innocent?

But we should also look more closely at what Celuien said - now as we know she was a wolf. And what Rikae said - even though my gut-feeling says she's one more safe-kill, but still. There could be something in there too...