Chapter 10

Sable's POV

Rook found me near the fire pit an hour later, watching me the way he watched everyone else get sized up since I arrived.

"Bram tell you anything useful?" he asked.

"Not really. Mostly that whatever happened to me last night isn't going away."

"Figured as much." He nodded toward a log near the fire. "Sit. We need to talk about how things work around here, since you're planning on staying."

I sat, mostly because my legs still felt shaky from the sleepless night. "I didn't realize I had a choice about staying."

"You do. Nobody's forcing you to be here." He stayed standing, hands loose at his sides. "But if you're staying, you need to understand what that means, because it's not like Ironclaw. Nobody's going to hand you a bowl and tell you to scrub floors because that's your rank."

"Then what do I do?"

"Whatever needs doing. Same as everybody else." He crouched down, picking up a stick and poking at the dead ash in the fire pit, more out of habit than purpose. "You train. Combat, tracking, whatever you're capable of learning. You pull shifts on watch once you're steady enough. You help with food, supplies, whatever the camp needs that week. Nobody's exempt because of where they came from or what mark they're carrying."

"Not even me?"

"Especially not you." He looked up, meeting my eyes. "I know what Ironclaw taught you about your place. Bottom of everything, no say in anything, work until you drop and be grateful for the privilege. That's not how it runs here. You want a say in this camp, you earn it like everybody else did."

Something about the bluntness of it settled easier in my chest than I expected. Back home, kindness always came with strings attached, some catch waiting underneath. This didn't feel like kindness. It felt like something steadier than that.

"I can work," I said. "I'm not afraid of that part."

"Didn't think you would be." He tossed the stick into the ash and stood again. "What you did for Bram, that's going to matter more than you probably want it to. People are already talking about it."

"I noticed."

"Some of that talk's going to be ugly. People are scared of what they don't understand, and what you did, nobody understands it yet, including you." He said it plainly, no judgment behind it. "That doesn't mean you hide it. It means you learn to control it before it controls you."

"How do I do that?"

"You start with Yarrow. She's been around longer than most of us, seen things the rest of the camp hasn't. If anybody's got a chance at figuring out what's happening to you, it's her." He nodded toward the healer's tent across the camp. "I'll take you over once she's up and moving. For now, there's a few things I need you to understand about how we operate."

"Go on."

"Fighting inside the camp gets you removed. Doesn't matter who started it, doesn't matter who's right. We handle disputes by talking, not with fists or teeth, unless it's actual training." He held up a finger before I could ask. "Second. Food and supplies get shared evenly. Nobody hoards, nobody skips their share of the work to get more than they earned. We don't have enough margin for that kind of selfishness out here."

"That sounds fair."

"It is, mostly, when people follow it." A faint, tired edge crept into his voice, like he had this argument with somebody before. "Third. You don't leave camp alone until you know the territory. Too easy to get turned around out here, too easy to run into something you can't handle by yourself."

"I ran into three rogues by myself two nights ago," I pointed out. "Didn't go great."

"Exactly my point." The corner of his mouth twitched, almost a smile, gone before it fully formed. "You're capable of a lot more than you think you are. Doesn't mean you're invincible. Big difference."

I nodded, taking it in. It struck me how different this felt from every rule Reva had ever laid out for me, every rule built around keeping me small, keeping me grateful, keeping me quiet. These rules felt like they existed to keep people alive, not to keep them in their place.

"Is that everything?" I asked.

"Mostly." He turned like he was about to walk off, already halfway distracted by something across the camp, some task waiting on him. Then he stopped, glancing back at me like he almost forgot something important.

"One more thing," he said.

"What's that?"

"Don't go near the border. Not even to look."

"Which border?"

"Ironclaw's." He said it flat, no room in his tone for negotiation. "Whoever sent those rogues after you isn't done. Ironclaw's still tearing through the woods looking for whatever's left of the mess that started this, and the last thing you need is to walk straight into whoever's still hunting you."

"I wasn't planning on it."

"Good. Keep it that way." He held my gaze a second longer than felt casual. "I mean it, Sable. Whatever pulled you out of that pack, it's not finished with you yet. The border's the last place you want to test that."

I opened my mouth to ask what he meant, exactly, what he thought was still coming for me, but he was already walking off toward the far side of camp, calling out orders to a couple of wolves loading crates onto a cart.

I sat there by the dead fire a while longer, turning his words over, trying to figure out how much of that warning came from caution and how much came from something he wasn't saying outright.

What sent those rogues wasn't finished. I already knew that. What I hadn't let myself think about, not really, not until he said it out loud, was how close that border actually sat to everything I left behind, and how much I still wanted, despite every warning, to know exactly what was happening on the other side of it.