Chapter 10

Wren

The Ironfang wolves came through the trees at midday, which Ezra said afterward was either very smart or very arrogant — nobody testing a pack's defenses came at midday, in the open, where they could be seen coming from half a mile off, unless they wanted to be seen coming.

There were five of them, and the one at the front didn't look like Wren had expected an Alpha to look, not after Kade — broader, less sharp around the edges, the kind of build that came from actual labor rather than ceremonial training. He stopped his group a respectful distance out and waited, hands visible, for someone from Nightshade to come to him instead of walking in like he owned the ground.

"That's smart," Ezra muttered, already moving to meet them, Wren a half-step behind. "Man knows how to not get killed walking into unfamiliar territory. Good sign."

"Alpha Rurik Thorne." He said it plainly, no flourish, offering a slight incline of the head that was somewhere between formal and simply polite. "Ironfang. We've had three separate reports this season of a pack running off rogues that should have won those fights easily. Figured it was worth finding out who, before somebody in my own territory got the same idea and tried it on us next."

"You could've sent a message instead of five wolves."

"Could have. Messages get ignored a lot easier than five wolves standing in your front yard, and I wanted an actual answer, not whatever a messenger thought I wanted to hear." Something that might have been the start of a smile pulled at one corner of his mouth. "You're the Alpha, I take it. Wasn't sure Nightshade had gotten around to naming one yet — word's been vague on that point, on purpose, I'd guess."

"On purpose," Wren confirmed, not elaborating.

"Smart." He studied her for a moment, openly, without the particular weight Kade's attention had always carried — assessing, not consuming. "I'm not here looking for a fight, if that's what your second's hand on that knife is suggesting he's braced for. Ironfang borders your territory to the east. Figured it was worth knowing whether the neighbors moving in were going to be a problem or an asset, before it became urgent one way or the other."

"And which do you think we are, so far?"

"Undetermined." He said it easily, no offense taken at the directness, which Wren found she appreciated more than she expected to. "You ran off three separate rogue incursions with a pack of what, six people? Seven? That's either an asset worth having or a threat worth neutralizing early, and I'd genuinely rather it be the first one. Wars are expensive. Alliances are cheaper, most of the time, if both sides actually mean them."

Ezra and Wren exchanged a look that carried an entire conversation neither of them needed words for. "We're not looking for a fight either," Wren said finally. "But we're not looking to be anybody's charity case or anybody's border wall either. Whatever this turns into, it happens as equals, or it doesn't happen."

Something in Rurik's expression shifted — not surprise, exactly, more like recalibration, the look of a man revising an assumption mid-sentence. "Didn't expect equals to be a condition anybody around here still bothered negotiating for. Most of the small packs I deal with are just grateful for whatever protection gets offered." He extended a hand, an oddly human gesture for a wolf, deliberate. "Equals, then. I can work with that. Better than I expected, honestly, walking in here."

Wren shook it, aware of Ezra watching the whole exchange with the particular stillness of a man recalculating his pack's odds of survival in real time, and aware, too, of something else — a low, curious hum of attention from Rurik that had nothing to do with alliances or territory, and everything to do with the way he was looking at her like she was a puzzle he wouldn't mind spending some time solving.

She filed that away, unexamined, for later. There'd be time enough to figure out what to do with it once she was certain Nightshade would still be standing long enough for it to matter.

Sable caught up with her after the Ironfang wolves had gone, arms crossed, eyebrows doing something complicated. "So. That happened."

"That happened."

"He was looking at you."

"He was negotiating an alliance."

"He was doing both at the same time, and you know it, because you're doing that thing where you pretend not to notice things you've very much noticed." Sable fell into step beside her, heading back toward the cabin, voice dropping into something a little more careful. "I'm not saying anything. I'm just saying I noticed, and I think you noticed, and I think it's allowed to be a good thing, whatever it turns into. You're allowed to let someone look at you like that again eventually. It doesn't have to mean what it meant last time."

Wren didn't answer right away, turning the thought over with the same wary caution she turned over most things these days. "I don't know how to do the eventually part yet."

"Nobody does, the first time." Sable bumped her shoulder, gentle. "Good thing you're not in a hurry."

Wren managed something close to a real smile at that, the first one Rurik Thorne's visit had earned out of her, and let the thought sit there, unresolved and mostly unwelcome and entirely, quietly noted.