Chapter 37

Wren

The attack came on the second night of Kade's absence, and Wren would spend considerable time afterward being grateful, in a grim, retrospective way, for every single doubled patrol and hastily reinforced watch post the pack had thrown up in the week since Ashenmoor.

The first warning came from the southern watch line — not the border Ezra had marked as most exposed on the enemy's target map, which told Wren immediately that whoever was coming had either changed their plan or never intended the map to be fully accurate in the first place.

"Multiple contacts," Denna reported, breathless, having run the distance from the southern post at a dead sprint. "A dozen, maybe more. Branded, same as the ones from Ashenmoor. They're not trying to hide their approach at all."

"Then they want us to know they're coming." Wren was already moving, calling the pack to formation with the ease of six years' practiced leadership, Sable falling into step beside her without needing to be asked. "Full mobilization. Everyone who can fight, to the southern line. Milo—"

"I'm fighting." Milo's voice, firm, already reaching for a blade he'd clearly been keeping close since the pack's fortification efforts began. "Don't even try to send me somewhere safe, Wren. I'm seventeen, not five."

Wren didn't have time to argue the point, and some old, resigned part of her suspected she wouldn't have won the argument even with more time to spend on it. "Stay close to Rennick, then. And if I tell you to fall back, you fall back. No arguments."

"No arguments," Milo agreed, which they both understood to be a lie, but there wasn't time to press the point further.

The fight that followed was the largest Nightshade had faced since Wren had taken the Alpha seal — a dozen brand-marked wolves pressing hard against the southern line with the same disciplined, coordinated ferocity as the ambush at Ashenmoor, clearly trained rather than simply desperate. Wren fought at the center of her pack's formation, power flickering in and out with a control that six years of practice had finally made reliable under real pressure, vanishing and reappearing at exactly the moments that mattered most, buying her people the openings they needed to hold the line.

It was Rurik's timely arrival — Ironfang's nearest patrol responding to Nightshade's emergency signal fires within the hour — that finally turned the tide, fresh wolves crashing into the attackers' flank at the exact moment Nightshade's own defense had begun to falter under sheer numbers.

By the time the last of the brand-marked wolves broke and fled into the darkness, Nightshade had taken losses — two wolves badly wounded, none dead, which Wren counted, in the raw aftermath, as something close to a miracle — and, more importantly, one attacker down but alive, pinned beneath Sable's knee and considerably less interested in fighting now that the numbers had turned against him.

"Talk," Sable said, blade at his throat, no patience left in her voice after a night like this one. "Who sent you. Why Nightshade. Why Wren specifically."

The wolf said nothing at first, defiant despite his position, until Wren crouched down to his level, exhaustion and fury both burning steady behind her composed expression.

"You're going to talk to me," she said quietly, "because I am considerably more patient than my second, and because I have a particular gift for knowing exactly when someone's lying to me. So let's skip the part where you waste both our time."

Something in her voice, or perhaps something in the still-fresh memory of watching half his companions fall in the last hour, finally cracked the wolf's resolve. "The Moonless," he said, voice rough. "That's what we're called. What we've always been called, since before Ashenmoor."

"What do you want with me."

"Not just you." A bitter, humorless laugh. "Every bloodline the Goddess ever touched directly. Nightshade. Ashenmoor, once. Others, older, that don't even have names left worth remembering. The Moonless believe the god-blessed lines are a corruption — power that was never meant to exist in mortal blood, power that unbalances everything it touches." His eyes found hers, something like genuine conviction beneath the fear. "We ended Ashenmoor forty years ago because we had to. We're not going to make the mistake of letting Nightshade's line finish what Ashenmoor started. Whatever the old prophecies say is coming, we intend to make certain it never gets the chance to arrive."

"What prophecy." Wren's voice had gone very quiet, very controlled, the particular quiet she reserved for moments that mattered more than she wanted to show. "What is it you think I'm going to finish?"

The wolf's eyes flicked, involuntarily, toward Ezra, who'd gone very still at the edge of the gathered pack, something old and careful settling over his weathered face.

"Ask your elder," the wolf said, something almost like pity in his voice now. "I think he already knows more than he's told you. I think, if you're honest with yourself, some part of you already suspects it too."

Wren turned to Ezra, and found him not meeting her eyes, which told her, more clearly than any interrogation could have, exactly how much weight was about to land on her shoulders.

"Ezra." Her voice cracked, just slightly, exhaustion and dread finally breaking through six years of careful composure. "What aren't you telling me?"