The photo had been on his desk for forty minutes.
He had not moved it. He had not turned it face-down, had not put it back in the file, had not done any of the things a person did when they had looked at something long enough and wanted to stop looking. He sat with it in front of him and his wolf had been doing the same thing for forty minutes that it had been doing for weeks: pointing. Not toward a threat. Not toward territory or conflict or anything with a name he could act on. Just pointing, the way it pointed at true north regardless of what direction he walked, the way it had been pointing since the first time he had sat in the Vault chamber and watched the new Alpha from Ember District take her seat at the table.
He had told himself: unfamiliar pack. Proximity. Territorial instinct
