The high from the training ring lasted most of the afternoon.
Aria’s muscles hummed with the good sort of ache—earned, not inflicted. Her wolf dozed contentedly under her skin, satisfied with having stretched in a place that didn’t smell like judgment.
She spent an hour helping in the kitchen, chopping vegetables while an older she‑wolf named Mara gave a running commentary on who in Nightfall could and could not be trusted near knives. It was the closest thing to gossip Aria had heard here, and even that felt more like fond exasperation than poison.
By early evening, the hall had begun to fill again. Wolves drifted in from patrols and work details, shedding coats and gloves, trading stories about broken sleds and a herd of stubborn deer that kept slipping the hunters.
Aria carried a po
