Wren's POV
I'm already awake when Rhydian finds me, still standing at the window where I watched the wards fail, my whole body wound tight with the particular helpless dread of hearing a fight happen somewhere close by and having no way to know how it ends. I count every wolf that limps back through the gate below, telling myself I'm looking for Rhydian's shape among them, though some smaller, more honest part of me knows I'm looking for evidence that whatever's happening isn't as bad as it sounds.
One look at his face tells me it's exactly as bad as it sounds.
"Tell me," I say, before he can find a gentler way into it.
"We caught one of them alive. Young, barely more than a boy." He says it carefully, watching my reaction the way you'd watch someone standing near a ledge. "Before he d
