POV: Tristan
The transition from the wild, frozen silence of the Black Peaks to the suffocating heat of the Great Hall was enough to make my senses reel. I stood at the center of the chamber, my body vibrating with a residual tremor of adrenaline and exhaustion. My silver-gray fur was still matted with the blood of the mountain rogues I had torn apart to reach her, and my human skin felt too tight, too fragile for the fury I was currently housing.
Beside me, Rena was a ghost. She was draped in my heavy, fur-lined cloak, her small frame shivering so violently I could hear her teeth chattering from two feet away. She looked like a broken doll, her feet blue and cut from the ice, her eyes wide and haunted.
We had survived the night, but the sun had risen on a new kind of execution.
"You b
