The sun hadn’t yet crested the peaks of the next day when the heavy iron door of the training courtyard groaned open. The air was a razor, slicing through the lungs with every breath, and the ground was a sheet of black ice and packed grit.
Rhiannon stood in the center, her breath blooming in thick white clouds. She had swapped her evergreen tunic for a sleeveless leather vest and braced wrist-guards. Beside her, Fenris looked like a statue carved from the mountain itself. His shirt was discarded despite the sub-zero temperatures, the steam rising off his heated skin like a physical manifestation of his power.
"In the South, you were a resource to be guarded," Fenris said, his voice dropping into a drill-master’s cadence. "Here, you are a hunter. And a hunter who cannot defend their o
