The moon had not yet risen, and the Nightfang Pack’s compound was unusually quiet. The torches lining the stone corridors flickered in the cold wind, casting long shadows that twisted across the walls. I could almost feel the weight of the alpha wing pressing down over the pack tonight, not the literal weight, but the unspoken tension that seeped into every room, every gaze.
Kael moved through the corridors with his usual precision, each step controlled, each motion calculated. But there was an edge to him tonight, something sharper, colder, as if the walls themselves whispered reminders of the absence he refused to name. He paused at the balcony, overlooking the training grounds where the younger wolves still sparred under the faint glow of the moonlight filtering through the mist.
The
