Aaron
I don’t ask her casually.
That matters.
The packhouse is steady again. Not quiet, not tense. Just… aligned. The kind of alignment that only happens after something rotten has been cut away and everyone is still learning how to stand without compensating for it. Movement flows where it used to hesitate. Decisions land without being tested three times. Wolves occupy space without watching one another for cues.
It isn’t relief.
It’s function.
Reza has been moving through it like she belongs here.
Not carefully.
Not defiantly.
Just… present.
That difference hasn’t gone unnoticed.
I’ve seen how wolves orient when she enters a room now. Not the quick recalculation that follows tolerated figures, not the subtle bracing that signals uncertainty. They don’t step aside for her, a
