**LANDON**
The reports are too clean. I notice it before I consciously name it, a low, instinctive prickle that tightens at the base of my skull as I work through the stack of summaries laid out across my desk, each page aligned neatly, each line written in careful, neutral language that leaves no room for friction. Patrol routes are logged with precision, supply checks are marked complete without deviation, and welfare notes are phrased with the same restrained reassurance, different handwriting carrying identical tone.
Nothing is wrong.
And that is exactly the problem.
Packs do not move this smoothly without pressure, not unless something has prompted wolves to fall into line ahead of instruction, and as I read, I begin to recognise the pattern beneath the order, the way routes doubl
