I'd pinned the map to the council chamber wall before anyone arrived.
Not the small version from the war room — the full tactical display, drawn to scale, with Northbridge at the center and the seven proximate pack territories radiating outward like a wheel with a damaged hub. The three attack sites from yesterday were marked in red. The corridors between them in grey. The compound's current defensive gaps in a color I'd decided to call amber, which was more diplomatic than red and more honest than green.
The council filed in and found me standing in front of it with my arms crossed, waiting.
Elder Setch — senior elder now; Rowan had stepped back from council duties after the ceasefire, the war's final months visible in how he moved by its end — looked at the map. Looked at me. Took her
