ASHER As the Alpha King of Wegalla, I often had to endure things that I didn’t want to, and this meeting was no exception. I wasn’t usually one to drift off during important conversation, but this particular one wasn’t holding me as much as I wished for it to. I’d invited a few of my more trusted councilors into my study to discuss some business, and as I sat back in the leather armchair at my desk, their discussion danced by my ears. I’d had the housekeepers make some rearrangements, so the councilmen were seated around me rather than all of us sitting in the more informal seating area of my study. I fidgeted in my seat. These days, I was more restless than I’d ever been. There was much to attend to, but ever since the viper attack in Rosepetal’s garden with Cassandra Keller, I’d been

