Whispers of the Winter Wolf

Episode Twenty One

Part 32: The Viper's Poison

Torg was brought to the war room, not as a prisoner, but as an asset. He was still limping, his massive frame supported by two of the pack’s guards, but his eyes were clear. When they led him into the stone chamber, he stopped, his gaze wide with awe. He had never been in a place of such power.

He saw Draven at the head of the great, carved map. And he saw me, standing at his side, not behind him.

Torg’s training was so ingrained that he tried to kneel. His wounded legs buckled, and he nearly collapsed. "Alpha," he rumbled, his head bowed low. "Luna."

"Save your strength, Torg," I said, my voice quiet but carrying. "We have work for you."

Valerius was there, a blank sheet of parchment and a charcoal stick in his hand. He looked at Torg, his one good eye sharp and assessing.

"The Luna has a mission," Draven said, his voice the calm rumble of the mountain. "And you have the knowledge to make it succeed. You swore an oath. Now, you will honor it. You will tell Valerius everything."

Torg’s loyalty, so recently broken and reforged, was a simple, powerful thing. He was desperate to please, to belong to the Alpha who had given him warmth and the Luna who had given him a purpose.

For the next hour, Torg talked. He was not a mapmaker, but his memory was brutally effective.

"The northern pass... you follow the dry riverbed until you see the three-toothed rock," he rumbled, his massive finger tracing a line on the table. "The cache isn't in the pass. It's under it. There's a cave, hidden by a waterfall that's now just a trickle of ice. Silas... he was proud of that one."

Valerius’s hand flew, sketching, his face a mask of concentration.

"And the eastern pass?" I prompted.

"The gorge," Torg said, his brow furrowed. "It's an old, forgotten quarry. They're dug in deep. But..." A slow, cunning, almost wolfish grin spread across his simple face. He was thinking like us now. "They're lazy. The guards there... they're from the Red Creek pack. They think they're untouchable. They keep the night-watch fire too high. You'll smell them a mile off. And they... they get drunk. Silas was always furious about it."

Valerius looked up at me, a gleam in his one good eye. This was not a fortress. It was a party.

"How many?" Valerius asked, his voice a low rasp.

"Ten at the gorge. Maybe... six at the waterfall. All second-tier. Not... not like Torg," he said, puffing his chest out with a strange, new pride.

"It's enough," Valerius said. He rolled the parchment. "Alpha. Luna. We can do this. We'll be ghosts."

"Good," Draven said. He nodded to the guards. "Torg. You have done well. You have honored your oath. Go back to the Healer's wing. Heal. Your Alpha is pleased."

Torg looked like the sun had just risen. He beamed, a huge, simple, and utterly devoted smile. "Yes, Alpha! Thank you, Luna!" He was hauled back to his feet and led, a hero in his own mind, from the room.

Valerius was the last to leave. He stood at the door, his raiding parties no doubt already assembling in the courtyard.

He bowed, his movements crisp. "Alpha."

Then he turned to me. He didn't just bow. He placed one fist over his heart, a true warrior's salute, and inclined his head. "Luna. Your strategy is sharp. We will see it done."

He was gone.

The door clicked shut, leaving Draven and me in the heavy, profound silence of the war room. The die was cast. The raiding parties were on the move. My plan, the viper's plan, was in motion.

I turned to the map, my fingers tracing the routes Valerius was now taking. "Three days," I whispered, more to myself than to him. "If they're successful, we'll have bought ourselves... a month? Maybe more."

"You've bought us a chance," Draven said.

His voice was right behind me. I hadn't even heard him move. His hands came to rest on my shoulders, his thumbs stroking the wool of my tunic. His presence was a solid, living wall of heat, anchoring me.

"That was... well done, Lyra," he murmured, his chin brushing the top of my hair. "You took a brute, a broken tool, and reforged him into a key."

"He was just a lost wolf, Draven," I said, leaning back, just slightly, into his strength. It felt... natural. "He just needed a pack."

"And Kaelen?" he asked, his voice low, the one unresolved thread.

My gut tightened. The ashy taste of that victory returned. "She... she is a loyal warrior. But she was loyal to the past. She was loyal to a way of fighting that will get us all killed. She... she had to be removed."

"Yes," he said, his voice flat. "She did." He was quiet for a long moment. "A viper, you said. A Queen. You are making the choices I cannot."

I turned in the circle of his arms, my hands resting on his chest. His heart was a slow, steady drumbeat beneath my palm. "We make them together. You were the one who broke Kaelen's pride. I just... I just showed you where it was cracked."

A dark, slow smile touched his lips. "A King and a Queen," he rumbled. He looked down at me, his golden eyes no longer just proud, but impressed. "My mind. My strategist. But Valerius and his men will be gone for three days. Silas is in the cold, breaking. Torg is healing."

"So, what now?" I asked. "We wait?"

"No," he said, his hand sliding from my shoulder to cup my jaw. "Now, we train. And I... I fulfill my part of the bargain."

"Your part?"

"I am the mountain," he said, his thumb stroking my cheek. "You have secured our borders. You have handled the enemy. Now, I must handle the pack. They have seen the Viper. They have seen the Queen. But they have not seen the Luna."

I frowned, not understanding. "What's the difference?"

"The Queen commands their loyalty through fear and respect," he said, his gaze intense. "The Luna... she commands their loyalty through their hearts. You have won my council. You have not won my pack. Not the elders, not the pups, not the omegas. They still see you as the cold, rogue stranger who deposed their Beta. They fear you. They do not love you."

He was right. I had focused so hard on the war that I had forgotten the people we were fighting for.

"I don't... I don't know how to do that, Draven," I whispered, the admission a raw, vulnerable thing. "I know how to hunt. I know how to fight. I don't know how to... lead."

"Then I will teach you," he murmured. "This war won't be won on the borders, Lyra. It will be won here." He tapped his fist over his heart, then placed that same hand over mine. "It will be won in the hearts of our people. Come. It's time they met their new mother."