Night pressed close around the patrol road, thick with pine and mist. Gravel crunched under our boots as Corren and I walked side by side, the only real light a thin smear of moon and the occasional gleam from his phone when he checked the map.
He’d insisted on a minimal escort—just Bryn running a lazy loop wider out, his scent dipping in and out of range like a bored comet. “If someone wants us,” Corren had said, “they won’t come while half the pack is staring.”
I’d called that arrogant.
I’d gone anyway.
“Your stride’s off,” I said, breaking the quiet. “You’re babying the left side.”
“It’s called not ripping my stitches,” he replied. “Some of us learned from last time.”
“Some of us still walked themselves into a cursed circle two days after being gutted.”
“Some of us,” he said, “we
