FREYA
We hear them before we see them.
The sound carries up the valley road as the car climbs the last stretch toward home. A low, broken sound that I cannot place until we come through the gates, and then I know it.
Wailing.
There is a crowd outside the Alpha house. Dozens of pack members packed close under the floodlights. And there, laid out on the ground in front of the house, on boards, under white cloth, are the dead.
The very same men I took up the mountain this morning.
My chest caves in on itself as I look at them.
The families have come. They are on their knees beside the boards, keening, and the whole pack has come down to watch, because there is no hiding it anymore. No more talk of patrol accidents. No more quiet matters managed by Dexter. There are bodies on the ground
