Chapter 13 – Wolves at the Border
1276 Words
Ironveil porridge was better than Lyris had threatened.
Thicker than Tidewatch’s bland cafeteria glue, laced with honey and dried berries and something nutty I couldn’t identify. I sat on a bench at one of the long wooden tables, bowl steaming in front of me, watching the pack swirl through the hall.
Kids darted between legs. Warriors wolfed down food before heading to drills. A couple of elders argued over whose turn it was to take the river patrol.
It looked…normal. Messy. Alive.
“Eat,” Lyris ordered, dropping onto the bench across from me with her own heaping bowl. “Talren will hunt me if you show up in his clinic all dizzy‑eyed.”
“I thought he’d be thrilled with more data,” I said, taking a spoonful. Warmth spread through my chest. “This is good.”
“Don’t sound so shocked.” She smirked. “We’re not complete savages.”
A young wolf with a mop of brown hair—Dashael, if I remembered right—trotted up, eyes bright.
“Luna—uh, Lunara,” he corrected quickly at Lyris’s pointed look. “Can we show you the puppies later? The real ones, not Nyxen.”
I choked on my porridge. Lyris snorted so hard she almost spilled hers.
“We’ll see how my schedule looks,” I managed, wiping my mouth. “Clinic first, puppies second.”
“Okay!” He beamed and scampered off.
“Already collecting worshippers, I see,” Lyris said.
“Please don’t call them that,” I groaned. “I have enough anxiety.”
Whatever she was about to retort was cut off by a sharp series of howls from outside.
Not alarm, exactly. But close.
The hall stilled. Spoons paused halfway to mouths. Conversations cut off mid‑word.
Lyris was on her feet in an instant. “Border call,” she said, already moving. “Northern ridge. That’s not our usual patrol pattern this early.”
My stomach dropped. “Trouble?”
“Or visitors.” Her mouth was a hard line. “Either way, you might be useful.”
I scrambled up, abandoning my bowl, and followed her out into the yard.
Wolves were already converging toward the main gate: Varik, Nyxen, a handful of others shrugging into jackets as they jogged. Riven stood near the outer fence, arms folded, gaze fixed on the tree line beyond.
The northern border was different from the road we’d come in on. Steeper. Rockier. Pines clung to the slope like stubborn sentries, branches dripping from last night’s mist. Mist itself pooled low over the ground, thin and shifting.
A patrol wolf bounded in through the gate, half‑shifted, flanks dark with sweat.
“Alpha,” he panted, bowing his head. “We’ve got movement near the old ravine. Scent of…a lot. Rogues, mostly. And something else.”
“Something else what?” Varik asked.
The wolf grimaced. “Fear. Old blood. Like the camps.”
Cold slid down my spine.
Riven’s expression didn’t change, but his scent sharpened. “Any aggression?”
“Not yet. They’re…hovering. Some of them look half‑starved. One or two smell like Council facilities.”
Talren, who’d appeared at my elbow without me noticing, inhaled sharply. “Escaped stock,” he murmured. “Or redirects.”
“Options,” Riven said, already moving toward the open gate.
“Drive them off,” one of the older wolves suggested. “We can’t take in everyone.”
“Invite them in under guard,” Lyris countered. “Sort them later.”
“Call the Council,” another said bitterly. “Let them deal with their mess for once.”
They all looked to Riven.
He glanced at me.
“What do you smell?” he asked.
It took me a second to realize he meant literally.
I stepped closer to the gate, letting the wind wash over me. Under the usual forest scents, I caught it: unwashed fur, fear‑sweat, the sour tang of old medication, ozone from half‑burned runes.
And beneath that, fragile as cobweb, a note that made my skin prickle.
Loneliness.
“Wolves who’ve been moved around too much,” I said quietly. “Pushed and pulled until they don’t know where they belong. Some of them are hanging on by threads.”
Talren watched me with bright eyes, taking in more than my words.
Riven’s jaw flexed.
“Ironveil is an open haven,” he said, loud enough for the group to hear. “That doesn’t change because it’s inconvenient.” His gaze swept the assembled wolves. “But we are not a dumping ground. We bring them in carefully. We watch. We choose who stays.”
Varik nodded once. “I’ll take point.”
Riven turned to me. “You’re with us, Wildcrest. Talren, too.”
My pulse kicked up. “You want me greeting a mass of traumatized, possibly unstable strangers on day two?”
“I want you there to read the room,” he said. “And to see what your gut—and your not‑wolf—say about them.”
No pressure.
We moved.
The path to the northern ridge was narrow and steep, cutting through dense pines. Fog licked at our ankles. The patrol wolf led, Varik and Lyris flanking him, Riven beside me, Talren just behind.
As we climbed, the scents grew stronger. Fear. Confusion. One thread of brittle, brittle hope.
The trees opened at the top of the ridge.
Below, in the shallow bowl of an old dried riverbed, a cluster of wolves huddled.
Some half‑shifted, some in human form with ragged clothes and haunted eyes. A few snarled when they saw us, teeth bared in a show of bravery that didn’t reach their shaking shoulders. Others shrank back, pressing into each other.
And at the center, standing a little apart, was a girl.
Maybe fourteen. Thin as a sapling, hair hacked off unevenly at her shoulders, chin lifted like she was daring the world to hit her first.
Her eyes found me.
My breath left my lungs in a rush.
Because the thread I’d felt the night of the empty cage—the one lost child whose call had echoed through my bones—snapped taut between us like a wire.
It was her.
The one I hadn’t reached in time.
“Luna,” she whispered, voice hoarse, as if she’d been screaming for years.
The wolves around her flinched at the word.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
Riven stepped forward, measuring the distance, body language saying we’re not here to attack even as every line of him stayed ready.
“Ironveil territory,” he called down, voice carrying easily. “You’re trespassing.”
A growl rippled through the group.
The girl didn’t move her gaze from my face.
“You said you’d come,” she said, louder now. There was no accusation in it. Just a bleak, exhausted statement of fact. “You were late.”
Shame punched through me so hard I swayed.
Talren’s hand brushed my elbow, a silent anchor.
“I’m here now,” I said, stepping up to the edge of the ravine, my voice steadying even as my insides roiled. “And so is Ironveil. You made it farther than they ever wanted you to.”
Wind tugged at my hair, carrying the tangled scents up around us.
Behind me, I could feel Ironveil holding its breath.
Below, a pack of broken, battered wolves waited to see if we were another cage—or the first real home they’d ever been offered.
- Writer
