Ryan’s POV
The night rages around us, alive with the clash of claws and the guttural roars of wolves tearing into one another. The air is thick with the copper tang of blood and the raw scent of sweat, the ground already littered with the bodies of rogues who thought they could breach Red River territory. My muscles burn with exertion, but the fire inside me does not falter. If anything, it only grows hotter, stronger, more determined with every blow I land, with every breath I drag into my lungs.
Beside me, Alex moves with the same lethal rhythm, his strikes quick and decisive, his knife flashing silver beneath the moonlight as it arcs cleanly across the throat of a rogue who dares to lunge too close. For so long, there has been nothing between us but bitterness and mistrust, old wounds
