Leah
The cold was a living thing. It clawed at my face, bit through my coat, found every seam and gap in my clothing and burrowed deep. I'd thought I understood cold, thought the winters back home had prepared me for this. I was wrong. This wasn't just weather. This was punishment.
I stood at the edge of the training grounds, watching warriors move through drills with mechanical precision. They were dressed in furs and heavy leather, their breath clouding the air in thick plumes. Snow swirled across the packed ice beneath their boots, and not one of them seemed bothered by the wind that threatened to knock me sideways.
This was madness. Who trained outside in this frozen wasteland?
But here I was, clipboard in hand, fingers frozen, tasked with assessing these wolves like I had any righ
