My cousin Lily had been taken by the Black Rock pack. Their alpha, Valeria, had one demand: the head of the Frost Moon war general. I was strapping on my armor, ready to lead the rescue, when my eldest brother Cassian slipped something into my drink. I woke up bound in silver chains on the pack’s ceremonial altar. My three brothers — Cassian, the pack Enforcer; Julian, the Beta Treasurer; Killian, the Sentinel Commander — had once been my greatest shield. Now Julian and Killian pinned me down while Cassian raised a silver-spiked rod, his eyes full of a pain he had no right to own. “Elena, don’t hate us. Lily is too fragile for Black Rock’s dungeons.” The rod came down and shattered my wolf core. Through the agony, I finally understood. They hadn’t come to let me fight. They had come to trade a broken war general for their precious, unscarred girl. — The drug was still bitter on my tongue, blood rising in my throat. “Lily is delicate,” Cassian said, eyes cast down, a faint tremor in his voice — but the hand gripping the rod didn’t waver at all. “She wouldn’t survive the dungeons.” “So I’m the one who suffers for it?” I said, holding his gaze, each word deliberate. Julian crushed my shoulders into the stone, his face turned away. “Elena. We’re doing this for the pack.” Killian held down my legs, her usually warm eyes flat and cold. “You’re the war general. They probably won’t kill you. You’re more useful alive.” “Alive?” I laughed, the sound scraping out of my chest. “This is how you keep me alive.” The rod rose again and fell. The crack of shattering bone was obscenely loud in the silence. Cold sweat soaked through my shirt instantly, darkness eating the edges of my vision. The pain was a tide. It swallowed me whole. Through the blur, I watched Cassian drop the rod and wipe my blood from his face with his sleeve — slow, careful, thorough. He came to the altar and looked down at me. “Sleep, Elena.” His voice was unbearably gentle. “When you wake up, Lily will be home.” I dug my fingers into the stone, pulled every last scrap of air into my lungs, and forced out three words. “Cassian. Ashford.” He went still. Shame flickered across his face before he buried it. I smiled. Blood frothed at the corner of my mouth and stained my lips red. “You will all regret this.” Julian and Killian released me and stepped back behind Cassian. Three faces — same bone structure, same carved-in resolve. Not one of them looked at me again. They turned and left. The bolt slid home the moment the door closed. I had become a prisoner in my own room, a war general who could no longer run. —
They loaded me into a crude iron cage and drove me toward the border — toward the Pale Ridge crossing. My legs had been roughly bandaged, but silver poisoning kept the wounds from closing. Blood soaked through the wrappings and fused with the fabric; every lurch of the road sent a fresh spike of agony up my spine. The guard assigned to transport me was one of Killian’s own men. He kept his head down the entire ride and only passed a water bottle through the bars when my thirst became impossible to hide. “General. Forgive me.” He said it every time. I took the bottle and drank in silence. I had no hatred left for him. I was saving all of it. Seven days later, the cage stopped at Pale Ridge. The handoff was staged in open ground between the two packs’ front lines. Two Black Rock soldiers yanked me from the cage and dropped me in the dirt. I lifted my head and found her — the reason I was here. Lily. She wore clean clothes and a heavy fur-lined coat, cradled at the center of my three brothers like something irreplaceable. Her face was pale but unmarked. Not a scratch. Black Rock’s alpha, Valeria, sat astride her black war-wolf, staring down at me with open contempt. Her pack had been crushed beneath my command — twice. “Elena Ashford.” Her voice carried the pleasure of someone who had waited a long time. “Look at you now.” I didn’t look at her. My gaze pushed past her and locked onto my brothers. Cassian stepped forward and dipped his head toward Valeria. “Alpha Valeria. The exchange is complete. Release Lily now.” His voice carried a careful deference that made my stomach turn. Valeria laughed and pointed her riding crop at me. “This is the Frost Moon war general? Can’t even stand. Pathetic.” Her wolves laughed with her. My brothers’ faces tightened with brief shame, but none of them spoke. They only pulled Lily closer. Lily leaned out from behind Cassian and looked at my shattered legs. Those wide, always-glistening eyes held no guilt — only a bright, unmistakable glint of triumph. She curved her lips at me. Just barely. A silent gloat. A winner’s smile.
Valeria waved her hand and two soldiers released Lily. She gathered her coat and ran straight to my brothers, shaking. “Cassian!” She threw herself into my eldest brother’s arms, trembling like she’d barely survived the end of the world. Cassian stripped off his own fur coat and wrapped it around Lily, murmuring softly. “You’re safe now. We’re going home.” Julian and Killian crowded in, fussing over every detail. “Are you hurt anywhere?” “Those savages didn’t touch you, did they?” Three people formed a wall around one girl, as if she were the most precious thing under the sky. No one looked at me again. I, the one they had broken and used as currency, had become a discarded object the moment the trade was done. Valeria finished savoring the scene and drove her wolf toward me. “Take her.” Two soldiers hauled me up and dragged me forward; my shattered legs carved two red lines through the gravel. As I was pulled past my brothers, I wrenched my head around. “Cassian. Julian. Killian.” All three went rigid at once. The hands sheltering Lily stilled. Lily twisted in Cassian’s arms and smiled at me — wider now, brighter. “You traded Frost Moon’s war general for someone who can’t even howl.” My voice was wrecked, but every word landed. “One day, this pack’s territory will be a graveyard because of what you did today.” Cassian’s face went iron gray. He clenched his fist. Julian’s eyes slid to the ground. Killian’s face — for the first time — showed something close to fear. “Get her out of here!” Cassian nearly screamed it. The soldiers quickened their pace and dragged me behind enemy lines. The border sealed at my back, cutting off everything I’d ever known. They brought me to Valeria’s command tent. She sat in the alpha’s chair and cleaned her riding crop with a silk cloth, unhurried. “Three years ago at the Hollow Gorge, you destroyed ten thousand of my wolves and took my best lieutenant’s head.” She looked up. “I swore that day I’d make you beg for death.” She rose, crossed to me, and used the crop to tilt my chin up. “I kept my promise.”
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