Alpha Terrell's POV
The anger hadn't cooled.
I had expected it to - anger usually did, given enough corridors and enough stairs and enough time moving through this. It was a practical thing, anger. It burned hot and then it burned down, and what was left afterward was usually something more useful. Clarity. Decision. Purpose.
Not tonight.
Tonight it walked with me every step down to the lower levels, sitting in my chest like something with teeth, and by the time the dungeon corridor materialized out of the torchlight I had stopped pretending it was going to leave on its own.
The lower level was eerily quiet. The torches in their wall sconces threw long orange shapes across the floor. The guard at the corridor's end straightened when he saw me coming.
I was halfway down the corridor when I heard her.
"Alpha."
The voice came from the second cell - small, urgent, and stripped of every bravery she initially carried.
