The river crossing burned before she saw it.
Smoke coiled into the sky in thick, black spirals, carrying the scent of iron and pine sap and something far more intimate—wolf blood on stone. The clash of steel rang across the valley in fractured rhythm. War did not roar in one voice. It broke into hundreds.
Elara did not run toward it.
She walked.
Each step aligned with the deeper current now flowing beneath her skin. The earth did not resist her weight. The wind did not push against her. Even the distant tremors of shifting bodies—wolves colliding in fur and fury—reached her as vibrations through ground rather than noise through air.
She was no longer entering war as prey.
She was entering it as interruption.
At the crest of the ridge, she saw them.
Draven's banners held the western embankment—black and silver cutting through smoke. Defensive formation. Tight. Disciplined. His warriors did not charge blindly; they absorbed impact, redirected force, controlled terrain.
