Chapter 3

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."