He was not what people expected.

That was, Obsidian had found, the most useful thing about him.

They expected rage. They expected the kind of Alpha who ruled through fear in its rawest form, through broken bodies and public displays, through the simple animal logic of the strongest wolf taking everything and daring others to object. They expected someone who looked like what he had done.

What they got was a man who read reports at a stone desk by candlelight, who ate simply and slept four hours a night by choice rather than necessity, who had not raised his voice in six years and had not needed to.

He...