POV: Ayla

The strategy room feels smaller than it did the last time we stood around this table. The same map is still spread out, the same stones holding the edges down, but the lines drawn across it now carry a different weight. What was discussion has become decision. What was private has become something that will have a date.

Caius stands at the head of the table with a single sheet of paper in front of him. The language on it is formal, precise, the kind the inter-pack council expects when a claim is moved from recognition into record. Ryker leans against the wall near the window, arms crossed....