Iron Howl stank of smoke and blood.

The floor was slick with corpses, fur burned down to charred bone, steam rising from the still-warm bodies. Wolves knelt in clusters, faces to the floor, trembling. Others cowered, pressing their backs against the stone pillars, unwilling to meet my eyes.

No one moved for Kael.

No one looked to him.

They looked at me and beyond me.

At the fire still smoldering in my skin.

At the womb where the pulse of the unborn crown still throbbed steady as war ...