The halls were quieter than usual that night, the kind of silence that pressed against your skin and made your instincts itch. I pulled my hood up and slipped past the curfew wards, heart beating steady but sharp. My wolf stirred uneasily, ears pricked as though the shadows themselves were alive.

I wasn't supposed to be out here, but alliances weren't built in daylight under the council's eyes. They grew in whispers, in places where risk outweighed comfort.

The academy's stone walls ...