I look at the smoking courtyard. The physical infrastructure is destroyed. But the magical infrastructure is intact.
Then we don't use the human tech, I say, my mind racing. We use the pack. We weave a living dampening grid. We use the integration school to filter the magic before it reaches the guest quarters.
Kade stares at me. That requires three hundred wolves to maintain perfect, synchronized focus for three days straight. It’s impossible.
It’s necessary, I reply. We are the mortar. We hold the bricks together.
Before Kade can respond, Elara walks into the courtyard.
She is seven years old. She is wearing her pajamas, her dark hair messy from sleep. But her eyes are glowing with a faint, luminous silver. She is holding a tablet.
"Mama," she says, her voice quiet but carrying tha
