The Founding Moon gathering grounds were older than any pack that used them.
A vast natural amphitheater cut into a hillside, ringed with standing stones worn smooth by a thousand years of moonlight, every pack in the region arranged in its ancient place around the central floor. Hundreds of wolves. Banners. Torches guttering against the dark. And at the high seat where the host Alpha presided sat Damien Hale, golden and certain, dressed in ceremonial black, with the empty throne of his stolen pack behind him.
We rode in under forty banners of Ironfang and the whole gathering went silent.
I felt the weight of every eye. Some of these faces had watched me get dragged out by the hair three weeks ago. Now I rode in behind the cruel king of Ironfang with his mark on my throat, in Ironfang c
