121 | AVALANCHE

I ran to the window. My palms stuck to the icy sill.

Wolves marched into Winterpaw’s central territory. They surrounded the mountains and filled the valleys. I squinted down at them; my breath felt too thin in my lungs, my head too light on my shoulders.

It couldn’t be – no, not already – it was too soon…

The armies couldn’t be here. Could they?

But the pit in my stomach told me that I knew they could. Every day I’d spent here I’d been waiting: waiting for Ares, waiting for them. And in the space of half an hour I’d finally been granted both.

I chewed on the inside of my cheek, leaning closer to the window. Outside, the wolves lined up in neat rows. There were less of them than I’d expected – definitely in the tens, not the hundreds – and some of them looked familiar. No, not just some – all of them did. I could pick out patterns in fur and the curl of a lip from years of living and training and fighting alongside them.

“Haile?” Ares rasped. The bed groaned beneath his weight as he sh