Anger. Anger was something Kaisa knew very well. She had experie ever since her worthless, good-for-nothing parents died in some ditch she couldn’t even name. Not a day went by without her being e the o dominate opposition is, cusacks’ shit, and pour milk into her siblings’ ungrateful, useless mouths instead of sleeping and rec. It helped her through the worst, both the bane of her existend the reason for her rash as, as well as a fiery drive that got her ba her feet.

  But after that bitch had cracked her bohe rage… lessened, as if released from a punctured balloon. She still inteo see Ashbringer eat dirt, of course, just nht now. She wasn’t fit to lead a rger paot when her own was inferior. Anger also helped Kaisa do things she wouldn’t normally do, and as she stormed across the corridor, seething with embarrassment, it was rage that gave her enough humility to carry out her pn.

  She knocked on the Bootlicker’s door, ging at the ridiculous portrait of a caped moron raising a hand to a moonlight sky that was clumsily painted over the gray metal. She agonized over her worries, cursing herself since she saw firsthand that Bootlicker was fine, and she wao cry from the o admit an inferiority in anything.

  Spirits. Never asked a thing of you. Make her snap so I snap her. Kaisa’s broken arm still hurt, but she could swing it.

  “Open!” a voice said from the other side, and Kaisa entered, blinking from a sudden shock.

  The interior wasn’t what she had expected. The wolf hags were given proper s, often too big for their belongings. Kaisa herself had a couple bdes made from the slit-like fs of ioid warriors, a couple of bags filled with the junk she collected from the dead svers, some trophies, including the skull of her first victim, and knives.

  Anji’s room was brightly lit by a set of blue mps pced on wooden posts; a sizeable wardrobe, that was once a crate, hid one wall; posters of the already familiar caped figure covered the other walls, depig a white-haired woman surrounded by a yellow lightning halo. The unknown wench often flew alongside several colorfully dressed people or battled vionsters, bsting them bato gaping ic rifts. A rich leather jacket dotted by smiling badges y over a made bed o a simir skirt. On a bedside table hotograph of a happy family. In it, a young, white-haired wolfkin girl pumped her fists to the sky, surrounded by cubs and her mother and father.

  Privileged bitch. Still-living parents. g sisters and brothers. Fwless. Why? Why never her, why always others… Kaisa brushed off the frustrations. Impossible to ge, so why bother?

  Anji sat cross-legged on the floor, her toig out as she paihe top of her helmet white.

  “What are you doing?” Kaisa demao know. Did the fool fall for an Ice Fang?

  “Wanna be as Lightning whip.” Anji poio a poster with a brush. There, the electrian wore a bck bodysuit and a cape of the same color, fastened by a jade pin, draped over her shoulders. The top of her helmet was broken, and a mane of white hair stuck skyward for some reason. “She’s a superhero who protects young and old and zaps the bad guys!”

  “You believe in these delusions? In the fairy tales for cubs? Grow up,” Kaisa sniggered. “Superheroes do .”

  “Well, duh, or the world wouldn’t suuch still. Fial or real, good ideals are worth adhering to.”

  “What are you painting it white for, anyway? I saw you in battle; it was already that color!”

  “That’s the strahing! Every time I return it to the armory, it es back pitch bo idea who keeps pranking me.” Anji put the brush aside. “So what’cha came for?”

  “Iuargugh….” It hurt to say the words; the ge alohreateo choke her out. Kaisa trolled her rage and spat words into Anji’s fused snout. “I came to check up on you. You were weird in the med bay.”

  “Didn’t know you cared,” Anji said slowly.

  “Was it my fault?” Kaisa stomped at another wave of surprise that coursed through Anji’s muzzle. “Just tell me! Have I fucked up everything again with my request for lives?”

  “No.” Anji softened and smiled. “Your request was good! It whipped me into shape, and I murdered those bastards who dared to hurt is! Their bones crag was like musiy ears!”

  “Now you’re talking!” Kaisa cheered her on to keep going, enced by a fsh of life that had scared her before by its disappearance. “Don’t know what is b you, but howl it out! Go on, roar to your heart’s tent! Howl ye, ahe Spirits know of your victory! Rejoi overing an obstacle and…” Anji smiled, and Kaisa sulked at such a ck of bloodthirst. “You’re strange.”

  “Thank you for g, Kaisa. I feel better. Truly.”

  She wao storm out. She hated, despised hearing these words from this weakling, from a rival destio grovel at her feet. What could Anji know, anyway? But Kaisa made a promise ahe Spirits rot her alive if she ged a set course.

  “I…” Kaisa narrowed her eyes. “I… I need a favor. You… You’ve been to cities before? Like Houstad?”

  “Nothing like Houstad,” Anji answered. “However, Da and Ma often took me, my bros and my little sisters to help itlements. You know, up a road, fix a broken leg…”

  “No, I don’t know.” The er of Kaisa’s mouth twitched. Asking, begging, pleading… She wasn’t cut out for it. She quered, taking what she wanted! “I’ve never had much to do with the Normies. They’re weak.” She paervously, and the room suddenly resembled a cage to her. “Listen, there’s something wrong about my temper, and it’s ruining my pack. Martyshkina gave me an address of soothsayers… therapists in Houstad. They unfuck your brain or something. And I to bee normal. Really. Or I’ll keep failing the pack. But I have no idea how to approach them, what to wear, what to say…”

  “I see, I see.” Anji smiled. “You want my expertise. It’ll cost you.”

  “Name your price.”

  “Let me paint your cws.” Anji pressed her paws together. “A girl must look lovely.”

  Kaisa had half a mind to kito this serene fad shatter the mog features. But something—she wasn’t certain what—held her leg. Happy… Am I happy? The granny’s spiel kept pesteri nights. What does it mean to be happy? Is there anythier than to see another female prostrate herself to your merd hear the loser’s mentations?

  Ahe worthless Kirk never dominated ahe fool was too weak; he wouldn’t have survived this long if not for her. He looked different, helping the granny’s whelps. Stronger. If cooperation could transd an individual’s limits, then it was a sacrifice she had to make.

  She stretched a paw towards Anji and released her cws.

  “Do it.”

  “Wow, you really are serious,” Anji whistled. “Well, it’s only fair to warn you what you are signing up for.”

  She raised a finger, and Kaisa recoiled in horror. The… thing that slipped from the pocket of the wolf hag’s finger hardly resembled a cw. Dirt ore did not cover the noble white of the bone, but a radioactive hue did. e, green, purple, yellow, soft reds and blues, and shades of brown flickered into view as the fiurned.

  “What the fuck is this?” Kaisa yelled.

  “Not my fault! I did everything acc to the manual!” Anji shouted ba panic.

  “I never painted cws, and even I am aware you aren’t supposed to use this many colors! Spirits, I have a headache from mere looking at it!”

  “You think I don’t know it?! It’s the nail polish, it must be spoiled or something! My hairspray never caused such a mess!”

  “You dyed your hair?!”

  “What, you thought I turned ashen this young?!” Anji touched her braids and took a breath. “Okay, so we are in agreement. This is the pits. Listen, I was yanking your ; you don’t owe me anything. Marco is soon about to drop by for our pet project; how about you stay and we’ll talk? I promise not to hurt you.”

  “As if a weakling like you ever could!” Kaisa bared her fangs.

  “Who is being delusional now?” Anji asked pyfully.

  Kaisa wao leave and sm the door so hard that the metal would bend. But that would be an admission of cowardice. And there was nothi in the world to scare her. She decided to ge ahe Spirits curse and rage, ge she will or die trying.

  “I’m game. Have anything to drink?”

  ****

  “I thank you fraciously accepting my invitation,” said Sword Saint Camelia.

  “It roper,” replied Impatient One.

  They were in the private dining room of the sage supreme, who served the Wintersong household. The sword saints had doheir residences on the crawler to house the little ones brought aboard, and Camelia apologized for the inappropriate meeting pce. Upon examining the room, the shaman failed to uand the hidden meaning of her words.

  White marble sbs covered the floor, utterly hiding the metal. Above them y heavy carpets to prevent guests’ legs from feeling any disfort, and a rich tapestry woven into them told of various episodes in the life of the Wintersongs, from their founding to the rise of Camelia as a matriarch. Magnifit jade statues of the Twins and a smaller Ravager holding a rising sun stood guard over a soft-looking bed hidden by a dark opy that fell from four posts. Impatient One never met the Twins, but the unknown artist somehow mao breathe life into the green stone, and the rubies that served them for eyes shone like the m sun.

  The room unhe shaman a little, but not because of needless opulen the form of pictures and statues that barely fit in the requisitioned den. There were no st marks, nothing reminding of the sage supreme, and nothing ing from the items that beloo the sword saint. Camelia and a line of her servants, initiates who were traio learn obediend diligence, smelled of strong and soft perfumes, pleasing to the nose, but utterly void in terms of telling a character. There was something portentous about seeing a refle of a Wolfkin, different in fur color and alien in habits.

  Their physical differences ran even deeper. The Wolfkins of the Wolf Tribe had mouths full of fangs, but the Ice Fang Order’s Wolfkins had front es and the rest of their teeth resembled those of normal humans. Weaker cws, a clumsy walk on all fours, a ck of st… Impatient One did not share her sister’s s about a potential betrayal of the Order, as Lacerated One herself had veyed Ravager’s desire to preserve the Ice Fangs to the shamans. Nor did she hold a grudge over the lesser representation of the Blessed Mother in the Ice Fangs sculptures. It was a miracle that the two groups even accepted each other as retives; small differences were of no sequence.

  But she was wary and suspicious of them. Bertruda took a clear advantage by stealing a title in a most dishonorable mahe Wolf Tribe was the one bleeding in wars while the Order was building its strength. Their denial of informatioo deaths during the evacuation from Teo-Queen’s domain. An act could be a simple ce. Several attern.

  At a snap of the sword saint’s fingers, a youth in a bck tuxedo approached and poured drinks into their gsses.

  “Are you fortable in these?” Impatient One asked, pointing to his bck shoes.

  The youth g the sword saint, who nodded elegantly, not once ringing the jewelry woven into her fur. “Of course, dy. The material is nid, it is flexible enough that I easily grasp a feather with my index and big toes.” He lifted his leg, showing how the leather of his shoe moved to aodate the movements of his fingers. “I demonstrate…” Camelia’s cough led to him ging in fad retreating in a bow.

  “Pardon the excitement of the youth.” Camelia sniffed her wine, sav its aroma, and took a sip. “I fear the wartime has left our manners somewhat g. I will endeavor to address this shorting.”

  “I asked a question, and the cub answered. You obstruct his growth.”

  “You do not approve the servitude?” Camelia crified.

  “Manual bor breeds cooperation and obedience. Healthy traits for a is your useless melodramatics over ging the permitted limits on a whim that irritates me,” Impatient One said bluntly. “If you gave him permission to speak freely, let him talk and learn instead of crippling himself by pointlessly guessing your iions.”

  “A little hesitation help learraint.”

  “Hesitation is fatal on a battlefield. It is deadly in an area surrounded by wildlife. Be a better teacher and clearly expin the boundaries to the wards to eliminate guesswork.” The shaman ked gsses with the sword saint and drank in full. “Why have you summoned me?”

  Two women sat at a table with exotic dishes. Impatient One was dressed in the fi garments permitted by her rank: a sturdy brown jacket and patched lizard-skin pants. Unfamiliar pieeat, soaked in a sweet, pale sauce, floated in bowls before her, and thin steam drifted from the dishes. She snatched at the meat with the tips of her cws, drawing surprised gasps from the attending personnel as she ignored knives and forks. She paid no mind to their curiosity and indulged herself, remembering the pleasant taste against the pate and the ck of nourishment in those chopped pieces. Treats for cubs and little else. Waste of efforts to prepare.

  Camelia dressed herself in a long, smoky gray dress that left her ned shoulders bare and had a slice that left one leg open. Her sword was sheathed and securely faste her side, and the sword saint curiously examined a baked cake the shaman had brought. It wasn’t required, but Impatient Ohought it justly for both sides to share food. A silver fork poked through the soft crust, and Camelia cut a piece of the delicad closed her eyes, chewing on the meat and bread.

  “Rough and soft, the crust is tender yet crisp, and me, oh my, just the right amount of spice is used to season the meat. It’s like the fme of a campfire, warm and f.” She opened her eyes. “My sincere gratitude for the unusual sensation. You have a gift for cooking, Lady Impatient One.”

  “The credit goes to Colt. His recipe, his teag,” Impatient One replied iween lig a bowl of liquid. Unusual. Sour, but ri vitamins.

  “Lady, you should from this bowl!” excimed a young initiate. “The lemon bowl is for washing your fingers.”

  “Silly cub, everyone knows you use your tongue for that.” Impatient One rolled her eyes at her interlocutor’s ringing ughter. Bunch of weirdos.

  Colt. Yennifer missed him. Impatient One wasn’t a hypocrite, and she aowledged that she still harbored a part of Yennifer, a part of her psyche responsible for coddling her brothers and providing allowao the lower ranks. There was a long way to go before she could truly be a dispassionate judge worthy of the tribe’s trust.

  So many duties she had performed, ahe simplest hurt the worst. On the nights before the culling, she and Nissi had begged him to leave the tribe and find happiness elsewhere, but the stupid male had refused. Colt’s stubbornness art of his charm and a trait she ied from him. He ughed at his first botched cooking attempt, telling Mother that he hadn’t failed; he’d just found a way that didn’t work. Colt opped halfway; when he decided to master something, he studied it thhly and wasn’t afraid to ask for help. On the night when Mrieved about the lost cubs of her test litter and cradled the barely alive Marpatient One lost to Yennifer, and they cooked diogether for the family.

  This was the st time they felt truly at home. Colt was old then, but he tried his best to hide it to ease Nissi’s and Yennifer’s worries. Soon after, he was gone, and there was a hole in the family. A hole left by her paw.

  Dad. Why did you have to grow older? Why did you have to decide to stay? Haven’t you done enough? Didn’t you and Mom deserve a rest? Impatient One and Yennifer shook their head, regaining posure. Colt was a shining example of how the lowest of the low iribe’s social hierarchy performed his duty fwlessly. She had nht to let him down. Too sweet. The food was ri vitamins, but its sweetness brought unwahoughts. Fine frieving.

  “There is much we learn from each other.” Camelia raised a gss of wine. “I’ve always wondered why our cousins take bites and scratches easier than I.”

  “Even cubs know the ao this question!” Impatient One ughed. She turo the initiates and spotted the girl who pyed with Marco the most. The cub stood so uncharacteristically quiet, putting her paws over the long bck skirt. Almost a different person pared to all the times the two cubs rolled around in the dirt. “You there! Ahe question.”

  “Yes, dy,” the initiate answered at Camelia’s nod. “Our cousins’ skin is loose and baggy. It is also rather thick, almost like they’re wearing a suit, and when you close your fangs on their necks, they squirm and bite back…”

  “Bite back?” Camelia gently inquired, and the girl fell silent. “Correct me if I am incorrect, Cordelia, but there is only one pymate from whom you could have gleahis knowledge in su undylike manner, and he is far youhan you and is unwell…”

  “Let the cubs py and explore!” Impatient One smmed a palm over the table, drawing attention back to herself. “Perhaps they’ll form a real team, uered by the distrust pguiain elders.”

  “A fair notion.” Camelia took a jab about Leonidas’ and Macarius’ headlong charge rather well. “I was even wilder in my i days. So many rightfully called me a brutish ruffian.” She pced a paw to her mouth. “Ah, I feel a tingle of inadequacy after hearing the expnation.”

  “Don’t be,” Impatient One grumbled. “Ice Fangs’ muscles are amazingly estic.”

  “And how did you learn it? A secret lover, by any ce?”

  “There is a boy from your tribe. A sage. Challenged me to full tao ons duel, and I spent a good two mirying to break his arm.” The shaman chewed o and tinued sourly. “Never ma. Flexible, ear-stabbing snake.”

  “Why am I not surprised?” sighed Camelia. “Impatient One. I’ll be frank. I know that you have eaten human flesh.”

  “Yes.” The shaman didn’t refute the accusation. She had already reported it to the officers and received a formal reprimand.

  “May I ask why? Is the fvor really so tempting?”

  “You tell me. What do you think is in the cake?”

  Impatient O eating, pretending not to hear the horrified gasps of the initiates. The bloodlust filling the room was almost palpable; it was as if a great avanche of stones had smmed into the shaman’s body. Veins and muscles bulged on the Ice Fang’s elegant body; she had set aside a fork, and a bright crimson light engulfed Impatient One, promising an immi and iable demise. A vapor trail left the sword saint’s lips. The sensation leasant and familiar, a genuiion unencumbered by the veneer of false civility. Marco was in good paws. The shaman ighe paw that grasped the sword hilt until the st moment and then said: “It was a jest.”

  “It is fortunate, dy,” Camelia said icily. The crimson light in her eyes faded. She gestured for the initiates, and the male refilled their gsses. “I would have syed you otherwise.”

  “I know. I wao see the real you,” the shaman grinned.

  Camelia ran a paw over her snout, calmed herself, and said: “I wasn’t aware that the shamans are permitted to lie.”

  “We are not. But nothing human is alien to us, so shamans are allowed to make jokes as long as they are directed at friends and do not leave them in the dark.”

  “You t me as a friend, then?” Camelia asked.

  “Foolish question,” the shaman grumbled. “You fought beside us, saved a male’s life, and treated him ter. Who you be, if not kin and a friend to our eribe, Sword Saint?”

  “Sometimes I fet how different my distant family is,” Camelia said warmly, pg a palm over her heart. “You honor me. But do tell, what sort of meat did you use?”

  Impatient One khat this question would e, and it was still humiliating. But what could she do? Attending a peace parley empty-handed and not exging and sharing food would be an insult, a gesture of mistrust, and that was the best she could afford. She shrank bad admitted: “Cusack leg.”

  “Cusack?” The sword saint lifted a piece of a cake and touched the meat, tasting it again. “But dy, surely I am a victim of your jest anew. It is too soft.”

  “Tenderizing. Inteenderizing,” Impatient One forced the words out. It was an uatement. Cusack meat was highly nutritious but notoriously known for its hardness, and Normies bred lizards as it hysically too hard for their children to chew on cusack steak. Impatient One applied a special teique Colt had taught her to soften it up.

  She had prepared a gift for Camelia, one of the wealthiest individuals in the Recmation Army, using the cheapest and poorest quality ingredients avaible iate. The ignominy of such a gesture was obvious. If Camelia wao incur a blood debt for su insult, the shaman would pay it.

  The sword saint smiled brightly a eating: “You simply must share the recipe. If we mass-replicate the tenderizihod in factories, it has the potential to boost the sales of cusack rations. My nose and tongue don’t lie; there’s a profit to be made. For both of roups. Speaking of which,” she said off-handedly, “the matter of strained retionships incurred by an act of rash misuanding remains. Tell me, what is the procedure for transferring a title from one warlord to another in the Wolf Tribe? My knowledge of that matter is somewhat g.”

  Ah, so that is the reason for the invitation. Impatient One uood. Soulless One was right. The Ice Fangs liked to dance around an issue, never revealing their true iions. Camelia did not invite her here to talk about her ibalism or to build rapport; it was because of that cheater, Bertruda Mountaintop. She didn’t want to help Jahe Wolf Tribe, or Impatient One.

  The realization saddened her mood. What a fool she was, thinking that the Ice Fang wae the retionships betweewo groups. In her arrogance, she imagined herself as someone who could mend a chasm, so maybe their cousins could visit their vilges and pete in dominations, and the Wolf Tribe could do the same. Idiot. All the Ice Fangs cared for were themselves and no one else. They be trusted on a battlefield, no matter the superstitions of the older shamans. But in times of peace… They didn’t care about Jahey cared that one of their own had sullied her honor and brought shame to the household by attag the wouhat is what they wao fix—to be perfe the eyes of others.

  “Nothing be done,” Impatient One said sternly. “Warlord Janine lost fair and square and was stripped of her rank by the Blessed Mother. An honorable name is not a toy to be passed around. It is a thing of honor, a mark of achievement, and Sword Sairuda has ear tenfold for her as. No one disputes her success.” The food no longer piqued her i, and the shaman stood. “I have had my fill. There is a penane to do.”

  “Have I offended you in any way, Lady Impatient One…” Camelia asked, startled. Or pretending to be startled.

  “You have not,” Impatient One assured her. “You are a generous host, a staunch ally, and I wish your den and your bloodline pead happiness. I was led astray by immaturity. I apologize for the unworthy joke, and I will send you the recipe. sider it a gift from the Wolf Tribe.”

  She said her farewells to the initiates and thahem for the food and service. There will be no uanding in this geion. But ge is iable. What is impossible today may be an everyday reality tomorrow. Patience. She must have patiend do her duties.