Chapter 56 THE SCOUT

Chapter 56 THE SCOUT

The scout came in just before midday.

Not walking — half dragged by two of Vaska's border wolves who had found him on the eastern approach moving through the trees in a way that suggested he thought he was being subtle and had been wrong about that for at least the last mile.

He was young — younger than Aria had expected, barely past twenty, with dark eyes and a split lip from where he had apparently decided that running was a better option than surrendering and had been corrected on that point.

Vaska's wolves brought him to the center of the camp and Vaska came out of her shelter and looked at him with the flat amber eyes that gave nothing away.

Aria was there because Sable had come to get her and Elara had said go and so she had gone, standing now at the edge of the gathered wolves with Sable beside her and Elara a step behind, watching.

The scout looked around the camp with the calculating eyes of someone who was scared and trying not to show it and was not succeeding particularly well. His gaze moved across the wolves, across Vaska, across Aria — and stopped there for just a moment too long before moving on.

Vaska noticed. Of course she noticed.

"Who sent you?" Vaska said calmly first.

The scout said nothing.

Vaska looked at the wolf on his left. The wolf tightened his grip on the scout's arm and the scout's jaw locked against whatever sound that produced.

"Who sent you?" Vaska said again. Same tone. Same patience but more loud. Like she had all the time in the world and was simply waiting for him to catch up to the reality of his situation.

"I was tracking game," the scout said.

"You were tracking game," Vaska repeated. "On my territory. Through my eastern approach. Past three border markers you would have had to deliberately duck under." She tilted her head. "Try again."

The scout said nothing, just staring.

Vaska looked at Sable. Something passed between them without words. Sable stepped forward and crouched in front of the scout and looked at him at eye level with the unbothered expression she wore for everything.

"Here's what you should understand," Sable said conversationally. "You're inside Ironfang territory. Whatever instructions you were given about what to do if you were caught — they assumed you'd be caught by someone who hadn't been doing this for four years on this specific mountain." She paused. "We know what we're looking at. We know where you came from. We know approximately how many of you there are and we know the direction you came from." She let that sit for a moment. "So the only question is whether you tell us what we're asking and make this easier on yourself or whether you don't and we work with what we already have.".

The scout looked at her. At Vaska. At the wolves surrounding him, then bowed his head a little.

"How many?" Vaska said.

A brief pause.

"Forty," the scout said. His voice was flat and resigned — a man who had done the calculation and arrived at the only sensible answer. "Maybe more by now. He was still sending word to the outer clans when I left."

The camp went quiet.

"He," Vaska said. "Who is he?"

The scout looked at the ground. "I don't know his name," he said. "None of us do. We just follow orders."

"What does he want?" Vaska asked. More curious.

The scout's eyes moved to Aria again. Brief and telling and unmistakable.

Vaska looked at Aria. Then back at the scout. "The girl," she said.

"The children," the scout corrected quietly. "He wants what they carry."

The camp was very still.

Vaska looked at the scout for a long moment. Then she looked at the wolf on his left. "Take him to the eastern shelter. Keep him there." She looked back at the scout. "If you try to run you won't get past the ward. I guarantee that personally."

The wolves took him away.

He groaned as they dragged him out.

Vaska stood in the center of the camp and looked at the ground for a moment. Then she looked up and her eyes moved across her assembled wolves — taking inventory, calculating, doing the thing she did where she looked at a situation and stripped it down to exactly what it was and exactly what it required.

"Forty," wolf two said from beside her. Quietly. Just placing it.

"At least," Vaska said.

"That changes the defensive calculation significantly," wolf two said.

"I know," Vaska said.

She looked north. At the border markers. At the treeline beyond them where seven wolves were sitting in the cold and one Alpha was waiting to be told what came next.

Forty wolves coming from the south.

Possibly more.

Forty one in this camp — minus the injured, minus the untested.

She did the numbers. She had been doing the numbers since the witch came to her last night and she had been coming up with the same answer every time.

She looked at Sable. "Go to the border," she said. "Tell him to come in."

Aria's head turned sharply. "Vaska—"

"Not now," Vaska said. She didn't look at Aria. "This isn't about what happened between the two of you. This is about forty wolves coming down that mountain and what this camp needs to still be standing when they get here." She finally looked at Aria directly. "I need every capable wolf on the right side of this fight. That includes him." She paused. "This is my decision. Not yours."

Aria looked at her for a long moment.

Then she looked away.

She doesn't have any right to make a decision on her own. What was she going to say or do when Kael finally met with her?.

She only came for protection and not for something like this. This doesn't look like freedom anymore.

Sable was already moving toward the northern border.