Chapter Text
The fire at the village center burned high despite the early cold that year, fed with lumbering logs and sprinkled with dried moss until the smoke rolled black and heavy into a white sky.
Funeral pyre and ceremony, all in one.
Every face in Winterhaven stood around it. Old Marta, turning 120 that year, with her walking stick. The Bransen brothers, scarred from last winter's Pig Orc skirmish across their faces. Children held at their mothers' sides, eyes wide and glassy in the firelight, fear clearly ridden on their face. Even the wooden ramparts, tall as redwoods, surrounding the village with members of the town guard on lookout, did not seem to help their fears.
Scott Hunter stood at the flat stone that served as a speaking platform for their village, the spry wolf's instincts as keen as ever, watching and waiting for the last of the villagers to arrive from the hundreds of cabins that made up their village before speaking.
He was not the largest Alpha in Winterhaven. That distinction had always belonged to the Rozanov blood. Though Scott carried his size differently, lean, deliberate, every ounce of muscle earned through years of hauling game back through deep snow and driving younger hunters harder than they thought their bodies could manage. The scar bisecting his brow gave his face a permanent severity. When he spoke, the wolf fangs that pressed slightly past his lower lip caught the light of the pyre, white and sharp, a quiet reminder that the man had teeth in more ways than one.
The villagers nearest the stone shifted unconsciously to give him room they hadn't given anyone else. Not from fear. From recognition. Scott Hunter had fed them through dozens of brutal winters. They knew what he was worth. His voice, more than any other in the village, had weight.
"Grigori Rozanov led this village for seventy-two years, when he was named Chief at the age of 50. The youngest chief our village knew in its long history." His flat voice carried clean across the square and silenced anyone who'd been murmuring in an instant. "He was not gentle. He was not easy. Many called him cruel, and none would deny his cruelness. Yet, he was strong, and he kept us alive when the winters tried to take from us our very lives. When the Dire Wolves came in numbers, it was Grigori alone who held the northern pass alone until the hunting party reached him. When the Kingdom's taxman attempted to levy higher demands of our pelts and meats, it was he who said "come and take it then" and through intimidation alone ensured that no Knight of the King's court ever took more than they deserved."
A murmur threaded through the crowd. Grief, yes, of the fallen chief, that was to be expected. Yet, it was followed with relief, as the iron hand who dictated every move of the village, down to the chef's use of salt in daily meals as "frivolous", was finally released from their necks.
Though in its place, fear soon followed. Fear of the unknown. Fear of being without that strength that kept them alive year after year.
"His youngest son Andrei, barely 20 winters old, challenged our chief when years had finally slowed Grigori. Andrei was warned he was foolish, that he was impatient, and that he was not comparable in strength. None wanted him to be Chief, but he would not hear our words. Yet, he insisted. That is the old law of this land. Strength governs by the Rozanov blood and by the Alphas who are sired by that blood. The strongest leads and none may dare speak out otherwise." Scott's jaw tightened for a moment, the only crack in his composure. "Neither survived the challenge. Despite Irina's best attempts, they have left us for the Great Beyond. The law demands what it demands, and so here we are now."
No one spoke.
The fire popped. Somewhere behind the crowd, a child, one with a soft pair of red fox-tipped ears whimpered and was promptly hushed by a woman with a long, bushy red fox's tail. The blacksmith, a beast of a man covered in soot from the ram-horns on his head all the way down to his cloven feet, scoffed, muttering "the old man still took down a young buck".
"Winterhaven's first chief arrived at this lake five hundred years ago, when this village was eight Beastfolk, a small family and a wall of cut timber, escaping the Capitol and their persecution of our people. They built with their hands in the dark without a single tool to their disposal. They hunted blind in blizzards. They held the line and survived that first winter, because they chose to hold. That is what this village is. Not the timber. Not the stone and ore. Not the precious furs and handsome meats. Not the things the Capitol and Merchants say makes us "valuable". No, it's the choice. The choice to be strong in the face of the brutal ways of the world. That is why we are Winterhaven. We are winter's haven." Scott let that sit. Then he turned, and his eyes found Ilya standing to the left of the stone platform. "Ilya Rozanov is now the last of that bloodline and heritage. The last of the Rozanovs!"
Ilya stepped up onto the stone, brushing past Scott, towering over the older man with ease.
He felt every pair of eyes immediately.
Old Marta's looked tired. The Bransen brothers' blank expression wasn’t a great sight to behold. A few of the younger men, the hunters and the guard, looked him straight in the eyes, not with hostility, but with uncertainty.
They were all asking the same questions.
"Can Grigori's cub do this?"
"Should Scott be leading instead? He's an Alpha, too! A strong one!"
"What of Irina? The former Chief's wife has rarely left her bed in a month. Will we even have a healer this season?"
"Will we make it through this winter? Does the cub know of our harvest situation? Will the timber stocks hold? All signs point to a brutal, early winter."
Ilya was thirty years old. Twenty whole winters younger than he should have been before taking this mantle.
Grigori had been a bear of a man in more than his shifted form, someone whose presence had occupied a room before he entered it.
Ilya felt the gap between what he was and what the village expected.
He looked down at himself. The leathers were new, stitched tight across the broad chest, layered over with wolf-fur at the shoulders that added width he didn't need. His hands hung at his sides, clawed and broad, each finger thick and scarred. He'd spent the better part of the morning binding his forearms in dark cord, the way his father had, the way that made a man look deliberate and his muscles look dangerous.
As an Alpha, Ilya was enormous. He knew that much. Six and a half feet of dense muscle and brown curls, with a thick layer of body hair that sprouted around every nook and cranny of himself. Power granted to him by his Alpha nature, and built up by years of hauling timber in his youth, hunting down game with the hunters, cutting orcs and dire wolves down with the guard, and running the northern pass until his legs gave out to ensure he was faster than any Dire Wolf.
The village boys used to dare each other to touch his arms when he wasn't looking, then scatter like startled birds. Back in the day, he'd let them, and playfully chase them in feigned anger and chuck them in the lake for fun. He wondered if he would still be able to have such levity.
Though size was the only thing he had going for him. Grigori had everything else that truly mattered.
Grigori hadn't needed the wolf-fur trim to prove he'd killed dire wolves. He hadn't needed the cord-wrap or the new leather to be a display of his muscles and strength. The old man stood stark naked in the middle of a blizzard once when he'd been "questioned" about his strength as chief and made grown men reconsider their choices with nothing but a look at him bearing the worst that Winter had to offer.
Ilya had merely dressed himself like a chief this morning and hoped no one noticed the difference. He hoped people would quit seeing him as Grigori’s cub.
"Was he always that big?"
"Always. Ilya would have been as strong as Grigori, if he'd just been given more time to grow."
"Have you seen him shift into his Grizzly? That monster towers over entire houses! Surely we are safe in his guidance!"
"Size does not mean leadership. It only means strength. Strength will not keep us warm and fed."
"Unbonded, still at 30. No cubs. Many wonder why he rejected all of his father's Omega offerings from the village. Plenty of beautiful women, at the ripe age to bear children."
"They say it was because of his duties to the village. I say that is nothing but a lie. Scott has two children with Kip and runs the Hunters just fine as their leader!"
"Well he needs to get a hurry on! He's the last of the Rozanovs! We need heirs!"
The doubt in the crowd was not malicious.
That almost made it worse, in Ilya's eyes. It was the doubt of people who had survived too many things in the coldest, cruelest part of the kingdom, to spend hope carelessly. Even on him, the beloved son of Grigori and Irina. That was the cruelty of Winter in Winterhaven.
"I do not blame them." Ilya thought. "I would never blame anyone for being scared."
"I know what you are thinking. Allow me to silence those vile thoughts." Ilya's voice came out larger and deeper than he intended, the vowels of his Winterhaven tongue rounding and rolling in the cold air. "You are thinking… he is young. You are thinking… his father was great, and his brother was bold, and the one left standing is the quiet one. The careful one. One who is not fit to rule."
He looked at them. Let the silence hold a moment, trying to scrunch his face into something intimidating, before the fire.
"Good."
A few heads shifted, confused by the wording.
"My father ruled for seventy-two years with iron and will and I would not dishonor him by pretending I am him. I am not. I am Ilya." He pressed his fist once against his chest, the tattoo he allowed to be seen from a torn fragment of his leathers, the bear inked in black and ochre across his right pec, something his mother had overseen the morning of his first shift when he was barely 16 winters. "I will tell you what I am. I am this village's son. Every scar on this land is in my blood. Every winter this village has survived is alive in me and I will not let it die. What I lack of my father, I make up for in pride and conviction, for this village, my people, are my everything!" His voice had risen without his intending it. Ilya roared out, his words pressing all the way into the sky. "I swear to you on Grigori's name, on Andrei's grave, on my mother's hands, I will make this village as strong as it has ever been. Stronger. THAT IS MY WILL AND THAT IS MY OATH!"
The crowd did not erupt in applause or celebration. Ilya hadn't expected them to. That was not Winterhaven's way.
Yet, he saw something ease in the faces before. Not belief, not yet. Willingness, maybe. The willingness to wait and see. His words had been strong, and his reputation, aside from his lack of a mate, was exemplary.
Old Marta struck her walking stick once against the frozen ground with a "here, here!". A few children looked a little less afraid. The Bransen brothers held their hands up together in solidarity. Silent, but strong. The people did not kneel or bow, for none knelt or bowed in Winterhaven, such things were for the Capitol and their fools. Yet, Ilya knew, all the same, he'd been accepted.
The "for now" was unspoken but clear.
Scott met his eyes and gave a single, small nod. The hunters of the village, one by one, came up and patted Ilya on the shoulder, shaking his hand. A sign they, the most valuable assets of the village, had accepted Ilya as their chief.
The town guard, behind their leader, Troy, did the same, patting and shaking as they all promptly returned to their post. "Nothing to see here, get back to work!" Troy had barked, as if this were just another day on the job.
The smiths, the miners, the tanners, the weavers, the loggers… Each and every faction of their village, each one a necessary component of their people's survival and the reason that gold still traveled all the way north to them, accepted him.
Soon, the crowd dispersed. The ceremony and passing of the torch was done.
Ilya stepped off the stone, as the Alpha Chief of Winterhaven.
He kept his face composed through the greetings with the villagers. Shook hands. Let the elderly touch his tattoo and offer prayers in the old manner. Made promises to "finally" start seeking an Omega and have cubs, to silence the social stigma.
Ilya answered three separate questions about the timber stores, assurances of food stocks and harvest management and one about the northern pass's rumored orc overflow before he let himself look again toward the edge of the crowd where he'd spotted the strangers.
He had noticed them during the second half of Scott's speech. Two figures near the gap between Marta's house and the old storage barn, close enough to observe, far enough to be uncertain of their welcome.
Now, with the crowd dispersing and the fire settling to a slower burn, Ilya crossed the square at an unhurried pace, his fur cloak billowing behind him.
The first was a surprise to him. A human. Humans rarely left the comfort of the Capitol, they rarely survived the extreme cold and hostile environments. He was shorter, athletic in a compact and deliberate way, leather armor worn smooth at the shoulders. He wore his hood up, and his eyes tracked Ilya's approach, cautious, but not frightened. There was a crossbow at his back. and a sword at his side. He had the bearing of someone trained to protect rather than to fight, which was a different thing entirely.
The other one was…
The scent hit him before conscious thought could name it.
Beastfolk, for sure. Fox. Clean and sharp and layered under it something cool, like the underside of a pine branch after snow.
Omega. Unmistakable.
Ilya had smelled Omegas before. There were twenty in the village, all but four mated by this point, whose scents he had long since catalogued into background noise. Uninterested, his instinct had told him.
This was not background noise. This was entirely new and it moved through him the way the first deep breath of spring air moves, after a long and unforgiving winter of isolation.
The man himself was lean and stood very straight. White fluff fox's tail, still, not raised or curled, just present, held with deliberate control. Freckles across his nose above a composed expression. Sharp eyes that had been watching Ilya from the moment he started crossing the square and showed no intention of pretending otherwise.
Ilya gathered himself.
He was aware, in the practical part of his mind, that he had just finished swearing before his entire village to be a strong and capable chief. He was also aware that something instinctual and inconveniently basic had just lit up in his chest and was making him want to act in ways unbefitting of a chief.
Ilya pushed it down. Firmly. Buried it the way he buried most thoughts that troubled him.
The human spoke first.
"We didn't mean to interrupt the ceremony, Chief Rozanov. We arrived at the tree line just as it was starting. We are sorry for your loss and express our sincerest wish for your success." His voice was measured, accent from the Capitol, words chosen carefully. Pretty words that usually didn't mean much. "Hayden Pike. Former Knight of the Realm, now personal attendant and bodyguard. We come in peace and ask for an audience with you." He didn't specify to whom he was guarding but the slight tilt of his head made it obvious.
The fox-tailed man said nothing immediately. He studied Ilya for a long while, at least a minute, before finally breaking the silence.
"Shane Hollander, scholar." A pause. "I am an Herbalist."
"From the Capitol," Ilya said.
"From anywhere there are herbs worth studying." The correction was not rude. Merely accurate.
The pine-frost scent of Shane drifted on the air again and Ilya kept his expression even and his hands still, claws pressed flat against his palms so they didn't show.
"You have come far. At least a month's travel by foot," he said. Ilya saw the state of their clothes, their boots, and their packs. No way they had come by anything other than their own two feet. "Impressive," Ilya thought. Usually getting this far required a guide from someone familiar with Winterhaven, or a kind of resolve you didn't find in the Capitol.
"We have, yes." Shane muttered, with about as much enthusiasm as you'd expect from someone who'd said they'd walked down the street.
Ilya was intrigued. Few Omegas, even beast folk, could handle such a hard journey.
"Then come inside. You will be cold in a few hours' time. Your human? I am surprised he even stands." He turned back toward the great hall without waiting, because if he stood in the open air breathing that Omega's scent for much longer, the careful composure he had built for his new life as Chief would crumble in an instant.
The Great Hall was the largest structure in Winterhaven by a wide margin, built from timber so old it had darkened into a petrified state, the walls thick enough that the wind outside became little more than a nuisance.
Pelts hung between the rafters. A long table dominated the center, scarred with use, flanked by benches worn smooth. The fire at the far ends of the hall had been burning long enough that the stones around it had gone the color of old rust.
Shane made note of it all in the time it took Ilya to push the doors open.
One long hall. Single entrance. Defensive architecture, not ceremonial. Every piece of furniture chosen for durability. No decorative flourish beyond the pelts, and those were functional, insulation, status markers, hunting record all at once.
The only concession to aesthetics was the carved bear above the hearth, rough-hewn and without delicacy, but unmistakably intentional. The same mark that Ilya showed inked on his skin.
Practical people.
Good. He'd work with practical. At least they'd be better than the spiritualist nuts worshiping the sun. As if the sun was going to do anything but warm the land.
Two men had followed them in without invitation, likely Ilya's lap dogs, which Shane had heard about through the whispers in the ceremony.
Scott Hunter, who smelled of old blood through his soaked leathers and the scent of burning bark. He had the flat, expression of someone who was always thinking about risk and reward. An overthinker. Big, brawny, and bulky, clearly an Alpha who worked from dawn until dusk. Yet, a thinker. Interesting.
Troy Barrett followed behind, taller, with the hard stillness of a guard captain who probably learned a long time ago that silence and listening was a valuable commodity. He looked at Shane the way all other Alphas looked at Shane. With a gaze that read "why aren't your pregnant with your third child yet" and "why do you care so much about silly plants?" Shane rolled his eyes. No use in trying to talk to that one. A traditionalist, through and through.
Alphas near the door. Closest to exits. Oldest instinct in the book. They were ready and waiting to follow their Chief's orders, no matter what that would end up being.
Along the walls, a handful of Betas, a surprising number of them Beastfolk, moved through the space, banking the fire higher, adding split logs, setting cups on the table without being asked. They worked as though they were invisible to the Alphas in the room, a skill learned by being useful and unremarkably ordinary. A sad fact of life that came with Betas. Most only viewed them as "labor force", since they lacked the leadership and raw power of Alphas or the heightened senses and "sexual" luxuries of Omegas. One of them caught Shane's eye briefly and looked away.
"Pity. Betas can be so much more than what the Alphas that rule them pigeonhole them into."
Hayden had already clocked all three Alphas. Shane felt him settle two steps back and slightly to his left, which was his positioning when he was alert but not alarmed. Shane wondered if the Alphas saw Hayden as a threat or not. "Probably not", he thought, blankly. He hoped Hayden wouldn't have to prove his strength or show off that Silvered blade or silvered bolts of his. The last Alpha Beastfolk that tried to "take" Shane on the road was now six feet under for underestimating "the human".
There was only one Omega visible in the room. A man with white rabbit ears, flopped against his head, carrying a tray of dried meat and hard bread. He moved to the table, set it down without a word, and retreated to the far end of the hall where a low set of shelves held cookware and bundled herbs strung upside-down. The Omega wasn't afraid. His scent was calm, just careful and weary, as if he was wanting to impress someone. Probably the new Chief.
So. Alphas at the threshold. Betas serving the room. The one visible Omega managing the domestic end of things with competence.
Archaic, but expected. Not that the Capitol or anywhere else was much better. Entirely functional for an isolated northern settlement whose primary survival mechanism was collective physical strength and a unified front.
Shane found it neither surprising nor offensive. Though, to be fair, Winterhaven had one thing going for it that the Capitol never had: An Alpha leader who would hold audience with an unmated Omega.
Ilya sat at the head of the table. The chair did not look built for ceremony, no high back, no carving, but he filled it in with weight and bulk that made it look like it had always been his. He'd removed the fur-trimmed cloak, and without it, the sheer width of his shoulders was clearer. The tattoo on his right pec was visible through the parted collar of his leathers. Bear, rendered in broad, unpretentious lines.
He gestured at the bench near Shane.
Shane sat. Hayden remained standing. Scott and Troy settled along the side bench, not eating, not speaking, just present in the way that senior men in any hierarchy were present.
"You are an Herbalist." Ilya said. Not a question.
"Yes." Shane set his pack on the bench beside him. "I come seeking knowledge of your land’s herbs. Winterhaven sits on a mineral-dense soil formed from glacial retreat in the mountains farther north. The combination of long freeze and short thaw creates preservation conditions that develop medicinal compounds unavailable further south and provide a wide variety of benefits when crossed with other alchemical reagents. Three species of interest are known as boreal ashwort, frost thistle, and what I assume is called black smoke moss, though the naming is likely regional rather than botanical. I assume because your family has used it for both ritual and medicine, as I saw you do with the Pyre."
A short silence. Nobody understood a word Shane had just said, that much was clear. Even Hayden, with a traditional Knight's education, looked at Shane as though he had three heads.
"I know these plants. My mother speaks of ashwort, thistle, and this moss before. You know this from books? Or how did you come to learn of these? Speaking frankly, these are facts that should only be known to the healers of our village. These herbs are precious to our people, and that information is tightly controlled. We do not share, because they are ours." Ilya said, curiously.
Scott and Troy moved their hands to their weapons. Scott, a bow, and Troy, a massive blade on his back.
Hayden already had a hand on the hilt of his blade.
Shane rolled his eyes.
"Books? No. Books of herbs and medicine in the Capitol are hogwash. Mostly superstition. I've been traveling in this country since I was sixteen years old, over 12 years ago now. The rumors of these plants I picked up from traveling merchants and someone who was treated in this village by a rare salve. Based on those descriptions, I spent the last three years cross-referencing weather records and trying to draft up possible soil maps. Then, it came to me the kind of plants that would make the most sense to survive, and used the general descriptions of what the travelers told me. I'm glad my years of hypothesis were correct. I wasn't entirely confident with thistle, but I'm stubborn when I get an idea in my head."
Ilya paled. "You… You did not know they existed. You merely… thought?"
Shane nodded. "Until you confirmed them, yes. They were just theory."
A complicated look washed over Ilya's face. He rubbed his forehead, and waved at Troy and Scott. They put their weapons away. As did Hayden.
"Why do you come here for? To collect these herbs? To try and make deal for trading?" Ilya asked.
Shane met his eyes and laughed. "Commerce? No. Gold and coin are the greatest enemies of research and medicine. A blight, if I can be blunt." He sighed and pulled out a thick journey he'd been working in. "I would like to study them directly. I intend to spend a year here. As I said before, I am an herbalist and a practitioner of medicine. That is my work and has been since I was sixteen. Herbs and medicine are my life's work and the only thing that matters to me in the slightest. I have no need of gold, only the knowledge that comes from this land.”
Ilya's expression was attentive but not yet committed. Shane had spoken to enough chiefs and governors in the last four years to recognize the particular quality of a man calculating costs in his head.
"You are two more mouths," Ilya said. "Two more people to shelter, feed, protect through a long winter. Your human is especially…"
"Hayden is capable of carrying his own weight," Shane said, without heat. "He has done it in four settlements before yours."
"It is not about capability. It is about resource and if I think you are worth it.”
"Then consider this." Shane reached into the pack and drew out a flat cedar box. He set it on the table and pushed it across without ceremony. "Forty-two compounded preparations. Pain suppressants, fever reducers, wound sealants, three variants of respiratory treatment for cold weather illness, and a general tonic for fatigue. All correctly labeled. All correctly dosed for both adults and children, Alpha, Beta, and Omega. Enough to last for an entire season."
He reached in again and set a stitched journal beside it.
"These are instructions. Detailed enough that anyone with basic literacy and moderate patience can replicate them. When I leave, Winterhaven keeps the knowledge. You can supplant most of the ingredients with local ones for even greater effects."
Scott glanced at the box. Troy didn't move. The omega in the corner went pale.
"So I was right." A smirk on Shane’s face. He knew he had them.
Ilya looked at neither of his subordinates. He looked at Shane.
"You would give us that freely?"
"Not for free. As early payment for lodging, food, and protection." Shane folded his hands on the table. "I also notice that at least six people in the square this morning were coughing. Two of your guards were sneezing at their post. One man walked around with a bloody wound bandaged incorrectly. That suggests you don't currently have an active healer. I imagine this offer is quite nice then, yes?"
Ilya was quiet for just a hair too long. A crack in his otherwise unbreakable mask.
"My mother is the village healer," Ilya said. "She has been... unwell. Since the passing. Much on her mind and shoulders. She failed to save either her husband or her youngest son's life after the battle for leadership."
Shane rose an eyebrow immediately. "Be wary. Grief suppresses the healing factor of the body. She'll need monitoring. In this environment, grief can turn to death quite easily. I've seen it plenty of times before."
"Yes." A heaviness moved through his voice, brief and real, before he covered it. He was poor at covering things. His face broadcast everything, the grief, the pride, the faint relief he hadn't quite intended to show when Shane mentioned the respiratory treatments.
Shane had seen smarter politicians. He had rarely seen honest ones.
"Too emotional for effective leadership," Shane noted privately. "Decision making involves instinct rather than information. Passionate, certainly. Compelling, even, but passion is not a system."
Still, the man had spoken to his village without pretense this morning. Shane had stood at the tree line listening, and whatever critique he applied to Ilya's methodology, he could not fault the sincerity. The village had felt it. So had he, though he attributed that to the acoustics of the square and the shock of an honest village leader for once.
Ilya rose. He moved around the table's edge to retrieve the cedar box, turning it in his enormous hands. He checked its contents, sniffing it, and nodding, as if he understood what was in there.
The shift in air was immediate.
Not sharp, not the aggressive scent-dominance of an Alpha asserting rank. Something warmer and more complicated. Wood resin and the particular cold-iron note of a body that had been outside for hours. Underneath that, something harder to name, the way certain bark smells when you cut fresh into it and parts of that wood had still been alive on the inside.
The scent moved through Shane's lungs before he could stop it.
His tail, which he kept still as a matter of discipline, made one involuntary curl against his waist.
He pressed the sensation down. Hard. He bit his tongue.
"Scent is just about compatibility." Shane gulped. "This is nothing more than an Omega sensing compatibility with a strong, virile, handsome Alpha. Any unmated Omega would feel the same. He would make excellent children. If one were interested in that kind of thing."
This did not mean anything. This did not have to mean anything.
Ilya set the box back on the table and looked at him steadily.
"You will stay," he said. "On one additional condition. You and your human make yourselves useful. The herbs, the knowledge, all of that is good, but Winterhaven needs a healer now, this winter, not a promise of instructions on paper after you have left with our precious knowledge. While my mother is unwell, you act as healer. You treat what needs treating. You do not refuse work because it falls outside your research. You do not ignore emergencies for your research. Winterhaven and its people are first. Your research is second. I will not accept anything less for knowledge of our land. Should you ever fail in this, I will cast you out without a single hesitation, even in cold of Winter. Are we agreed?"
Shane considered this for approximately two seconds.
"Agreed."
Shane stood up, barely up to Ilya's chest, and extended his hand across the table.
Ilya looked at it for a moment, then clasped it. His grip swallowed Shane's hand entirely. The claws, curled back to avoid breaking skin, pressed cold against Shane's knuckles.
"Good." Ilya released him and straightened. He turned to the rabbit-eared Omega at the far end of the hall. "Kip. The herbalist's cabin beside my quarters. Have it opened and aired. Bring firewood. Have my mother's things taken to her private quarters."
Troy's short antlers, barely visible under his dark hair, pushed fractionally upward. The only tell the man allowed himself.
"Chief." His voice carried the particular flatness of a man selecting his words from a very short list. "The herbalist's hut shares a wall with your quarters."
"I know where my own quarters are, Troy."
"Strangers. That close? Do you think this is wise?"
Ilya's expression didn't shift. "One is a human who thinks a silver sword will give him an edge against a man three times his size, five times size when I am shifted, and one is a tiny omega with a tail and the body of one who ponders books day and night. I think I will survive the proximity."
Hayden swore under his breath.
Shane's gaze moved to his pack, sitting against the bench leg. Inside it, wrapped individually in treated cloth and separated by cork stoppers. Oil of nightshade concentrate, powdered widow's cap fungus, a tincture of black henbane potent enough to stop a grown man's heart in under four minutes, and seven other preparations that the Capitol's apothecary board would have revoked his license over, had they known. (Not that Shane cared, they were necessary for his research and education to continue.)
Each one, having been responsible for taking the life of beast, man, and Beastfolk alike on their trips, a big reason they had been able to survive the Winterhaven's monster population.
Shane said nothing. Overall, it was better to let people think you are weak than think you were strong. They'd all underestimate him, which would give him a sizable advantage in the future.
"The hut will be prepared by nightfall," Kip said from the far end of the hall, already moving toward the door, ears lifting slightly with purpose.
Shane stood, gathered his things, and prepared himself for the longest winter of his life.