Reject me twice (Kira and Theron) novel Chapter 98

[Theron’s POV]

Two weeks isn’t enough. Shadowpine can hold — I’ve rebuilt these walls and retrained these wolves, but holding and winning are different things, measured in reinforcements I don’t have.

I need allies, immediately.

I draft the ravens within the hour. ‘Cyrus of Ashenmoor is marching on Shadowpine to avenge Celeste’s death. The force estimated eighty to one hundred wolves, so reinforcements are needed. Timeline: two weeks.’

I don’t mention Ciri. That conversation requires context no raven’s scroll can carry.

I call the war council that evening. Senna, my senior wolves, and the patrol leaders crowd around the map table. The mood is grim but focused.

I lay out the intelligence, crediting Ciri as a defector without revealing her mission’s full scope. Some wolves bristle.

“She’s been here for weeks,” Garrett, my senior patrol leader, says flatly. “Showed up bleeding on our border with a story that didn’t add up. Now she’s suddenly a strategic asset? How do we know this isn’t part of whatever game she’s playing?”

“The intelligence she’s provided checks against everything we can independently verify,” Senna says, and the hall goes quiet. When my Beta speaks in defense of someone she’s personally furious with, it carries weight.

“I’ve cross-referenced her force estimates against the scout reports and the movement patterns our eastern patrols have logged for weeks. Her numbers are consistent. Her analysis of Cyrus’s tactical preferences matches everything we know about Ashenmoor’s military tradition.”

“Personal feelings about how the intelligence was obtained are irrelevant,” she continues, meeting Garrett’s gaze with the steel authority that makes her the best Beta I’ve ever had. “We use every advantage available, and right now, she is the most significant advantage we possess.”

The room absorbs this. Garrett doesn’t look happy, but he nods.

“Bring her in,” I say.

Ciri enters, and the tension is thick enough to breathe. Every wolf turns — measuring, weighing. She doesn’t flinch but walks to the table and begins.

“Cyrus favors three approaches, and he’ll choose based on terrain and ego — both of which I can predict with reasonable confidence.” She traces the routes on the map.

“His primary option is the eastern pass. Secondary option is the northern ridge approach, which offers concealment but restricts his force to single-file movement through the tree line. He won’t choose it — dividing his column feels like weakness to him. Tertiary option is the southern valley, which provides supply route access but extends his approach by four days. His impatience makes this the least likely.”

“So we fortify the eastern pass,” Garrett says.

“Make it look vulnerable. Cyrus commits hardest when he believes he’s found a weakness. If the eastern approach appears under-defended, he’ll pour everything through it without scouting the flanks. That’s when your ridge positions close the trap.”

The clinical detachment in her voice earns grudging respect — I see it in the way my strategists lean forward, the way questions shift from skeptical to operational.

She fields every challenge with precision, adapting her recommendations based on terrain knowledge the council provides. She’s not performing, she is working.

The woman who arrived bleeding and afraid is gone. In her place stands the strategist, the fighter, the mind Cyrus should have valued and didn’t. He had this asset in his own family and treated her as disposable. The waste infuriates me more than the espionage.

The council runs three hours: defensive positions assigned, patrols restructured, supply reserves calculated. The wolves file out with focused urgency.

The hall empties, but Ciri still gathers her documents.

“Stay.”

“What is it?”

“I’ve heard of Ironridge — in Ashenmoor, before Cyrus sent me here. Some say he’s a reformer who broke from his father’s isolationism. Others insist he’s an opportunist who reads the political winds and positions himself wherever advantage lies.”

“Malik appears to share your assessment.”

She looks at me, and the strategist in her eyes has replaced the vulnerability from last night — sharp, focused, reading the situation the way she reads battlefields.

“Thirty additional wolves could turn the defense in our favor. Or, they could introduce a variable we can’t control at the worst possible moment.”

“We’ll take the wolves and watch the man. Same strategy I used with you.”

The ghost crosses her face. “And look how that turned out.”

“It turned out with you standing in my war council, arming my pack against your own brother. I’d call that a success, Ciri. An ugly, complicated, painful success — but a success.”

She holds my gaze, then returns to the maps. Reinforcements in ten days. An army in the passes led by a man who swore a blood oath over his sister’s memory.

Somewhere between the threat and the defense, something fragile is taking shape between two people who haven’t yet earned the right to name it.