Snow fell harder as the warband staggered east.
Not thick, blinding flurries — no, the Marches weren't so merciful.
The snow here was fine, sharp, endless — a thousand tiny knives cutting into armor gaps, numbing fingers, masking blood.
It coated the corpses left behind from the last raid.
It softened the twisted, frozen shapes of dead men and shattered horses.
It covered sins and survival alike without favor.
Calder Vane moved at the front, Dog's Hunger dragging a faint line through the drifted muck behind him.
Each step forward felt heavier.
Not from doubt.
Not from regret.
Just the simple, grinding knowledge that fewer boots followed him every day.
They weren't a warband anymore.
They were a wound that hadn't finished bleeding out.
Saelen limped now, badly.
Her gut wound, hastily stitched days ago, had turned angry and swollen.
She tried to hide it — tightening her belt over it, keeping her shield high — but Calder noticed.
She fought slower.
Struck slower.
Bled faster.
And in the Marches, that meant death had already marked her shadow.
He didn't speak to her about it.
There was nothing to say.
No healer's mercy, no miraculous recovery.
Only the slow, grim countdown ticking under every wounded breath.
Worse still was Varrick.
The man moved among the warband like a wolf circling wounded prey.
Not in open rebellion.
Not yet.
But his silences had sharpened into something more dangerous.
He spoke only when necessary — short commands, grunted orders to the few survivors who drifted close to his orbit.
No jokes now.
No camaraderie.
Calder caught him once, murmuring low with two others near the supply sleds — too quiet, too intent.
When Calder approached, the conversation died with the speed of a slit throat.
Eyes flickered.
Weapons shifted uneasily in gloved hands.
No open mutiny.
Not yet.
But the scent of it was thick as blood in the snow.
They camped that night in the skeleton of an old orchard.
The trees were twisted black shapes against the snow, clawing at the gray sky like starving hands.
No fires.
No light.
Only raw meat eaten half-frozen, and the hiss of cold wind rasping through hollow trunks.
Calder crouched over a scrap of stolen parchment, rough-sketching a plan.
A Thornhollow hunting party had been spotted nearby — lightly armored scouts sent to track their movements.
If they could catch them, slaughter them, maybe they could shake the pursuit for a few days.
Maybe buy enough time to breathe.
Maybe.
As Calder worked, Saelen approached — slow, careful, favoring her wounded side.
She didn't ask for permission.
She just slumped down across from him with a grunt, the effort drawing sweat to her brow despite the cold.
"You're dying," Calder said without looking up.
Not an accusation.
Just a fact.
Saelen snorted, a sound like wet gravel.
"Been dying since the day I learned to hold a sword. Just quicker now."
Calder allowed himself the ghost of a smile.
The grim kind.
The only kind left.
Varrick passed nearby, pausing just long enough to glance at the two of them.
Measuring.
Weighing.
Then he moved on, muttering something low to one of the younger fighters — a shallow-eyed boy just old enough to grow a spotted beard.
Recruiting.
Building.
Preparing.
Calder filed the observation away without blinking.
He didn't fear Varrick.
Fear was a wasted motion.
But he respected the danger.
And respect, in the Marches, was just another word for readiness to kill.
At dawn, they moved fast, striking for the shallow valley where Thornhollow's scouts had camped.
The snow masked their approach perfectly.
No horns.
No warnings.
Just Calder and the warband crashing through the thin tree line like death sharpened into human form.
The fight was short and brutal.
Calder drove the first scout to the ground with a shoulder-check that cracked ribs.
He finished him without slowing, Dog's Hunger biting through cloak, mail, spine.
Branwen fought near him — moving cleaner, faster now, killing with a kind of cold inevitability that would've sickened the boy he once was.
Saelen smashed into a trio of riders, her strength staggering them — but when she tried to pivot, her side gave out.
She went down hard.
A blade flashed toward her throat —
Calder's knife caught the attacker first, a quick brutal throw that buried the blade to the hilt in the man's eye socket.
They cleared the valley inside fifteen bloody minutes.
The snow turned black with churned-up blood and piss and torn banners.
No survivors.
No quarter.
Calder yanked his knife free from the dead scout's face, wiping it clean in the snow.
He found Saelen leaning against a shattered tree trunk, breathing hard, pale and shaking.
"You can't fight like this again," Calder said.
Saelen bared her teeth in something not quite a grin, not quite a snarl.
"Then I'll die the next time. Better standing than rotting."
Calder nodded.
Nothing else to say.
Varrick watched it all from a safe distance, arms crossed, axe hanging loose in his fist.
Not helping.
Not stepping in.
Waiting.
Waiting for the moment Calder stumbled.
Waiting for the moment the Stonewolf cracked open wide enough to bury a blade inside.
As they looted the bodies, Calder caught Varrick muttering again — low, coaxing words to the more ragged fighters.
He spoke of easier paths.
Of better leadership.
Of a way out of the cold and blood.
He hadn't made a move yet.
But the foundation was crumbling.
Soon.
They made camp on higher ground that night, a cluster of broken stones that once might have been a shrine.
No gods lived here anymore.
Only crows.
Only the endless whimper of the dying wind.
The warband huddled close, every man and woman hunched like beaten dogs, their eyes darting from Calder to Varrick and back again.
Torn loyalties.
Fractured hope.
The crows circled overhead.
Growing restless.
Growing bold.
Waiting for the feast to begin.
Calder sat apart, sharpening Dog's Hunger slowly, methodically.
The blade reflected no firelight.
Only the cold, dead gleam of a man who understood:
Tomorrow, he might have to start killing his own just to finish the march.
And when that moment came, he would not hesitate.
Not because he was cruel.
Not because he enjoyed it.
Because survival wasn't an act of faith.
It was a butcher's ledger.
A tally paid in blood.
The Marches demanded it.
The gods — if they were still watching — demanded it.
And Calder Vane — the last wolf — would pay whatever price survival asked.
Even if it meant carving down every last soul who still called him a leader.