Page 18 of Iron Beneath the Snow

“If he can’t,” another said, “it fractures them.”

Soren did not look up.

“They will not call it a failure,” he said at last.

His voice carried easily through the hall without rising.

“They will call it contamination.”

A low ripple of sound moved through the group—not quite laughter, but close enough.

“They’ll declare her ruined,” someone said. “And bury her.”

“Or cleanse her,” another added, more quietly.

Soren’s jaw tightened, the movement small but visible.

“They won’t kill her.”

The certainty came too quickly.

Silence settled at the table, sharper than before.

His second’s gaze shifted toward him.

“And if they do?” the wolf asked.

Soren lifted his head then, meeting the question directly.

“They won’t,” he said again, slower this time, the words set more deliberately into place.

Because if they did, Frostvein would lose more than a daughter.

They would lose leverage.

Vargan was not careless enough to destroy an asset out of anger.

“She was central to their union pact,” Soren continued, his tone returning to its usual steadiness. “If that union collapses, so does the standing it secures.”

“So what do we do?” his second asked.

Soren straightened, his focus shifting from the map to the room as a whole.

“We ensure they cannot contain it quietly.”

Understanding moved across several faces, not immediate, but inevitable once the line of thought revealed itself.

“You’ve already marked her,” one of the older wolves said. “That’s enough.”

“Not if Frostvein hides her and calls it purification,” Soren replied.

He turned away from the table and walked toward the far end of the hall, where the Ironfang sigil had been carved directly into the stone—jaws open, iron driven through bone, a mark that carried no pretense of sanctity.

His hand rested briefly against the cold surface.

“They will call her unclean,” he said. “That works in our favor.”

A pause followed, longer this time.