The days and weeks that followed were busy.

  Grub moved through the cavern from dusk until dawn with a kind of quiet, relentless purpose. Each time Dravak’s eyes found him, he was somewhere new. One moment he worked with the three assigned Warriors, fitting logs into place and directing how mud should be packed between them. The next he stood beneath the smoke-stained ceiling, palm pressed to stone, listening for hollows only he could hear. When his Mana ran thin, he shifted without complaint to other tasks. He knelt beside children and showed them how to handle the wolf pups gently but firmly. He checked bindings on wounds. He hauled water. He scraped mud into baskets.

  He ate standing. Slept little. Complained never.

  Dravak had seen goblins driven by fear. By hunger. By pride.

  He had never seen one driven by something as steady as this.

  After Grub had revealed his magic to the tribe, Dravak had watched him closely. Closer than he let on. He had expected to see signs of it. That old rot from the stories. A hunger to command. A taste for being feared. A spark of something that wanted more than its place.

  He saw none of it.

  Instead he saw stone dust coating Grubs skin and resin beneath his nails. He saw arms that trembled from days of hard work. He saw a goblin who worked until his Mana emptied and then found other work to fill the hours until it returned.

  Not a simmering threat, but a tool. A sharp one.

  While Grub worked himself lean on stubborn purpose, Dravak turned his focus outward. He sent more hunting parties into the forest in careful rotations, never risking too many at once. He began rationing food and firewood with a hard eye toward the coming freeze. He counted spears. Counted bodies. Counted how many could still stand in a line if something tested them again.

  And he kept one eye on what was changing inside his cavern.

  At the same time, the four former slaves still spent most of their hours among the wounded. Grub had taught them his cleaning and binding, and they moved now with the confident rhythm of work that fit their hands.

  They washed with bark-brown water that stung and bit. They bound with cloth smeared in warmed resin, sealing torn skin shut. They checked for heat and swelling and darkening flesh. They recognized when a wound was closing cleanly and when it needed to be torn open again. They renewed bindings before the resin hardened and cracked, and pressed the strange black charcoal paste into seams to seal them.

  The smell of rot that had once clung to the wounded corner of the cave thinned, then vanished.

  One evening, as Dravak passed by that corner out of habit, he used Identify on the nearest of the four.

  The words that rose before his eyes made him stop.

  [Goblin Medic – Level 3]

  Health: 40/40 | Stamina: 30/30 | Mana: 10/10

  Medic.

  Not Warrior.

  He flicked his gaze to the others and identified them in turn.

  [Goblin Medic – Level 2]

  [Goblin Medic – Level 2]

  [Goblin Medic – Level 3]

  Same name. Same change.

  The Warriors, no, the Medics, noticed his stare and shifted uneasily.

  “What is it, Chief?” one asked, voice suddenly hoarse.

  Dravak grunted. “Open your Status.”

  They blinked at him, then did as commanded, eyes unfocusing as they looked inward.

  A beat of silence.

  Then their faces changed. Eyes widened in shock. Then something almost like fear, quickly smothered under rough pride.

  “Medic,” one whispered. “The System calls me Medic.”

  “Me too,” the others echoed one by one, thumping their chests with a fist. “We are not Warriors anymore.” Their faces fell slightly at the realization, and their gazes instinctively moved over to Grub, who was currently busy near the cave mouth working on the construction of the new wall.

  A few nearby goblins who had overheard the proclamation muttered under their breath. “Medics. Hmph.” “Strange tribe,” someone said darkly. Dravak turned a hard stare on them and they quickly averted their gazes.

  Grub noticed the commotion and headed over, appearing at the edge of the group, dust and mud still on his hands. He paused for a moment, seemingly Identifying them.

  “Good,” he said simply. “That means you have learned well. The tribe will need all of you.”

  The four newly designated Medics straightened at that, as if the words had given them a new spine. They nodded and went back to their work with renewed intent.

  Dravak moved on, mind racing. This was a name he had never seen given to a goblin before. Another change, another bit of strangeness bestowed upon his tribe by Grub’s actions. Strange ways, strange results indeed.

  Change was not something most Chiefs liked nor accepted. But this change was keeping more of his goblins alive than it killed.

  For now, he decided that was acceptable to him.

  The wall rose under the cave mouth like a crude second jaw.

  Dravak did not often step close to watch its construction, but he saw enough in passing.

  It did not appear all at once. The first few days, the three assigned Warriors dragged down cut saplings from the slope and stripped them clean. They wedged the first upright supports into natural crevices along the stone edges of the opening, bracing them with rocks hammered tight by hand.

  Crossbeams followed, lashed together with thick hide strips pulled until the wood creaked under tension. Mud and torn grass were packed into the growing lattice, pushed deep into gaps with fingers and flat stones.

  They did not close it fully.

  “Not yet,” Grub had said when one Warrior reached to start sealing the uppermost spaces. “If we close it now, the smoke will choke us out long before the vent is finished.”

  So the top third remained open and jagged. Wind still slipped through, but lower down its bite was dulled.

  The design for the doorway came next.

  Grub marked the height against the stone with a charcoal line well above his own head, nearly six feet tall. Taller than Dravak.

  “No stooping,” he had said simply when one of the Warriors helping him had asked why it was so large.

  The Warriors grunted in agreement at that. They understood.

  A thick slab of wood was cut and shaved from a large tree they had found fallen over in the forest. It was carefully flattened along one face and trimmed along the sides until it could sit snugly between two heavy uprights. It was crude but massive, heavy enough that four goblins strained when lifting it.

  The gap for the door was left open as the rest of the wall grew around it.

  When they first tried to set the slab into place to test its fit, it rocked. Not much, but it was just enough to be a problem.

  Grub crouched and investigated the floor where the slab would sit. He found that the cave floor at the mouth sloped and rippled in shallow rises and worn depressions. When walking through, no one noticed. But when they tried to brace the slab upright and press it into its frame, one lower corner refused to sit cleanly. The slab shifted under pressure. It would not hold steady enough to brace from the inside.

  One Warrior swore and kicked at the stone. The slab wobbled harder.

  Grub frowned as he looked at the small ridge at the corner of the gap, then turned to the Warriors nearby.

  “Lift,” he said.

  The Warriors heaved the slab away, grunting with the effort.

  Grub placed his hand over the raised section and began. Stone Chip bit shallowly into the uneven ridge and slowly but surely, small flakes snapped free.

  Chip.

  Chip.

  Chip.

  A faint dusting of stone gathered around his makeshift boots.

  He paused once to feel the bump, then shaved a little more from the high spots.

  When he finished, he ran his palm across the area.

  Flatter.

  “Set it again,” he said.

  They lowered the slab back into position.

  This time it sat square and steady.

  One of the Warriors pressed his shoulder into it experimentally. It held. He leaned harder.

  Still solid.

  Grub found the hollow in the ceiling on the third day.

  He had been climbing up and down a crude scaffold for hours, palm flat against the ceiling, tapping and listening while the fire smoked beneath him. To Dravak, every knock sounded the same. Stone on stone.

  To Grub, one answered differently.

  He froze above the hearth, pressed his palm to the rock, and tapped again.

  A dull note.

  He shifted his hand a fraction.

  Tap.

  There.

  Thinner stone. Not open sky. Not yet. But closer than anywhere else.

  “This is the place,” he said quietly.

  Dravak gave a single nod. The Warriors steadied the ladder without comment.

  Grub wrapped cloth over his mouth and nose and began to work.

  Stone Chip was patient magic.

  A flick of his fingers.

  A thin flake snapped free.

  Dust drifted down through the firelight and settled across the hearthstones.

  He chipped again.

  And again.

  The cavern was mostly quiet, except for the steady crack of stone surrendering slivers of itself.

  When his Mana thinned, the cutting stopped.

  His vision blurred at the edges. His fingers trembled. Grub knew the line between pushing forward and losing control.

  So he climbed down and worked elsewhere.

  He hauled wood with the three Warriors at the cave mouth. He packed mud into seams. He watched how the logs settled against stone. He corrected angles. He observed.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  When his Mana had returned, he climbed up again.

  Tap.

  Listen.

  Chip.

  Chip.

  Chip.

  The hollow widened slowly under the steady rhythm of his work.

  A shallow indentation became a bowl no deeper than a thumb joint. Each time he carved another layer away, he pressed his palm into the fresh stone and listened again. The hollow shifted course as thickness changed. Sometimes he had to angle the cut sideways, following the weakness instead of forcing a straight path.

  The vent would not be a tunnel drilled blindly.

  It would be a path coaxed through the rock.

  Weeks passed in this way.

  The rhythm of the cavern began to shift around him.

  Huddling around the morning fires, trying to stave off the cold.

  Hunting parties leaving to find the game that hadn't already fled from the incoming winter.

  Medics binding wounds when the Hunters came back with bleeding wounds.

  Children drilling with the spear and with their wolves.

  The rhythm of Grubs' work filling the cavern.

  Tap.

  Chip.

  Chip.

  Chip.

  Tap.

  Repeat.

  The small irregularities from his Miscast perk became familiar companions.

  A faint spark that snapped against stone and died before anyone noticed. A wisp of smoke curling from his fingertips that blended easily with the hearth. A brief dampness against his palm that made the rock feel as if it had sweated.

  At first he had flinched.

  Now he barely paused.

  He chalked them up to the System’s idea of humor. A Unique Perk that so far had felt like little more than a nuisance, and more often than not, a detriment.

  Still, some small stubborn part of him held onto hope.

  One day, he thought, this will mean something. One day it will not just be an annoying quirk. It will matter. He refused to believe that the System would actually punish him for the choice he had made way back then in the void.

  Until then, he simply ignored the small effects and kept working.

  Grub had to admit that the work he had been doing came at a cost.

  He felt it in the ache that never quite left his shoulders. In the way his fingers trembled faintly, and the dull throb behind his eyes when he pushed his Mana too low, too often. He ate standing more nights than not. Woke up early and slept late.

  He had been running himself thin.

  But it had not been for nothing.

  He had been using his Skills and Spells constantly over the past weeks. Climbing up and down the scaffold. Chipping stone. Tapping and listening. Binding wounds. Brewing tannin water. Cooking. Identifying. Testing. Repeating. Again and again, until the actions felt less like effort and more like instinct. He had even managed to sneak in some practice with Pebble Toss occasionally, even though he wasn't using it for the wall or the vent.

  And the System had noticed.

  Grub pulled up his notifications and let his eyes move over the long list of messages that had accumulated.

  [Congratulations! Quick Feet has reached Level 5.]

  [Congratulations! Climbing has reached Level 3.]

  [Congratulations! Stealth has reached Level 3.]

  [Congratulations! Identify has reached Level 4.]

  [Congratulations! Cooking has reached Level 4.]

  [Congratulations! First Aid has reached Level 6.]

  [Congratulations! Herbal Insight has reached Level 6.]

  [Congratulations! Stone Chip has reached Tier 1 Level 6.]

  [Congratulations! Stone Tap has reached Tier 1 Level 5.]

  [Congratulations! Grain Shift has reached Tier 1 Level 5.]

  [Congratulations! Pebble Toss has reached Tier 1 Level 3.]

  There had been more in between. Smaller steps. Incremental gains. But these were the ones that mattered.

  He flexed his fingers slowly, feeling the difference in ways that were hard to name. He did not feel stronger in a single obvious way. He wasn't faster, or smarter. Just… more capable. More certain.

  The System rewarded effort.

  And Grub had given it everything he had.

  Each time Identify leveled, he tried using it again on Dravak, Throk, and Kesh.

  And each time, the result had been the same.

  Question marks.

  Even now with the Skill at Level 4, when the description clearly stated it worked on creatures five or fewer levels above him, the three of them remained unreadable. Which meant they were at least six levels higher than he was.

  That was sobering.

  The rest of the tribe, however, was not beyond him.

  The children had reached Level 2. Most adult goblins ranged between Level 3 and 5. And a handful of hardened warriors now stood at Level 7 or 8.

  Grub found that quietly impressive.

  When he had first arrived, most of the tribe had hovered between Level 2 and 5. The battle against the dire wolves had been costly.

  But it had also been fruitful.

  Strength had been carved out of blood.

  The Ironfang were smaller now, sure, but the ones who remained were stronger for what they had survived.

  Each time his Mana ran dry, Grub turned to the children.

  They were no longer the scrawny, hollow-eyed things he had first drilled into exhaustion while the warband was away. Their limbs had thickened, and their shoulders broadened. Hunger was replaced with muscle. They were nearly the size of the full Warriors now, though their faces still carried the signs of youth.

  They moved now with more confidence. Their spear stances were steadier, and their footing firmer.

  And the wolves had grown with them.

  No longer the small, blind, squeaking bundles of fur, the pups had become lean, long-limbed creatures roughly the size of a medium hunting dog on earth. Their paws were still greatly oversized, showing they had plenty of room to grow, but their teeth were no longer the harmless milk teeth they'd had. Grub's own wolf, Sable, was the smallest of all of them, but she was fiercely loyal to Grub, and followed him around wherever he went. She could often be seen dozing within a short distance of wherever Grub was working.

  Grub decided they were big enough now that the real work of training them could begin.

  At first, their training had been simple. Do not bite your handler. Come when called. Eat from the hand that feeds you. Sleep beside your goblin.

  But now it would be different.

  Grub showed the children how to move with their wolves instead of dragging them around. How to issue short, sharp commands. How to reward them correctly for good behavior, and how to correct their bad behavior without breaking trust.

  He demonstrated the techniques with Sable first, then had the young goblins try to emulate him. How to stand still while the wolf circled. How to let the animal learn the scent of spear and leather. How to practice coordinated movement, child and wolf flanking an imaginary enemy.

  The cavern echoed with new sounds.

  Sharp whistles, short commands, low growls, and occasional yelps.

  The bond between goblin and wolf deepened.

  When his Mana returned again, he climbed up his ladder.

  Tap.

  Chip.

  Chip.

  Chip.

  By the third week, the cavity had deepened enough that the air began to feel different against his knuckles.

  Colder. Thinner. He pressed his palm in.

  Stone Tap answered with something new.

  Not solid. Not completely hollow. But almost.

  He stilled completely and let a small grin cross his lips.

  Below him, the fire snapped and shifted, the smoke rolling upward and striking the ceiling as it always had, spreading thick and stubborn.

  Grub inhaled slowly through the cloth.

  Tap.

  The echo came back faint.

  He raised his hand.

  Stone Chip bit into the ceiling, and a small crack splintered through the last thin membrane of rock.

  For a heartbeat, nothing happened.

  Then, a shard no larger than his thumb broke free and fell.

  A thin shaft of gray light pierced downward through the new opening.

  A draft of cold air slipped through after it, cautious and sharp.

  The smoke wavered.

  Then, instead of pooling and spreading, it trembled, thinned, and drew upward, into the passage.

  A narrow spiral began to form above the hearth. The dark cloud gathered itself and fed slowly but surely into the throat he had carved. Instead of sitting there, it began to disappear.

  Grub couldn't help himself, and let out a loud cheer.

  Below, conversations faltered, and heads tilted upward.

  Many pairs of eyes watched as the smoke continued to climb, reached the opening, then vanished.

  Grub immediately began widening the breach, shaving the edges carefully so the smoke had an easier path out of the cavern.

  Each flake that fell strengthened the pull.

  By the time his Mana was gone once more and he climbed down from the ladder, the change was undeniable. The ceiling above the hearths no longer sat dark with the ever present cloud of smoke.

  The air felt lighter and cleaner.

  Soon, a small crowd of goblins was looking up and watching as the smoke continued to slowly disappear.

  Dravak watched it for a long time, arms folded.

  Then he had a thought, and turned to the three Warriors that he had set to working on the wall alongside Grub and Identified them.

  [Goblin Warrior – Level 3]

  [Goblin Warrior – Level 3]

  [Goblin Warrior – Level 4]

  He grunted and walked away. With the vent opened, and smoke steadily leaving the cavern, the wall was quickly finished a few days later. The final logs were tied tight, and mud was smoothed into every seam, all the way to the top. The heavy central door-slab was given a final pass, shaved slightly to make sure it was perfectly fitted for the gap. In the meantime, the vent had widened even further. The smoke drew more eagerly with each passing day.

  The final test came on a night when the wind outside howled along the ridge and blew through the gap in the wall hard enough to make the pups whine and the children shiver even before dusk fell. The cold air swirled around the inside of the cavern, biting through furs.

  Dravak gave the order then.

  “Shut it.”

  The three Warriors that had helped build the wall moved over, and with the help of another, heaved the thick wooden door into place. Inside, a pair of stout bars braced it. The last sliver of the soft gray light from outside vanished, leaving only the firelight and the breathing of the tribe.

  The wind’s bite dulled to a distant moan.

  Dravak fed the fire with a fresh armful of wood and watched as the flames climbed and the smoke rose, hit the ceiling, and slid neatly into the vent’s mouth. It did not spread and hang like it had done for so long, did not sting eyes or fill lungs. It rose and vanished outside, steady and clean.

  Warmth slowly thickened in the cavern, quickly becoming comfortable and constant.

  The tribe shifted, first uncertainly, then with small sighs. A few goblins stretched their hands toward the fire, surprised at how quickly their fingers stopped aching once the biting wind was fully held at bay. The oldest of the wounded fell into genuine sleep for the first time in days instead of the restless half-dozing of pain.

  Dravak walked slowly along the length of the wall and set his palm against it. Cold pressed faintly against his skin, but did not pass through.

  Inside, the air was still.

  Safe.

  He turned back to the three wall-workers. “You three. Come here,” he said.

  They approached with mud on their arms and wariness in their faces.

  Dravak used Identify on the first.

  He blinked, and grinned.

  [Goblin Builder – Level 3]

  Health: 40/40 | Stamina: 30/30 | Mana: 10/10

  He checked the next.

  [Goblin Builder – Level 3]

  And the last.

  [Goblin Builder – Level 4]

  “Look at your Status,” he ordered them.

  They opened their Status at once. Eyes widened, then widened further.

  “Builder,” one whispered. “The System calls me Builder.”

  Another laughed once, abruptly, almost disbelieving. “We were Warriors. Now… this.”

  “A spear is no use if it freezes in your hand,” Dravak said. “You have built something that keeps spears standing. Do not shame your new name.”

  They straightened at that, shoulders pulling back. Throughout the cavern, the whispers rose again.

  “Medics.”

  “Builders.”

  “Strange tribe,” someone muttered, but there was no venom in it anymore. Only a kind of weary awe.

  Dravak opened his mouth to speak again, but he was interrupted.

  The System chimed. Once deeply, then again more softly.

  The first sound was deeper than the simple notes of levels or tricks. It resonated along his teeth. He had only heard the sound once before, when he had completed his one hundredth battle and lived, and the System had rewarded him for it. He willed the notifications to open, and the familiar window rose before his eyes, painting the air above the flames with pale letters.

  [Congratulations! Achievement Earned: Keeper of the Hearth]

  Keeper of the Hearth: You have led your tribe to adopt true sheltercraft, pairing a smoke vent with a wind-breaking barricade to harden your home against the cold.

  Others roam and endure. You have chosen to make a place endurable.

  Reward: +1 to All Stats.

  New Passive: Hearthbound Morale

  Hearthbound Morale: Allied goblins within your domain recover stamina more quickly and suffer reduced fatigue. When defending the domain, allied goblins additionally resist fear and morale-breaking effects.

  Experience Gained.

  [Congratulations! You have reached Level 23. 1 Free Stat Point Available.]

  He stared at it until the words stopped looking like tricks of the smoke.

  Then he dismissed the window and waited.

  The change rolled through him like a slow, deep tide. It wasn't anything flashy or significant. It was a tightening along bone and muscle. A subtle shifting of weight in his stance. A clearer edge behind his thoughts. The ever-present ache in his shoulder eased by a hair. His lungs drew in air and gave it back with less drag.

  He had fought through a hundred battles for less than this. Scraped experience from every kill, clawed for skill increases that barely budged the numbers that shaped him.

  One breath, and all of him had risen.

  He shifted his weight and felt the cave floor sure beneath his feet. The air felt closer to his skin, the fire’s heat more precisely measured.

  Hearthbound Morale hummed at the edge of his awareness, like a drumbeat in a distant tunnel.

  He looked at his tribe.

  At the Medics binding wounds.

  At the Builders wiping mud from their hands.

  At the children asleep against warm rock, large pups bundled into their arms.

  At the wall that now held the cold wind at bay.

  At the vent that carried away the smoke that would otherwise choke his tribe.

  And finally at Grub, the one responsible, who sat at the edge of the firelight, back against the stone, eyes heavy with exhaustion, fingers still stained with stone dust, resin, and charcoal. His wolf pup was curled at his feet, sleeping peacefully in the newly warm cavern.

  Shaman, the tribe still whispered when they thought nobody could hear them, but the word no longer held the same hint of fear and distrust it had just a few short weeks ago.

  Dravak’s jaw tightened.

  Magic. Medics. Builders. Walls. Vents. It all combined into something he could scarcely believe.

  He paced the cavern, lost in his thoughts.

  If the story of the old Shaman held any truth, it was that power could bend goblins into new shapes. Sometimes until they broke.

  He would not let that happen here.

  The runt had changed the cavern.

  Wounds that should have rotted had closed. Smoke that should have choked them slipped cleanly into stone. Cold, biting winds that should have stolen their warmth were now broken against a wall. Warriors who should have remained only Warriors now carried new names the System itself had spoken into being. It was a lot to take in. Yet it wasn't the end.

  His mind drifted toward the wolves.

  They were no longer blind bundles of fur huddled at the children’s feet. They had grown larger, more dangerous by the day. Their bodies had lengthened, shoulders thickened, and teeth sharpened. Even now their shoulders rose to a goblin’s chest, and they were not finished growing. In a few more weeks, they would be large enough to bear weight. Large enough to run with purpose instead of simply following.

  Dravak had watched them move beside the children during drills. Not yet disciplined. Not yet coordinated. But instinctively aware of each other in a way that promised something more.

  Another change.

  Another possibility.

  Dravak was not blind to what that meant.

  He had led the tribe into battle against the dire wolves and returned victorious. That victory had been necessary. The pack had pushed into Ironfang territory. If he had waited, if he had chosen caution over action, winter would have finished what teeth began. The tribe would have been hunted down in the snow, one by one.

  So he had struck first.

  Seventeen cairns stood on the hillside as a result of that decision.

  Victory did not erase loss. It did not refill the ranks. Survival bought in blood still left scars.

  He did not regret the decision. He would make it again.

  His eyes drifted around the cavern, taking in the numbers, the empty spaces where Warriors had stood.

  He understood better than most how goblins thought. A Chief who returned from a raid with fewer Warriors than he marched out with invited quiet doubt. Fair or not, some might wonder whether his strength had slipped.

  That was why he had not shown shock when the System renamed his warriors. Not when “Warrior” shifted to “Medic.” Not when “Warrior” became “Builder.” A Chief did not gape at change. A Chief could not look uncertain in his own cavern.

  At the time, he had spoken as if he had expected it. As if it were part of a plan.

  The truth was more complicated.

  In ordinary times, he would not have accepted such strangeness so easily. But these were not ordinary times. The tribe had stood on the knife’s edge of winter with too few Warriors and too many wounds. He had needed something to shift their fortune. Any path that led away from slow starvation and toward strength was a path he would consider.

  Grub had provided one.

  That earned the runt a measure of trust.

  Not comfort. Not blind faith.

  Trust.

  Still, there were now questions that could not be ignored.

  Not only about the magic. Fear of Shamans and old stories could be answered with a blade if necessary. That was simple.

  It was the System that troubled him.

  Most goblins lived with little more than a name burned into their soul. Warrior. Hunter. Scout. Chiefs and a few lieutenants saw deeper. Numbers. Skills. The weight behind command.

  Grub spoke like one who saw deeper.

  He had never said it outright, but by revealing his magic, he had showed enough. Spells were not given to ordinary goblins. Insight into Skills and descriptions was not common knowledge.

  And now the System itself was reshaping the tribe in ways Dravak had never seen.

  That was not something a Chief could afford to ignore.

  Soon, he decided, he would call a private council. Throk, Kesh, the Medics and Builders. And Grub.

  Not before the whole tribe. Quietly. He could not start the whispers that he was not in control of what happened to his tribe. This would have to be handled delicately.

  He would ask the renamed goblins what had changed inside them. Whether the word on their Status carried weight beyond sound. Whether their instincts pulled differently now.

  He would ask Grub how much he could see. What access he truly had. What it meant for the Ironfang.

  And he would ask, once more, where the runt had come from.

  Not to pry for pride. Not to tear secrets open.

  But because a chief had to know what stood beneath his roof.

  He would not press beyond what was needed. The runt had earned that much. His own words weighed heavily, even now. Secrets could remain secrets, so long as they did not endanger the tribe.

  If Grub’s strangeness continued to make the Ironfang stronger, Dravak would shelter and encourage it.

  But if it ever turned its teeth toward him or his, he would cut it down himself.

  For now, the fire burned hot. Smoke rose and vanished cleanly. The wind clawed at a wall that did not fall.

  The wolves grew. The children grew with them.

  Most tribes were forced to endure winter, and emerged lean and hungry.

  The Ironfang would not.

  They would emerge standing.