Janine charged after Ravager, adding her howl of rage to the howls of her sisters and brothers. Her short legs stomped across the stone ground, leaving torn footprints in her wake, while her pack followed her. The warlord reached for her laser rifle, picking up a target on a wall. The Wolfkins preferred to use shardguns, simple weapons for close-to-midrange encounters that were capable of unleashing armor-piercing shards at the foe. At long range, however, the accuracy suffered, leading to scouts and some wolf hags using other ranged weapons.
Janine’s eyes found a trembling guard armed with a rocket launcher. She fired the overheated energy beam straight into the projectile, exploding it along with the unlucky guards and her fellows. Martyshkina fired once, tearing a guard in two. The warlord laughed, spun her revolvers, and fired once more, killing not only the single guards but also the people behind them. Flame balls licked the side of the wall, exploding in a deadly bath made of searing plasma and evaporating those who failed to jump, along with detonating their ammunition. Stopping firing her plasma dischargers, Alpha crashed into the wall, creating a gap for her own forces.
Janine stormed through the main gates, smashing their remains aside with the Taleteller. Her loyal axe made the air scream from pain, bisecting two guards who tried to stop her entrance. Bullets and energy beams from the defenders’ weapons hit the warlord’s armor, failing to penetrate the meter-thick armor. Laughing like an evil spirit, Janine came upon the enemy combatants, cleaving a path through them.
An explosion behind her made her stumble. A defensive tower fired its missiles at the gates, widening the gaps and killing several Wolfkins. Before the warlord could throw her axe at the tower, Ravager was already on it, uprooting the entire tower along with a small section of the wall. The commander raised the ruins over her head, ignoring pleas for mercy from the tower’s operators. Janine saw Ravager’s maddened eyes and understood immediately that the progenitor had gone too far again. The Blessed Mother went berserk. Any soul incurring her wrath would only meet a mindless and efficient demise.
Ravager cast down the tower on the guards below, making the ground tremble, and moved across the wall, her claws striking out and collecting the lives of those before her. Gore and crimson soaked her fur, failing to change its color. Allowing the progenitor to fight her own battles, Janine sliced another guard before her and kicked a woman off her feet, putting the sabaton on the guard’s body. She gave her just a second to decide. In her panic, the guard fired her weapon in vain, and this was enough for the warlord. Janine popped her like overripe fruit and moved on, slashing and firing, her pack storming behind her.
The capital city looked just as lifeless as the land on the other side of the wall. Whole toxic rivers flowed next to walkways. Janine saw how one guard fell there after being shot in the shoulder. The man shouted, thrashing like mad, and Ignacy stopped his advance, extending a paw to the screaming man. Ignacy pulled out the man, only to find out that his gray hazmat suit had melted, leaving the leather and steel of his armor merged with the man’s lower part. Impatient One appeared next to Ignacy, slapping him hard enough to send him across the street before charging at the guards. The Wolfkins kept their advance, leaving the twitching and screaming man behind them. Whether he’ll live or perish will depend on the medics following behind. For now, Janine was glad that her daughter restrained herself and did not use her claws on her brother.
Like waves of a dark sea, the Wolfkins started spreading across the city, breaking through the makeshift barricades, refusing to give their foes even a second to fall back and reform their ranks. Led by scouts, Wolfkins climbed on top of gray buildings, ignoring the hiding civilians within, and painted the rooftops red with the blood of their foes. The Wolfkins did not advance in silence. Each of their movements was accompanied by the whine of servomotors and the scratching of steel edges against each other. The state’s mass-produced power armor was anything but subtle. Accompanied by the wailing howls and barking sounds of their shardguns, the Wolf Tribe produced a truly nightmarish cacophony for ears that teared hard at the enemy spirit.
Janine’s eyes narrowed at the sight of Bogdan sparing a screaming guard on the rooftop after a young cub below begged to spare her daddy. Her stupid son kicked the man down, probably breaking a leg of the guard but otherwise leaving him alive. After checking the situation, Janine calmed down a bit. The scout in charge of Ignacy’s and Bogdan’s got a bullet to her belly, leaving her injured back on the street. No wonder her pack is fooling around. But the fact that Ignacy spent the barest minimum of time to help the wounded scout and charged back into battle, accompanied by the remaining warriors and his brother, deserved praise.
Flames erupted from the two streets to their west, announcing Ashbringer’s advance. Through the cameras in her helmet, Janine saw Alpha closing in on one fortress within the city. The Techno-Queen had ruled through fear, and trying to send soldiers motivated by it against a horror like Alpha was most unwise. Whips of unseen terror struck in all directions from Alpha, making guards drop their weapons and fall down, whimpering helplessly. The strongest warlord simply crushed those few who had found courage in them to stand against her, believing them to be unworthy of sullying her claws.
“Ashbringer, cut on your fire,” Dragena’s voice said over the communication, and Janine switched channels, seeing the Warlord standing calmly in the siege camp, overseeing the advance of all packs. “There are civilians within buildings, and if you set aflame pipes with oil, there will be naught but dust.”
“I am not that incompetent,” Ashbringer snapped back. A searing burst from her flamethrowers left twelve scorched remains in her path.
Ripping out the heads of the two soldiers with a backhanded swing, Janine felt cold. Ravager. The Blessed Mother stopped the decimation of the enemy forces on the wall and turned around, looking calmly at the Ashbringer. She did not leap to attack, nor did she growl. All anger and madness simply washed away from the Commander, who held a screaming figure of an enemy officer in a purple cape with one paw. And this calmness freaked out Janine more than any rage.
“I obey.” Ashbringer quickly fell on one knee, baring her neck in submission and ignoring the enemy fire.
Ravager turned her gaze to the screaming officer and stopped for a moment, noticing the surrounding forces around her. The Blessed Mother turned to the man, looking less than a cub compared to her size, in her paw. Her paw twitched, causing the man to choke on his own screams. Ravager’s pupils dilated and returned to normal, her breath switched between heavy and quick intakes of air. Arresting her madness, Ravager raised the officer to her lips, leaving a marking of a prisoner, before throwing him to the soldiers, accepting the surrender.
Her calmness did not last for long. She leaped from this section of the wall, crossing the entire city with one gracious somersault. With the force of a bomb, Ravager landed on the opposite wall, partly crushing it under herself, and moved on, snuffing out any life in her path by slashing, stomping, or simply gulping down foes fast enough that none had any time to even offer a surrender.
The Wolf Tribe did not attack mindlessly. Each vector of their assault was meant to take out one of the enemy’s most precious holdings, following the strategy of ‘tearing off the throat and suffocating’ made by Ravager, meant to lessen losses from both sides with an overwhelmed show of force. With morale crumbling, enemy leaders dead, and armories secured, even the most fanatical opponents would struggle to find the heart to continue pointless resistance.
Dragena commanded their advance with casual ease, connecting with the scouts and wolf hags when she saw them advancing too fast, bringing them back in line with a simple word. Through connecting her vision with scouts, the warlord constantly updated enemies’ positions, marking the most charismatic officers among the enemy to be eliminated. Her impersonal voice quenched the bloodthirst of the most eager packs, ensuring the security of surrendering foes. Her keen mind oversaw the suppression of fire from artillery and the crawler, limiting the casualties among the civilians. Under her leadership, the advancing front was never exposed, spreading equally to capture the valuable targets.
Dragena calmly reined in other warlords in battle, enjoying the full support of Ravager. Prior to the invasion, Dragena and a few soldiers from Alpha Pack, the ones whom Alpha groomed to be the Tribe’s superior infiltrators one day, prowled the countryside, capturing a few of the Techno-Queen’s officers. From them, the state learned about the general shape of the capital and the location of factories, underground bunkers, and defense installations. No matter the fear, the soldiers have failed to reveal the location of their leader. Dragena spared the lives of those who cooperated and forbade any torture, assuring the Commander that the Techno-Queen distrusted her own officers.
And Janine loved this element of uncertainty. She and her pack were tasked with capturing the looming tower to the west of the city. This tower handled communications, and there was little chance of the enemy’s leader being there… But the excitement of a possible glory moved the Warlord like nothing else. The enemy leaders were always being taken down by either Ravager, Zero, or Alpha. What if she’s the first to join their ranks? Janine, the Queen Killer, the Ruler Feller… She imagined Martyshkina felt the same, judging by how pushy she and her troops advanced on the armory.
Their opponents were a scrawny lot. Dressed in gray hazmat suits and wearing a light exoskeleton beneath, these people were easy prey. In the narrow, choking streets of the capital, filled with suffocating smoke that clotted the skies, the primary danger from them was their surprisingly advanced weapons. Their armor-piercing projectiles cracked the power armor of the lesser ranks with several bursts; high-powered lasers were strong enough to melt their way down to the softer flesh beneath; and explosions were hard to avoid in this maze.
Bogdan was sent ragdolling across the street after a guided missile landed on the ground next to him, killing one male and taking a warrior’s leg. The guard who fired the projectile started to reload his weapon, and in this moment, the shaman jumped forward, using the side of a building as a springboard to leap down on the attackers. Where Janine advanced methodically, cleaning off the streets assigned to her pack, Impatient One turned into a whirlwind of dashing violence. No shamans ever used any ranged weapons or blades, their claws and fangs were everything they ever needed. And now her jaws caught the screaming man, biting him in two and hungrily devouring the remains while she sprinted around the guards, bisecting anyone around her and creating chaos and a road littered with dead across her erratic advance.
Janine turned the worry of her son into strength, cleaving a guard before her in two halves and propelling a gust of wind forward with enough force to knock several others down. Wolfkins around her howled, filling the air with songs of rage, and fired their own shardguns, leaving just bloody tatters in place of men and women who tried to oppose them. Ignacy helped Bogdan get back on his feet, and together, both males shot down guards who tried to fire into their sister’s back.
“Enough,” Janine commanded, stopping the shaman from butchering a guard who fell to her knees.
Their foes were broken, and Dragena ordered Janine Pack to halt their advance. All around their advance, they started throwing the weapons down, allowing the wolfkins to push them back, where the Ice Boys would tie them up. Out of curiosity, Ignacy pulled a cowl from a guard’s head, revealing a face covered in chemical burns with a shellshocked expression in her wide eyes. The woman coughed, unable to handle the pollution in the city she lived in, prompting Anissa to pull back the cowl and give Ignacy a smack behind his head.
“They can’t even live in their own city,” Anissa spat on the ground.
“Technically they could before, s… Wolf Hag!” Ignacy quickly corrected himself under Anissa’s eye. “According to what we know, just twenty-one years ago, people lived here normally, with no need for gas masks. Then, the Tecno-Queen came to power, and the Wastes truly lived up to their name, life expectancy plummeted to oblivion…” He pointed at the trembling guard, reading information off the woman’s tag around her neck. “Just take her, for example. In her early twenties, but looks in her forties, her hairline receding already, and she spills blood with each cough. If you ask me, in ten years this entire region would have had its population halved at least…”
“Neeerd!’ Bogdan kicked his brother in the ass. “Who cares what might have happened? Who cares about ancient history? We’re here, so all will be ok. Rather than wasting your time on theorizing, embrace the practical.” Wrapping one paw over his brother’s shoulders, he pointed up at a warrior. “Look at that beauty! Such posture, a thick waist, gorgeous fur, and lengthy white claws shine through this smog, almost accidentally unleashed… The girl clearly has hots for you, brother, come on, go talk to her, and then make many little ones…”
“Bogdan,” Anissa half-groaned, half-growled, commanding the troops to assemble the defensive positions. “Does anything other than mating ever worry you?”
“Of course. My cubs, my soulmate, my family…”
Then, if you want to keep seeing them, get to your position before I gore you for the disobedience or before an enemy kills you." Impatient One landed next to her brothers and sisters, sending Anissa onto the ground with an elbow hit. “Discipline! Maintain discipline, Wolf Hag! Males are too dumb to know what’s best for them, but what is your excuse? Make them work! They can have fun after the battle is won!”
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Leaving Anissa in charge of the pack, Janine stepped forward, looking at the looming tower. She spied the satellite arrays on its sides, along with cables going into the building, supplying it with energy. The whole thing was no less than three hundred meters tall, give or take a few dozen meters. The surface around the tower was flat, with toxic waste flowing underneath gratings, creating the image of a moat filled with water.
“Dragena, why are we stopping our advance?” Janine asked, putting the laser rifle behind her back and taking the axe in both arms. She could feel the streets trembling, albeit slightly, and not all of it came from explosions around the city. Releasing the claws on her feet, Janine gave a signal for her troops to get ready.
“Because this is an obvious trap, sister,” Dragena replied calmly, sending an image of the city to Janine’s HUD. “Observe. We have nearly claimed it, yet we have yet to meet any steel servants or minions. And there is something else too. Ravager…”
“Blessed Mother,” Lacerated One growled over communication.
“Ravager,” undeterred, Dragena ignored the shaman’s indignation. The supreme shaman and her troops were busy moving the civilians out of the city on the Blessed Mother’s orders. “She can feel it too. Notice the pattern of her movements. She both satiates her bloodlust on the walls and is looking for something.”
Janine had to admit that she was right. Accompanied by the shamans, Ravager always charged toward the enemy leader’s neck, leaving the warlords to gather stragglers in her wake. She did so in part to lessen the losses among enemy forces. Once engaged, anyone carrying a weapon became prey in the Blessed Mother’s eyes. And considering that some new breeds had claws or blades for arms… Janine’s former warlord, Terrific, once had her lung pierced while saving a cub from being eaten by Ravager. The Commander knew the extent of her madness, so her current behavior felt weird to the packs. Why is she prolonging the slaughter? What are they missing?
Part of the answer came upon her in moments. Figures broke free from within the toxic rivers, crashing through both stone and metal gratings. They resembled madly twitching insects; their elongated bodies were held by three many-jointed legs, six more limbs pointed in all directions from the top of their bodies, four limbs ended up with palm-sized needles; and two of the remaining limbs had crude manipulators. White lenses serving the robots for arms locked at the Wolfkins, and with a clack sound, their backs opened, revealing two sets of metallic wings.
Steel minions. The standing army of the Tecno-Queen, merciless hordes who decimated all her rivals. Janine met the first one of them, catching the metal bug on the butt of her axe and spearing it with it. The creature twitched, bleeding oil and broken gears; its arms struck once across her armor, leaving scratches.
Dangerous. The warlord broke through the remains with one swing of her axe, bringing its blade to the approaching horde and allowing it to drink full and deep. The steel minions did not differentiate between allies and foes; one of them opened the back of a surrendered guard before leaping on a nearby Wolfkin. Bogdan had to block an incoming strike, saving one of his former foes. He exposed his neck to an attack by doing this, but his brother’s calm shot saved his life.
They work well together. Janine decided, advancing forward. The incoming swarm was met with well-timed shots, downing foes by the dozens before they could bring their full might on the Wolfkins. A few robots who broke through the gunfire have carved a toll on the attackers. Matching males in strength, the bladed limbs of the steel minions got buried in the chest plates, finding their way to the hearts within with chirurgical accuracy. Each strike of these creatures aimed for efficiency; when unable to confirm a kill with the first attack, steel minions aimed for joints and rubber neck armor hidden behind thinner protection of gorgets.
Anissa and the warlord both caught on to the enemy’s intention of thinning them out instantly. Janine took position five steps ahead of her pack, turning in a whirlwind of steel and restrained rage, smashing aside the swarm. Anissa ordered males to take position behind females, a potential heresy and most unorthodox tactic, but one Janine was in full agreement on. Warriors, scouts, and wolf hags in her pack had far greater chances of survival. Seeing how one of the steel minions stood right back up, Anissa locked her weapon behind her back and lunged forward, slashing with her own claws.
Impatient One came right after, and this brought a smile to Janine’s lips. Seeing her two little girls fighting back-to-back with a ferocity that would’ve made even Lacerated One proud… Oh, what a glorious future they have! Anissa easily beat aside claws aimed for her lenses, slicing through the legs of a steel minion with a low kick before finishing it with an elbow strike that bulged the small head all the way into a chest. Impatient One simply thrust with her paw, leaving a gaping hole in a steel minion who flew above them, before biting the head of another.
“Finally, something worthy to kill!” roared Warlord Eled over communication. Through a shared video feed, Janine saw how Eled’s troops also came under attack, and the warlord swung her gigantic scythe, harvesting four machines with a single slash.
“Technically, these are just machines, warlord. You can destroy them, but they don’t have any life to begin with,” Ignacy said.
“Someone never met Artificer, I take it.” Alpha spat, standing unbothered by any danger in a sea of steel minions and allowing her pack to freely shoot them off her.
“Janine, keep your males focused on the fight!” Eled laughed happily. “They make me look bad!”
“Eh, when a male is right, then he is right.” Explosions rocketed ground before the pack of Warlord Ygrite, sending hundreds of steel forms back. The warlord herself, a horrible mess of claws coming through the opening in her mouth, came forward, catching a robot with her paw and crushing it. “Ah, I love myself some good, well-set ambush. Especially when we turn it against the enemy. Keep on using grenade launchers, boys; if even a single one of these tin-can bugs gets to you, no booze tomorrow! Girls, join the fun; don’t be shy! Your booze is also at stake, you know!”
“Oh, so she is allowed the indiscriminate use of explosives and I am not allowed some flame? Cusackshit!” Ashbringer snarled, melting a line of steel minions before herself with streams of fire.
“Hold your positions, sisters,” Dragena’s voice cut through the chatter. “Eled, Predaig, the losses in your packs are unacceptably high. Take an example from Ygrite and Janine and keep the males at a safe distance.”
“It is the males’ sacred duty to sacrifice themselves for the tribe!” Lacerated One joined the communication.
“In times of need, supreme one. We can win here without losing a soldier,” Dragena replied dispassionately. “Martyshkina, you are way ahead; pull back; we haven’t yet met any steel serva…”
The ground exploded beneath Janine, sending the warlord back. Something big, easily bigger than a battle tank, was rising from the depths below the street, covered in toxic waste. Its crimson-colored body was a gruesome mix between bronze and steel. Standing on four mighty limbs the size of Janine’s torso, the beast of steel lunged up, placing its hooves on the street. The warlord barely had after she landed before the giant head rammed her with mighty horns, casting Janine into the rows of her Wolfkins.
Twin lenses, each burning purple, locked on the warlord, and from stylized nostrils came a surge of overheated air that turned Janine’s armor red with heat and led to a warrior on her left screaming as the woman simply cooked alive within her power armor. Feeling the stone beneath her melting, the warlord hit with both arms, sending nearby soldiers flying back. Burns won’t kill them. In her youth as a scout, Janine once had her entire left leg engulfed in chemical flames, with the skin turning black. She walked it off just fine in a few months. But overheated air might rupture the lungs of her soldiers, and this was far more dangerous.
Finally, she had a better look at her attacker. Back when she was a cub, her dad once showed her a colored book containing images of extinct animals. And what stood now before her, down to the muscles and a tail that crushed one house with a careless swing, was, undeniably, a bull. A steel bull, made artistically and bigger than several houses. The brass skin covered every inch of its body, leaving just joints on the legs exposed, showing the workings of massive metal muscles moving among the gears the size of a human. From its steel lips came a thundering roar of such intensity that it smashed one steel minion against the ground, killed a guard, and left cracks in Janine’s lenses.
The steel bull moved forward, bringing its hoof to Janine. Sliding into the molten ground, the warlord reacted a second too late, and the many-tonne limb came down on her, pressing Janine into the stone ground. Tough. Janine groaned, noticing dents and cracks in her armor from the initial hit of its horns. The Wolfkins opened fire, but their armor-piercing projectiles left only scratches against the steel skin.
“Aim at the joints!” Anissa gave the command.
The pack fired to no avail, a bubble of energy came to life, shielding the exposed areas. The bull’s head moved, looking down on the insects that dared to challenge it. A piercing light got born in the beast’s left eye, and upon seeing it, Impatient One grabbed several soldiers, dragging them to the side.
And Anissa stumbled. The attack came fast, a pure beam of light leaving the beast’s eye. Yet Anissa failed to notice Ignacy to her left, failed to see him in time because of her missing eye. The Wolf Hag reacted a moment too late, and this moment was all it needed for her brother to suffer. The beam ate away Ignacy’s right arm, evaporating it all the way to the shoulder, moving past the boy and slicing through two warriors and a male standing behind him, killing them instantly.
No. Janine felt rage boiling down inside her—rage she last felt during her ranking match for a warlord’s title. This tin-can, it dared to make a Crippled out of her boy! The world stopped. Janine felt her body go numb and felt the weight trying to crush her from above disappear. Reddish dots started filling her vision.
“Sister…” She froze, hearing the voice of the dead woman.
To her left, amidst the frozen-in-time Wolfkins, a figure moved. Tall as Janine, the newcomer had her head hanging to the left, a piece of bone pierced the broken neck, sticking out with dried blood and muscle. Lifeless amber eyes found Janine, and the corners of torn and ragged lips moved, showing way too many tiny fangs inside the mouth. Janine remembered her, remembered the dent she left on the woman’s head, the dent that leaked out the brain matter even now. The woman had the visage of a starvation victim, her body was unnaturally thin, with her ribcage threatening to tear its way free from the embrace of flesh. Her many jointed limbs, far too long for a normal Wolfkin, beckoned Janine.
“Restraint…” Warlord Terrific gurgled, and the world came back to life. Wolfkins were fighting against the robots, filling them with holes and dodging incoming slashes. And the ghost of Janine’s former leader was nowhere to be seen.
Janine gulped, banishing the fantasies. There was no Terrific here; the honored warlord had been killed years ago because of Janine’s idiotic mistake. She pushed the bull’s hoof up, hearing her power armor screaming from effort. The bull above her shuddered, one of its eyes exploded, and a new roar came from its lips. The machine staggered back while fountains of oil poured from the broken eye, along with something thin.
Janine used this moment to roll from under it, looking through the eyes of her soldiers. Bertruda and her troops were behind them; the Sword Saint had cast her very spear into the beast’s eye. Seeing the bull’s second eye come to life, shining with barely contained energy aimed at the Ice Fangs, the warlord jumped up, facing the incoming beam with a slice of her axe.
The Taleteller was not an ordinary axe. Forged in a bygone era, Janine never ever had to sharpen it. It never dented or broke; no matter what it faced, it only bounced when a material before it was too strong. And tonight, the steel servant was tested by the Taleteller and was found wanting.
Janine turned her armor into defensive mode, her helmet fully closed around the head, leaving no exposed space for the jaws. Her paws and legs got encased at once, and the armor vibrated, enduring the incoming energy as Janine blocked the beam meant for her rival. The armor’s systems screamed, warning Janine that her armor was overheating rapidly. One after another, the internal cooling systems went offline, unable to handle the beam of energy that started cooking Janine’s own skin. Still, she persevered, refusing to even allow a thought of defeat.
Taleteller cleaved its way through energy and crushed into the steel bull’s eye with enough force to create a shockwave. Held by Janine’s two arms, it shattered the eye socket and bulged the ruined weapon installed in it deeper into the body with the sound of a train going off rails. The steel servant’s body shook, trying to adapt to having its intricate machine work come crashing into each other. The gears came off the alignment, and pipes that carried oil exploded.
With a wailing half-roar, half-whisper, the bull’s front legs gave in, and Janine landed on its head. Mercilessly, she brought her weapon first on its forehead, crashing whatever process still left intact beneath the metal skin. Then she walked on, opening the bull’s back with another cleave and allowing a torrent of flame to burst from the opening, engulfing her in a hellfire. Jumping off the ruined machine, she kicked it, sending it on the remaining steel minions and picked up Bertruda’s spear, still pretty shiny despite the oil covering it.
“Thanks, Bertruda!” Janine waved the weapon above her and threw it to the Sword Saint, who gracefully caught it. “You ain’t a total bitch after all!”
“I despise every single thing about you!” Came a screeching answer.
“What are our orders, Dragena?” Janine asked overly cheerfully, stopping herself from checking on her son.
The pack relied on the warlord. No matter the situation, she had no right to give in to emotions or worry. A warlord always has to show that she has a plan or has a general idea of what to do. No one made Janine reach her rank, and now she had a duty to uphold it. Banter, fake bravery—all of this was part of an image.
Activating her barely working lens, Janine saw how Marty came under attack by another steel servant, one that looked like an oversized scorpion. Its pincers failed to catch the warlord; a stream of acid from its sting melted three wolfkins alive before Martyshkina took it apart with the shots of her powered revolvers. Ashbringer came from the chest of a gorilla-like robot before her like a living star, melting her way through the massive body while wreathed in a white flame. A flying steel servant came from inside the city, diving into Dragena and the crawler. The warlord looked at the approaching beast. Before the beast could reach her, a figure jumped in the air, covering dozens of meters in a single leap. First Sunblade, the uncrowned leader of the Ice Fang order, struck forward with his trusted plasma blade. His first thrust opened the steel head; the following cuts took away its wings, downing the foe before it could reach the siege camp.
“The coordination officers reported that the signal to the steel servants came from within the tower,” Dragena replied, taking her paws off the knives. “Janine, you are the closest to it. Capture or kill, at your discretion.”
“Yes!” Janine roared and rushed forward, beating aside any steel minion trying to stand before her.
Anissa, Impatient One, and Anissa’s scouts all joined her at her command. Truth be told, the wolf hag would be best suited to stay behind; she was the third strongest in the pack. But Janine remembered how emotionally compromised she got during the death of her firstborn, to the point of nearly ruining her mission. No doubt, Anissa too feels shame and anguish about allowing her brother to get injured. It’ll pass; the boy was sturdy enough to endure this flesh wound, and in time, they’ll all have a laugh about this battle. But now she must pile task upon task on Anissa. Her daughter has to stay focused on the task, with no time to dwell on sadness or fear that her mother might not trust her anymore.