The pain came first. An ache in my chest like an icy fist resided there.

I forced myself to open my eyes, but it felt as though I hadn’t woken from the nightmares that had been plaguing me since I fell asleep.

With a groan, I flicked my gaze around the cell and found nothing new; I had this place committed to memory now. It felt as though I’d been trapped in here a lifetime, but it had only been four or five days. Though a lifetime in here wasn’t off the table yet…

I got to my feet, the shackles around my ankles clanking loudly, stretching my hands above my head and doing my best to work out the kinks in my muscles, but they still ached with every movement I made. I hadn’t been able to shift the whole time I was here – the six-by-six of my cell was too small for that, and I didn’t want to damage property on top of everything else that I’d done – but being trapped in this skin, in my human skin, was starting to drive me a little crazy. Ever since I’d first shifted all those years ago, I hadn’t gone more than a day or two without doing it. It was the only way I could cling on to that side of myself, to remind myself that I was as much animal as human, to stretch and feel the freedom my wolf form offered.

But they had locked me up in here to make sure that I couldn’t do anything of the sort, and they all knew just how dangerous that was. It felt as though my muscles were beginning to curdle under my skin, my bones growing thick and heavy and weighing me down. I didn’t feel right. Some half of me was missing, and they knew how painful it was to be stuck in my human shape for this long without reprieve.

I inhaled a great lungful of air, hoping it would clear my head, but instead was met with the choking stench of damp and rat droppings. I wasn’t sure how long ago this place had been built, but it hadn’t been cleaned since it was constructed and it was dank, disgusting and falling apart. Too bad that, despite it’s disrepair, the stone walls that kept me in were thick and heavy and not going anywhere; I should know, since I’d spent my first few days in this place clawing at them, screaming for someone to let me out, begging for some sort of release.

No one heard me. Or if they did, no one came to my rescue.

I paced back and forth in the cell, trying to work off the nervous energy that was pulsing through my system from not having shifted in the past few days. I was still half-asleep, fatigued by the indolence of the last week, and it wasn’t until I heard a cluster of voices outside that I remembered what day it was. I came to a standstill, eyes wide, and pricked my ears to try and make out what was being said; today was the day they were coming for me. Today was the day I couldn’t avoid my fate any longer.

In truth, I would have taken anything to get out of that cage for a while, although what was waiting for me would likely be just as bad. I couldn’t make out the details of what anyone out there was talking about but I didn’t need to – I knew that it concerned me. That was all anyone had been discussing around here the last week since my capture. I couldn’t blame them.

I began pacing again, trying to work out the kinks in my human muscles. I could feel the beast inside me, sense it snorting and pawing impatiently at the ground as it waited for me to finally give in to what I wanted and shift. But I couldn’t. Where the hell would I go? This damp, dank cage was specifically meant to keep in people like me, and even if I shifted right as they opened the door to take me out, I would be facing off against at least another dozen wolves who were better fed, better rested, and better prepared than I was. It would have been a suicide mission, one that I didn’t want any part of.

I placed a hand flat on one of the stones in front of me, letting the coolness of the brick calm me down a little. It had always worked, ever since I was young – touching something natural, something that came from the real world, made me feel better. I could make out the curves and contours of the stone beneath my fingers, just like I had done a dozen times before with wood or water or moss. I loved the way it felt, the unpredictability of the pattern rich under my hand. For a moment, I could forget the act that I was locked in this godforsaken place, could forget that I honestly didn’t know if I was ever going to see my freedom again, and pretend that I was somewhere far distant, a forest a hundred miles from here, running alongside a river, the cool stones under the pads of my paws as I ran and I ran and I ran-

I was whipped from my reverie by the sound of the door scraping open before me, and I blinked against the light that came pouring through – I felt thirsty for the sun, and moved towards the door, staring up into it for a moment before I realized who was standing there in front of me.

“Cora?” I asked, my voice sounding half-choked in my throat. She didn’t reply but I knew it was her. I knew her form almost as well as I knew my own, we’d spent so much time together over the years. Long blonde hair pulled up into a ponytail to keep it up off her face, pale blue eyes that shone in the early morning light, the exact opposite to me in almost every way. My best friend. Well, not any longer.

“Hi,” I greeted her awkwardly. I had no idea what to say to her given our current situation.

I knew what she had to do as well as she did, and that she had no choice in the matter, but it felt profoundly wrong not to be able to joke around with her as we had always done. I had known her since the two of us were kids and now she could barely even look me in the eye.

My heart twisted and I felt another stab of sadness in my chest. I knew she couldn’t treat me the way she used to, but that didn’t mean the memories of everything we’d shared together over the years vanished from my mind. I could still remember her goofy laugh, all those nights we’d sat up late whispering to each other across the bedroom, the discoveries we’d made together. And now…nothing.

She was dressed in her uniform, I noticed, as she went to undo the shackles around my ankles. The uniform that meant that the two of us couldn’t so much as exchange a greeting without getting her branded as a traitor as well. She kept her gaze firmly down, as though she couldn’t bear to look me in the eye, and I wondered what I would have done in her situation, if it were her in these shackles instead.

Her fingers brushed up against me for a moment as she went to undo my bindings, and I realized it was the first human contact I’d had in days. Tears pricked my eyes. And how long would I be in here if they found me guilty?

I dashed them away with the back of my hand as Cora stood up again and took my elbow. She finally looked at me, and I saw a hint of something behind her eyes. Maybe it was sadness, maybe even anger, but she wiped it away at once and pointed to the door.

“Come on, you need to get cleaned up,” she muttered, her voice passive.

The snow outside was thick on the ground and the air was icy cold, but the sun was glimmering down above us and I tilted my head back to take it in for a moment, glad to bathe in natural light for a change instead of being stuck up in that place. Cora paused for a moment, and I turned to her, finding her regarding me with that expression once more.

“Whatever happens, I forgive you,” I murmured, keeping my voice low enough that not even the most attuned listeners in the pack could have caught us. Cora’s mouth tightened and she blinked, but she didn’t say a word back. Instead, she straightened her shoulders and marched me up towards the enormous stone keep where I would meet my fate. We ducked inside and I was glad for the warmth. I needed my fur in this weather.

“In there.” She nodded to a door at the end of the corridor we’d just entered. “Go take a shower.”

She led me down the corridor, and I stumbled a couple of times, my feet feeling dangerous below me as I tried to get used to walking more than three feet at a time once more. She pushed me gently into the room, still showing these tiny hints of tenderness that told me she was as sorry about this as I was, and then closed the door behind me. I hurried to the shower, glad to be able to wash some of the grime and dirt of the last few days off of me. I switched it on and climbed beneath the roasting water, scrubbing at my skin gratefully and wondering how long it might be until I was allowed a shower again after this.

I didn’t blame Cora for any of this. Because if she showed even the slightest leniency towards someone like me, she would lose her standing in the pack just like that and would probably be subject to the same treatment I was currently victim of. But then, she would never have ended up in the mess that I was in. Because she was much more cautious than me…always had been. And she knew as well as I did exactly what punishment I would face if I was convicted of high treason.

High treason.

The words sounded almost archaic to me, like they didn’t belong in this day and age, and yet here I was, about to be tried for it – maybe even killed for it. I scrubbed my head hard, as though trying to wash those thoughts away. Death wasn’t the only punishment for treason – I could end up imprisoned for life, as well. Though the thought of being trapped up in one of those tiny cages for the next few decades was…no. I couldn’t do it. I would rather die. If that’s what it came to, I would take matters into my own hands and finish myself off. A life like that one wasn’t worth living, a life where I couldn’t access a fundamental part of who I was.

I was screwed unless I could change the minds of everyone else in the clan, and, judging by Cora’s demeanor, that wasn’t likely. I finished up my shower and climbed into the clothes that had been laid out for me, a prisoner’s uniform, all deep, dreary grey and utilitarian. As soon as I had done the last button up, there was a knock at the door, and it opened a moment later.

“It’s time,” Cora announced, and I noticed that she was flanked by a couple of guards. Did they really think that I was going to try and make a break for it, surrounded by everyone else in this place? I followed them out of the room, and then down and along what felt like endless corridors until we finally arrived in the courtroom. Cora opened the door, and the buzz of voices that had filled the cavernous stone-walled space suddenly fell silent as I followed her inside.

The entire clan was here. I recognized each one, had interacted with them all at some point or another over the years, and now here they were to cast judgment on me. To condemn me to a life that I couldn’t live, that none of us could live. Cora took my arm and guided me to the one free seat in the enormous, ancient room. The one all by itself, separate from the rest. I sat down and forced myself to look up at the man who was about to decide my fate.

Malcolm Kellum. His eyes were icy-sharp and bright blue as he stared down at me from the lofty seat he had over the entire room; his grey-white hair was perfectly in place, the same color it was when he shifted to his wolf form. He had been alpha around these parts for as long as most anyone could remember, and I doubted there was much in this world that could have dragged that position away from him. I tried to read the expression on his face but he was pointedly impassive, like he knew how much I wanted to know what he was thinking and wasn’t going to give me the pleasure. He got to his feet slowly, like a monarch, and all eyes in the room turned to watch him. The entire place seemed to pulse with the silence before he spoke, but finally, he did.

“Arianna Kellum, you are charged with high treason. How do you plead?”

I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and then spoke.

“Guilty, father.”