Alba stood on high ground, gazing at the orderly ranks on the drill field, his single eye narrowing slightly.
The wind swept sand and dust across the camp, sending several lonely tribal flags flapping weakly in the breeze. They looked especially glaring.
--Gray Mane, Red Fang, Black Stone. The recruits those tribes were supposed to send had yet to appear.
In the past, he might not have thought much of it. The grassland tribes were wild and unruly, and delays in assembling were common. But things were different now.
The disastrous defeat at Stone Bridge Town had spread silently through his heart like a crack, weakening the powerful confidence he had built through nearly twenty years of warfare.
Alba unconsciously rubbed the battle-axe at his waist--the weapon he had used to kill a rival twenty years ago.
He knew the laws of the grasslands better than anyone: the alpha wolf's position was always founded on unshakable strength. The moment he showed weakness, challengers lurking in the shadows would bare their fangs.
He returned to his tent with a dark expression.
"Great Chieftain." The captain of his guards approached cautiously. "Should we send people to urge those tribes on?"
A military overseer stepped forward and shouted sternly, "I request permission to take three hundred riders and 'remind' them of the Royal Tent's authority."
Alba narrowed his single eye, his bronze knuckles turning white. In the past, he would have dispatched a punitive force without hesitation for such defiance--hanging the tribal elders' heads above the camp gate while the remaining tribesmen naturally submitted.
"Great Chieftain!" A guard suddenly shouted frantically from outside the tent. "An urgent report has arrived from the grasslands--"
A rebellion? Alba shot to his feet, that word appearing first in his mind.
The tent flap was suddenly thrown