The drums pounded like a second heartbeat through the earth.
Jackie stood barefoot on the packed arena floor, cold soil pressing into his soles, blood humming from a hundred ritual chants swirling on the wind. Around the stone-ringed dueling pit, the tribes of the Northern Reaches gathered—antlered Karus, pelt-draped Eresh, flame-scarred Blackfang, and the mixed-fringe outlanders like Jackie himself.
Smoke from sacred cedar fires wove upward in silver streams, curling around towering totems carved with ancient beasts. Painted warriors stood in concentric rings, faces lit by firelight, expressions stern as carved stone. Elders murmured blessings. Hunters gripped blades.
At the far edge of the circle, beneath a bone-spiked war-banner, the Karus champion emerged.
Tall as a bear on hind legs, and twice as wide, Gorram Karus wore a cloak of dire wolfhide and a black-iron helmet etched with fang-marks. His arms were sleeved in ritual scars, his axe broad as a wagon wheel. His shadow alone seemed to bend the torchlight.
A hush fell.
Jackie rolled his shoulders. His tunic was simple, sleeveless, the leather worn thin at the collar. His only weapon was a bone-handled shortblade—light, quick, and inadequate against Gorram's mountain-cleaving steel. But deep in his chest, just beneath the Heartstone amulet, the Wolfflame stirred.
Let them call me outsider. Let them call me nothing.
He inhaled the camp's scent—burnt fat, old blood, pine resin—and stepped forward into legend.
Gorram raised his axe and barked, "A half-blood mongrel in the final duel? Do the gods mock me, or has this Gathering grown that soft?"
Murmurs rippled through the crowd. Even a few of Jackie's former sparring allies averted their eyes.
Jackie said nothing.
The warhorn sounded.
Gorram lunged.
Steel howled as the giant's axe split the air. Jackie dove sideways, feeling the gust of wind from the blow just past his shoulder. He rolled, came up on one knee, and slashed. His blade glanced off Gorram's greaves, barely drawing blood.
"Feeble," the warrior snarled, pivoting with unnatural speed. The flat of the axe came for Jackie's ribs—he parried with both hands, stumbling back as the shock of the blow rattled his bones.
Too strong. Too fast.
But something inside Jackie was changing.
He tasted copper, but also fire.
Wolfflame surged.
Not the ragged flickers of the night he'd first awakened it—but a steady pulse, hot as a forge and clear as mountain wind. His bloodline was responding—adapting.
Jackie's pupils narrowed. His muscles braced like a predator's haunches. Heat pooled behind his heart.
The crowd gasped as he darted in again—faster now, weaving through Gorram's sweeping strikes like a shadow slipping through trees. He slashed once, twice—light cuts across the warrior's shoulder and thigh.
The Karus champion bellowed, more insulted than hurt. "You think a few scratches will stop me? I was forged in bear blood before you were born!"
A wide swing came crashing down.
Jackie ducked—barely. The axe clipped his shoulder, tearing a strip of leather and leaving a red streak beneath.
Pain lanced through him, but he turned it into momentum, sliding under Gorram's arm and driving his knee into the champion's side. A grunt. A stagger.
From the sidelines, Kaden—Jackie's scowling rival—watched with narrowed eyes. His arms were crossed, but his knuckles had gone white.
"She won't pick him," Kaden muttered under his breath.
A whisper spread among the Eresh: "He moves like the windwolf…"
Gorram roared again and brought the axe around with terrifying speed. Jackie leapt back just in time. The weapon buried itself in the arena wall, stones shattering from the impact.
Jackie landed, panting. His arms trembled. His legs ached.
I'm running out of time.
But the fire inside him burned hotter still.
His amulet glowed.
The Heartstone pulsed.
Visions flickered behind Jackie's eyes: ancient wolves racing under moonlight, stars wheeling, a bloodline's echo reaching for its next evolution. He saw a spectral beast with burning eyes—part wolf, part flame—howling on a mountaintop.
He howled.
The sound cut through the camp—animal, guttural, a forgotten call. All fell silent. Even Gorram hesitated.
That's when Jackie struck.
Lightning-fast, he closed the distance. The axe came down, but Jackie stepped inside the arc. With both hands, he caught the shaft mid-swing, planted his foot on Gorram's thigh—and kicked.
The axe flew from the champion's hands, crashing to the dirt with a heavy thud.
Before the Karus warrior could recover, Jackie's blade was at his throat.
Frozen. Silent.
Then Gorram dropped to one knee.
"I yield," he growled, voice low and bitter.
Gasps erupted. Then roars.
From all sides of the arena, warriors stood, pounding fists against their chests, hooting, shouting. Some chanted Jackie's name. Others lit small fires, tossing herbs in reverence. Children climbed their fathers' shoulders, shouting, "Wolf-flame! Wolf-flame!"
He had done it.
The outsider. The orphan. The boy with no tribe.
He had bested a champion of Karus in fair combat.
Jackie looked down at his hands, still shaking. The power within him had reached a new threshold. He could feel it—he'd crossed some invisible line. The Wolfflame was no longer a flicker. It had become a core.
He raised his sword.
At the edge of the arena, Elder Mora of the Blackfang stepped forward with the ceremonial prize: the Ironfang Circlet, forged in dragonfire and worn only by the victor of the Trials. She placed it in Jackie's hands, her tattooed face unreadable.
"The flame accepts you," she said softly. "But beware. Power draws its own storms."
He bowed low, holding the circlet over his brow. The cheers grew louder.
From the crowd, Liri—the dark-eyed girl from the Eresh tents—caught Jackie's gaze. She gave the slightest nod, lips parting as if to say something.
But before she could approach, a shadow passed overhead.
Everyone looked up.
A hawk circled high, its cry shrill and strange. Not natural. Not right.
Then a Karus shaman stumbled into the ring, robes soaked in sweat, ash clinging to his tattoos.
"A blood-sign," he rasped. "From the northern peaks. Fire on the ice. The old stones are bleeding again."
The flames around the arena guttered.
Some warriors made the warding sign. Others reached for weapons.
Whispers turned to murmurs. Murmurs to shouts.
A Blackfang boy screamed and pointed toward the horizon—where distant thunder echoed across the glacier wall. A crimson flash bloomed in the far sky like a dying star.
Jackie gripped the circlet tighter. He could feel the warmth still rising from the Heartstone beneath his tunic.
The Trials were over.
But the war for the frontier was just beginning.
End of chapter 17