Chapter 5 - A NEW KIND OF SILENCE

Refusing to keep wounding the home around him, Paws resolves to train alone—pushing Kael into a fragile compromise that grants solitude without abandonment. But anger and medicine prove a brittle foundation, and when the Elder finds him at the old quarry, his challenge strips away every crutch Paws has come to rely on. To survive the selection, he must find a strength his father could never give him.