"You'll get your answer on the floor," he said. "Not on my picket line."
Mads shrugged and walked away. The insult hung in the air, unanswered and recorded by every watching eye.
---
Liv Andersen did not request a private meeting with Elara.
She simply appeared at the southern dens' fire during the midday break with Herman Eide and Sigrid Sivertsen and restated the position in language the Moot recorders would hear: the healing territory must be named independently or the southern dens would treat any Frostfang accounting of their sick as political overreach.
Several smaller southern voices nodded. The pressure was no longer philosophical. It was becoming a bloc.
Felix watched Elara absorb it without flinching. When Liv and the others left, he said only, "They're forcing the seam into the open."
"I know," Elara answered. "I'd rather see the seam than pretend it isn't there."
---
