Jade Fern Grove threading the needle

As the northman stepped into the open, Ivana turned her head slowly, the movement deliberate and fluid, like the shifting of a glacier. She watched him emerge with a gaze that was terrifyingly void of emotion. Her pale, ice-blue eyes locked onto his, dissecting him in a heartbeat; noting the size, the muscle, and the bubbling foam at his jowls.

Where he was hot, clacking jaws, twitching energy, she was absolute zero.

She did not crouch, did not bare her teeth in a defensive snarl. Instead, she drew herself up to her full, considerable height, the thick ruff of fur at her neck bristling just enough to make her silhouette even more imposing. Slowly, her own tail rose, not waving, but held stiff and plumed behind her; a silent, aristocratic counter-claim to the air he thought he owned.

The valkyrie let the silence stretch between them, heavy and suffocating, before she finally spoke. Her voice was a low, smooth alto, rough with the texture of a growl but clear as a bell.

„You drool, stranger,” she observed coldly, her eyes flicking to the foam at his mouth before returning to his eyes. „I assume you have the control to swallow it before you address me.”