Summary:

"In the songs the old women sing, the forest does not offer mercy… it only offers trades. When Anzhelina was fourteen, she walked into the deepest thicket to find the Young Wolf, Ruslan Dragunov. She did not go with tears; she went with a crown of iron and a heart of flint. She offered him a life for a life: she would be the moon to his tide, the lioness to his pride, and the mother to his heirs, if only he would tear the throat from the Great Bear, Grigori. Ilya still wonders if the North Wind blew too hard that night, or if it was Lina’s own hand that guided the Wolf ’s teeth toward their brother Andrei, too. Perhaps he was a branch that always needed breaking. That was the night the girl died, and the Queen of the Fortress was born. She traded her spring so her brothers could finally see the summer."