When the brisk morning air saw the horizon marked by red blood warning that peace was equally as short as the preceding night. The rogue camp was settled within a natural amphitheater of pines and boulders, its shantytents and lean‑tos spread higgledy‑piggledy around a central firepit festooned with furs and rubble barricade. We had wanted to rest after the ritual — to heal our bodies, to gather our minds. I paced in a perimeter around camp—Kael Draven muttering to Jace Thorn and Mara Lorne below the morning's gunmetal sky.
Jace's jaw was set. "I've doubled the sentinels on the ridge. They're not going to catch us unprepared."
"O.K.," Mara said, standing with her shoulders squared. "And the villains have stakes sharpened at every place you could choke. We will channel them where we need them."
