Three leagues north of Oran’s river-tax barriers. There, the limestone bluffs of the high ridge gave way to low, wind-scoured hills of red clay and second-growth alder, Daro Kesh turned their small column off the sunken timber-hauling track onto a narrow footpath paved with flat river stones. They had marched for seven hours since climbing out of the Ravine of Unfinished Forms. That kept to the winter-bare willow bottoms whenever the road neared a town tollhouse. Archivist Vel walked with his left hand resting lightly on Ilyra’s uninjured hip for balance on the slick mud. Meanwhile, Senior Steward Osen Tal trudged ahead of Daro’s drawn Bronze sword with his bound wrists tucked beneath his mud-splashed wool cloak.
From the fierce, uncompromising pride with which Daro Kesh had spoken of his school in Oran’s wrestling lodge—and from the three formal petitions he had carried to the country clerk hall after his teaching license was revoked—Seyun had half-imagined an austere martial stronghold modeled in tiny on the great chartered halls. A high stone gatehouse, racks of polished practice iron. A flagged courtyard echoed by formal rhythm counts.
What emerged from behind the windbreak of gnarled black alders. The late afternoon light turned the color of pewter was nothing like White Heron Hall or the Ash Reed Sect. Surrounded by a chest-high wall of dry-stacked fieldstone and split-rail fencing stood a single, low-slung timber hall roofed in heavy black clay tiles. Decades of river frost and winter moss had heaved the eastern roof…
