The tremor from the collapsed mine lift had barely died out of the foundation lime when the sentry wire above the ditch gave a single, hesitant pluck.
It was not the frantic rattle of a raider or the measured double-strike of Sella’s scouts. It was the slow, metallic scrape of an iron scabbard brushing against the gatehouse mounting block.
Inside the Grand Hall, the smell of burnt hair, vinegar, and scalded skin hung heavy under the rafters. Fen knelt between two pine benches with his sleeves pinned above his elbows, his fingers slick with elderberry balm as he wrapped boiled linen around the blistered palms of a young timber-hauler. Two benches down, Ossa Flint sat against the dry wall, her good grey eye fixed on the floor while a clean compress covered the red socket where her glass lens had shattered. Around them, the other eleven chorus workers sat in huddled pairs, sipping Hobb’s weak ginger wash and shivering each time the cold wind pushed past the curtain.
Noll Vey gathered his focus into the stone above the outer archway, feeling the damp limestone give way to the small, stubborn warmth of a single man standing in the road.
“He’s wearing Crown wool,” Noll said down through the mortar seam near the lintel. “Green surcoat, iron shoulder plates, gaiters muddy to the calf. No spear in his grip. His sword stays sheathed, but he has a bread knife tucked behind his belt buckle.”
