The stone drainage flume that skirted the southern foundations of Harth was half-flooded with freezing river wash.
Jon Hale ran along the narrow granite coping path, his leather boots splashing through grey mud and rotting alder leaves. Beside him, Sir Cael Ardent moved with the long, disciplined stride of an armored infantryman, his broadsword drawn, the notched steel held low to avoid striking the low arches of the stone footbridges. Behind them, wheezing with quarry-lung effort but keeping pace with the stubborn endurance of an ox, Alden Bram hauled his canvas tool roll and a twenty-pound iron sledgehammer.
They sprinted past the turn of South Lane.
Even in the desperate rush toward the hill, Jon’s gaze flickered to the right. The wide, barren patch of gravel where Dunstan Harl’s bakery had stood for forty winters lay grey and desolate in the freezing drizzle. The rain had pooled in the weed-choked cart ruts; a stray goat scrambled up the embankment, startled by their boots.
Cael saw it too. The knight did not slow his stride, but his jaw clenched so hard the muscles stood out like cords beneath his pale cheek. The memory of page seventy-two—the five names inscribed in iron-gall ink, and little Lark’s six-petaled daisy—was a physical weight that pushed him forward faster than any imperial battle horn.
