Emerging from the dark mouth of the western drainage drift into the pale winter sunlight of Stonewake’s lower courtyards, Kezra Venn felt the sharp, freezing wind bite through her wool trousers. Above the stone castle walls, the sky had cleared to a hard, fine china blue. The jagged granite teeth of the high Spine gleamed like chipped flint against the northern horizon. The shift from the warm, stove-heated underground warren to the biting mountain air made her eyes water. Then it sent a shiver through her shoulders.
Beside the courtyard water tank, Ulvan Dret was waiting. The fifty-four-year-old Host Mapmaker stood with his hands tucked deep inside the quilted sleeves of his grey wool robes, his breath pluming in thin, rhythmic puffs. His face was pale, lined with the deep grooves of chronic fatigue. His left knee was visibly braced inside a stiff leather gaiter that prevented the joint from bending beyond a shallow angle.
Beside him stood Sergeant Kroll. It looked sullen and cold. He held the leather map metal tube containing Ulvan’s five-drilled shaft chart.
Kezra walked straight to the stone bench beside the water tank. Without speaking, she unrolled Ulvan’s chart, took a piece of red marking chalk from Fellis, and laid the sheet flat against the coping stone.
