In the final hour before the dawn of Day One Hundred and Thirty-Nine, the wind that blew down from the high ice saddles of the Spine turned sharp, clean, and dry.
Kezra Venn stood beneath the low stone arch of the back gate at the southern corner of the service court. Outside the arch lay the narrow, cobbled upkeep lane, twelve paces wide between the sheer wall of the keep stone support prop and the low stone low roof wall that guarded the thousand-foot drop into the gorge. In the pre-dawn starlight, the dark stone paving blocks gleamed with a faint, frosted crust, undisturbed by wagon traffic since the tunnel diggers had completed the demolition of the stable wing.
She rested her gloved fingertips against the cold door post stone of the archway. That turned her head slightly so her good right ear caught the subtle shifts in the wind. The dull, persistent hum in her injured left ear. The permanent sound scar earned on Day Forty-Two. Just then, the Saltglass bitter salt blowout had burst her eardrum. Remained constant, like the far-off murmur of water over river gravel. She had ceased fighting that sound months ago. She had learned to treat it as an unbending benchmark. That permanent bodily reminder every spreading of power carried a permanent body cost.
