The wind off the limestone peaks drove the woodsmoke low along the gravel terrace. It curled around the wheels of the overturned freight wagon where the Alderfast camp fire burned red and small. Beyond the circle of light, the mountain dropped away into the vast, ink-black shadow of the sealed valley, dotted here and there by the faint hearth-glow of the lower farmsteads.
Two older basin terrace growers, Karr and Elan, had joined Adra Pike beside the iron fire-pot. Both men wore patched sheepskin coats stiffened with dried mud and lime dust, their wool scarves wound twice around their throats against the biting frost. Karr’s right arm hung slightly crooked from an old blasting fracture in the upper adit. Meanwhile, Elan leaned on a heavy hazel staff, his shoulders hunched with the persistent, dry cough that plagued every man who had spent twenty winters cutting shale in the deep drifts.
They had watched Morren’s cart rumble away down the dark switchback toward the valley hospital shelter. Their eyes were fixed on Kezra Venn with an urgent, desperate hope.
“We saw the rooms, Land-mapper,” Karr said, his voice raspy as he gestured with a calloused hand toward the towering black dark shape of Stonewake Citadel rising against the stars. “The western adits are empty. The miners took their looms and their children down the ramp two hours ago. There are dry stone barracks up there with stone hearths, vaulted ceilings, and cedar roof beams that don’t leak a drop of meltwater…
