The freezing air past midnight had settled into a dead, razor-edged stillness that made the stone gutters of Stonewake Citadel crack with frost. Across the high bailey, the great stables stood dark, swept, and deserted, the smell of eighty-six left warhorses already draining away into the alpine wind.
Kezra Venn walked the southern kitchen courtyard with Fellis Dain and three western-quarter miners who carried iron crowbars and mesh screens. Her coat was frosted white along the lapels, her breath puffing in rapid plumes as she held her open survey notebook in her left hand, lit up by the horn lantern Fellis carried in his uninjured right hand.
“The big beasts are easy,” Kezra said, her voice quiet in the hollow sound of the deserted courtyard. “A draft horse can’t hide in a woodbox. A cavalry charger doesn’t burrow into a floorboard. But the small creatures are what break an expedition. When I tried the first return swap on the Kilnstep drying shed on Day 5, the entire circuit failed at the third warning beat because a half-grown grey barn cat was sleeping behind the threshold stone beneath a pile of willow shavings.”
Fellis chuckled softly, adjusting the leather sling that supported his braced left forearm. “I remember. We spent an hour turning over timber balks in the dark while Maud shook a tin of herring scraps until the cat decided to show its face.”
