The shadow of the eastern service wall lay cold and sharp across the limestone cobbles of the upkeep lane, slicing the three-pace alleyway into bands of frozen gloom and brilliant morning glare.
Ulvan Dret’s scarred left hand reached toward the open binding of Kezra Venn’s bonded survey notebook. Then, a dark shape moved with soundless, hungry grace into the narrow space between the two mapmakers.
Yseld Arken shifted her weight forward, placing her broad, leather-clad shoulder directly across Ulvan’s line of reach. She didn’t draw her short spear from her back harness, nor did she level an iron blade at his throat. A brawl four paces from Guard Vane and Guard Kellen would have alerted the southern gatehouse just as surely as a trumpet blast.
Instead, Yseld planted the iron-shod butt of her hooked climbing staff squarely onto the cobbles between Ulvan’s boots. The iron metal ring struck the limestone with a dry, solid clack that shook through the stone floor, wedging the seasoned ash shaft like an unmoving gate bar against the older man’s chest.
Ulvan froze, his fingers hovering an inch from the wood of her staff.
His bloodshot eyes rose from the staff to Yseld’s face.
The former Cairn Host route finder and the veteran Cairn Host map maker stood eye to eye in the cold alpine draft. It was separated by barely a foot of mountain air.
