The price is never immediate.
It waits.
⸻
The first sign is absence.
A patrol that does not report.
A signal that should echo and doesn’t.
A stretch of land that feels… hollow.
Jason feels it like a skipped heartbeat in the lattice.
“Zane,” he says quietly.
“Something just moved through the boundary without asking.”
Zane is already standing.
“Where.”
Jason swallows.
“Close.”
⸻
They find the breach at the old crossing—stone worn smooth by centuries of feet that once trusted the world to be kinder than it is.
The bond does not surge.
The counterweight does not strain.
Because this was not force.
This was permission denied.
And something stepped through anyway.
⸻
The wolves fan out instinctively.
Too late.
Zane feels it then—sharp and personal, like a blade sliding bet
