CHAPTER 51: THE ROAD TO BLACK ROCK
The first warm breath of spring came soft and slow, melting drifts into rushing streams, turning brown slopes green, and opening the high passes that had held us prisoner for months. Even as the land woke, so did old tensions — and our first test of the new season lay at Black Rock, the strongest holdfast of the old loyalists, where the shadow faction had made its headquarters.
Corin sat with us around the main hall table, spreading out detailed maps of the fortress and its surrounding lands, his movements sure now that he was no longer hiding what he knew. “Black Rock was built to be unbreakable,” he said, tracing the line of steep cliffs that ringed the settlement. “It has its own wells, its own storehouses, its own forges. For three generations, it w
