Zephyr
By the time I reached the north net, my captains had already done their work, and done it well.
Four rogues had come through the high pass an hour after dawn, moving in a diamond, staying off the ridgelines, using the streambed to kill their scent. Professional habits. Rogues are not professional. Rogues are starving, desperate, broken things that hit a border like weather, all noise and hunger. These four had moved like men with a map and a wage.
My wolves had taken them in the birch hollow below the second watchtower. Three had chosen to fight to the end, and had been accommodated. The fourth, the smallest, had thrown down his knife the moment the ring closed, screaming surrender before anyone had touched him.
He sat now in the center of the hollow with his wrists bound behind
