We heard him before we saw him.
Not Fenris — the valley. The specific quality of the air changing as we came through the northern range, the root systems shifting from the deep unorganized patterns of old growth into the tended warmth of an enclosed space that had been loved and maintained. I felt it through the horse's hooves and through the connection I'd been holding continuously since we left the territory — the long reach northeast that had been tracking Fenris's frequency for two hours.
He was there.
Outside the valley entrance. Stationary. Not inside — the passage through the rock was too narrow for more than one person at a time and whoever had arrived first had made the calculation that entering a confined space without knowing what was inside it was not a calculation that favo
