They were two hours from the territory when Aria felt the shift.
It came through the root systems first — not the valley's warm tended patterns, those had faded an hour back as they moved south and the terrain changed from old growth to the transitional forest that marked the outer edge of Kael's territory. What she felt now was different. A disruption in the familiar network she'd been learning for weeks, subtle enough that she might have missed it three days ago.
She didn't miss it now.
"Something's wrong," she said.
Kael was already pulling his horse to a stop. He did it without asking her to clarify, without the half-second of doubt that most people inserted between hearing something and believing it. He simply stopped and looked at her and waited.
"The eastern ward line," she sai
