Vael's contact came through at dawn.
Aria was already awake when Vael knocked on the war room door — had been awake for an hour, sitting with the ward lines and the root systems and the particular quality of pre-dawn silence that felt less like absence and more like preparation. She'd learned to use these hours since coming to the territory. The power was quieter in the dark, more cooperative, less likely to surge unexpectedly. She could reach further and read more clearly and come back to herself without the effort it took in daylight when everything was louder.
She felt Vael coming down the corridor before the knock.
"Enter," she said.
Vael came in with a folded paper and the expression of someone who had been awake all night and had decided somewhere around the third hour that sleep
