We had four days.
I knew it the moment we crossed back into Ashgrave territory and Idris met us at the gate with a face already carrying the particular tight urgency of someone who'd been managing a crisis in our absence.
A second scout, one of our own this time, had spotted movement gathering at the southern pass, exactly where Renfrew's captured warrior had said it would appear, and the timeline his sighting suggested matched the scout's warning almost exactly.
"Four days," Idris confirmed, once we'd gathered in the council hall, the same room where I'd told the truth to a room full of skeptical faces less than a month earlier. "Maybe five if we're fortunate. The southern force is still gathering, but not slowly. Whatever patience Cassian Thorne had left, he's spent it."
Rhys moved
