The camp did not sleep that night.
Even after the wounded were tended and the dead prepared for burial, no one truly rested. Fires burned longer than usual, shadows stretching across stone like restless spirits. Conversations stayed low, clipped, heavy with unease.
I sat apart from the others, my shoulder freshly bandaged, blood still crusted beneath my fingernails. The pain was there, sharp, insistent but it was familiar. What unsettled me was everything else.
The way people looked at me now.
Not with suspicion.
Not with indifference.
But with attention.
I hated it.
Earlier, when the captive had been brought fully into camp, Sera had questioned him personally. I hadn’t stayed to listen. I already knew enough. Mercenaries did not move without coin, and coin did not flow without pow
