The wind howling through the jagged defile of Bone Ravine blew cold enough to rattle the loose scabbards against the stones.
Caleb Conway crested the southern ridge at the head of the forward column, his gray coat snapping back to reveal the purple jade medallion resting firm against his linen tunic. Below him, the terrain dropped into a barren gorge of fractured white shale, stripped of vegetation and scarred by ancient lightning strikes that had vitrified the stone into black glass. The spatial border separating the mortal peaks from the pocket realm was fracturing early, venting a metallic, ozone-heavy draft that made the hair on the back of his neck rise.
Across the four-hundred-pace expanse, encamped along the higher northern shelf like a gathering storm, sat the vanguard of the Sha
