The mood at the Silverclaw camp was a sharp contrast to the tension-laced mountain ruins they’d left behind.
Ashyra stood beneath the high canopy of the pines, arms crossed, eyes trained on the distant hills. The early morning mist hadn’t yet lifted from the valley floor, and the sun’s light was slow to break through the lingering clouds. She welcomed the cool air—it gave her something to ground herself with, something real to hold onto while her thoughts spun in too many directions.
The mountain had tried to swallow them. Again. The seal had been broken, yes, but what it meant remained dangerously unclear. What had been buried in those runes was older than any of them realized. A trap, yes—but also a warning. And whoever had set it had done so with precision.
Behind her, voices murmure
