Music carried from the Great Hall across the snow. They were celebrating Sera, which kept every guard looking toward the party and away from the mountain path.
I kept to the dark side of the buildings and climbed to the old stone altar on the rear mountain. The air smelled of pine. The High Priestess waited beside the altar with her hood up.
She held out two items.
The first was a small obsidian token, my one-way passage north.
The second was a silver ritual dagger etched with runes that caught the moonlight. A thin coat of wolfsbane shone along its edge, a poison made to sever spiritual ties.
"Once it is done, you will both feel the pain," the Priestess said. "All of it."
"Good." Caleb would finally share the pain he had given me.
I took the dagger and walked to the center of the a
