The valley waited like a wound that had never closed.
From the ridge, the Black Lattice stretched below them: rows of ancient ward-stones rising like broken teeth, strung with black iron lines that hummed in the night. The air above it shimmered faintly, bending starlight. It wasn’t a place built by accident. It was a net. And something inside it wanted out.
Lena stood at the edge of the hollow, her crowns faint but steady, her mark burning slow. Every time the wind shifted, the hum of the Lattice pressed against her ribs, reminding her that this was not just stone—it was law made into architecture. A cage that had forgotten why it was built.
Dominic crouched beside her, eyes narrowed, wolf instincts alive. “The wards reach high,” he said. “Step wrong and the whole valley will eat us.”
