The mill sat alone in a stretch of open field, its wooden sails long since rotted away, the stone base weathered gray by decades of wind. Mercer approached on foot from the southern gate, his horse left tied to a fence post a quarter mile back, exactly as the letter had instructed.
No cover anywhere. Tamsin had been right about that. Whoever chose this meeting place had chosen it to see everything coming.
He reached the door at noon exactly, the sun directly overhead, and pushed it open.
Darius Hale stood alone near the center of the main floor, hands clasped behind his back, watching Mercer enter with an expression that had none of its usual composure left. Whatever calm Hale had carried through the council chamber had burned away sometime in the last day, leaving something colder and
