**ATTICUS**
The search does not stop when the trail runs cold, it just changes shape, turning inward and outward at the same time as Axel and I start pulling on every loose thread we can find, because someone always sees something even when they do not realise it mattered. The packhouse becomes a pressure cooker of questions and half answers, warriors rotating through shifts while Axel coordinates patrols and I sit people down one by one, watching faces, listening for hesitation, tracking the places where truth snags.
Everyone swears they did not know. Everyone insists they would have stopped it. Some of them are lying.
Most of them are just terrified.
We get fragments. Devin pacing late at night. Devin asking about borders. Devin asking who was on watch. Devin asking questions that so
