The snow changed again.
It was finer now, more like dust than flake, and it clung to the skin in a way that felt wrong. Not wet. Not cold. Just... present. As if the forest wanted to mark them.
Leon moved at the front, his eyes tracking every flicker between trees. The vanguard followed in a staggered line—scouts wide, archers ready, mages in the rear. No one spoke. The silence of Witchpine still hung over them, thick as a veil.
Kellen joined him. "No prints but ours," he murmured. "Even the animals won't come this far."
Leon nodded. He'd noticed.
They passed the last of the ridge and entered what looked like a natural corridor—two lines of stone rising from the snow like pillars. Black moss clung to their sides, pulsing faintly.
Naeve signalled a halt. She crouched near one of the stones, brushing snow away to reveal a carved emblem—a crescent eye crossed by a single vertical line.
"This was a watch path," she whispered. "Old realm. Before the crowns."
