The fire crackled low in the stone hearth, its flame barely enough to reach the edges of the heavy wooden room. Shadows ruled here. Shadows and silence.
Bragg exhaled slowly through his nose, the flicker of the torchlight dancing across the jagged scar that split his lip. Across from him sat Venom, eyes like broken glass reflecting the low-burning flame.
Between them, untouched mugs of cold tea.
Neither had spoken for several minutes.
The third presence did not sit.
Miller stood like a statue in the corner, one arm cloaked, his remaining hand resting lightly on the hilt of a short blade sheathed at his side. The left sleeve of his cloak hung limp where his arm should've been. He neither leaned nor shifted. Just listened.
Snow tapped faintly at the windows, a soft and constant whisper from the outside. They were buried deep in the north now—beneath the spine of the world, beneath frost-bitten peaks and ghostwood trees that never shed their leaves.
