The days that followed were lean and hard.
Thornholt was less a holdfast than a wound in the earth, and the men knew it. The ruined palisade was barely worth the name — half the stakes had rotted, the rest sagged at odd angles. The old tower groaned in the wind. Birds nested in its broken heights. The stream ran clean, but that was about the only mercy the gods left them.
And the wolves came at night.
The first one they found on the second dusk — a big, grey-furred brute nosing around the refuse pit. It bolted when the torchlight caught its eyes. A dozen more howled from the woods beyond the hill. Garran didn't like it. Wolves were bad enough, but wolves always meant worse things nearby.
By the third morning, two men were missing from the watch.
"Slipped off in the night," Dannic the smith grunted, hammering a spearhead into shape on a crude anvil stone. "Took rations with 'em."
"Names?" Garran asked.
"Brann and Callyn. New blood."
Jorik spat. "Cowards."
"Or clever," Dannic muttered.
Garran left it at that. Thornholt was no place for the weak. Or the uncommitted.
He spent the better part of that day walking the perimeter, measuring the ground, watching how the mist gathered in the hollows. The place was defensible enough, if one had men and timber. He had neither.
A few makeshift shelters had been thrown up against the inner wall — lean-tos of rough-hewn branches and canvas. The old hovel's hearth now served as the camp's kitchen, though there was little enough to cook.
The woman — her name was Mera — worked alongside the others without complaint, her sharp eyes tracking every move. She spoke little, but Garran noticed no one crossed her, not even the hard-bitten mercenaries. There was a story in that, though he hadn't asked it yet.
By dusk, the camp stank of sweat, ash, and desperation.
That was when the rider came.
A lone figure, on a black horse, descending the eastern slope. A thin plume of dust rose behind him.
The men bristled, spears lowered. Garran strode out to meet him, sword at his hip, a dozen of the Black Harp at his back.
The rider dismounted just beyond bowshot, raising his hands.
"I come with word," he called.
Garran narrowed his eyes. The man wore no colors. Plain boiled leather, dust-caked, a scar down one cheek. But his eyes were sharp. A sellsword, by the look. Or something worse.
"Speak, then," Garran called back.
The man stepped forward, offering a folded scrap of parchment. No seal.
Garran took it, breaking the rough twine. A single line, written in a cramped, hurried hand.
'Men without masters gather east of the Dagger Hills. Bandits, deserters, and worse. They march. Beware.'
No signature.
Garran looked up. "Who sent you?"
"No one," the man said. "And everyone. The Marches bleed, steward. And the vultures smell it."
With that, he turned, mounted, and rode back the way he came.
The men muttered. Jorik scratched his beard. "Could be a lie."
"Could be truth," Garran said.
It didn't matter. Either way, the wolves were coming.
And men without masters were always the hungriest kind.
That night, Garran gathered his company by the hearth. Faces ringed with firelight, eyes hollow with fatigue. Mera stood to one side, arms crossed, listening.
He spoke plain.
"There's no lord riding to save us. No gold wagon on the road. Thornholt's ours, and ours alone. If you stay, you fight. If you don't, leave before dawn. No debts, no oaths broken. But if you remain — you fight to the bone."
No one moved.
Even the green boys held their ground. A few exchanged glances, but none stood.
Jorik grinned. "Good. I was getting fond of your ugly faces."
A rough laugh from the men. Tense, but real.
Garran let it sit a moment, then added, "Tomorrow we fell timber. We raise new stakes. We ready for war."
A ripple of nods. Steel rang as swords were lifted.
It wasn't much. But it was enough.
For now.