We chose the dry flats east of the training yard, ground Zereth had picked specifically because nothing there would collapse if a fight went wide, and because the ridge above it gave Nana and the doubled guard a clear line on both the field and the tree line beyond it. Threll walked the perimeter once before we started, unhurried, the way a merchant checks a scale before trusting it with anything valuable.
I didn't see Rena anywhere along the marked stones, which meant, as promised, she'd found a vantage none of us were meant to notice. Selena had planted herself at the nearest edge regardless, halberd grounded but her whole frame angled like a drawn bow, watching Threll's every measured step with an intensity that had nothing to do with curiosity. Malrik, for once, had said nothing since we walked out here, which worried me more than anything he might have joked about instead.
