The mountain canyon was exactly where Owen's coordinates had placed it.
Yuki had received them forty minutes ago, a precise geographic pulse through their bond, the kind of information that didn't need words, just location and urgency. She had relayed it to Odessa before the Hunter Association van had finished loading, and Alfred had driven with a focused efficiency that suggested he had navigated emergency situations in vehicles before and hadn't always been operating within legal speed limits.
They arrived at the canyon entrance on foot after the final half-kilometre, the terrain too narrow for the vehicle.
"Coordinates check out," Alfred said, scanning the rock faces with the methodical attention of someone who had been doing threat assessment for longer than Yuki had been a hunter. "The portal gate should be approximately two hundred meters ahead, around the bend."
Uru jiggled on Yuki's head with a nervous, rapid pulse that it had developed as a shorthand for danger-sensed.
