Kaelen Veyr knew three things about the outpost at Grey Creek. The ale was watered, the commanding officer was incompetent, and somebody had been forging supply manifests for the past six months.He had proof of the third. The other two were just common sense.The proof sat in his saddlebag, wrapped in oilcloth. Sixty pages of discrepancies. Weapons that entered the depot but never reached the front. Food shipments that vanished between checkpoints. Enough stolen material to equip a small army.Kaelen had spent three weeks gathering it. He had crawled through supply tents at midnight, copied ledgers by candlelight, and bribed a quartermaster with two silver coins and a bottle of cheap brandy. Now he was riding back to Arvendale with evidence that would end careers.Or get him killed. He had not decided which yet.The forest road narrowed as he descended toward the valley. Rain had turned the dirt to mud. His horse, a tired brown mare named Soot, picked her way carefully around the dee

The howl led Kaelen into a valley he had never seen on any map.That was his first warning.Military scouts mapped everything within a hundred miles of the border. Every creek, every ridge, every deer trail. Kaelen had studied those maps for years. He knew the terrain around Grey Creek better than he knew his own face.But this valley was not on any map. The hills folded together in a way that hid it from the ridge above. A man could walk within fifty feet of its edge and never know it existed.Kaelen crouched at the valley's rim and looked down.A village. Maybe thirty buildings, arranged in a rough circle around a central well. Wooden walls, thatched roofs, thin smoke rising from a handful of chimneys. People moved between the buildings. Normal people. Farmers, by the look of their clothes.Werewolves.He could tell by the way they moved. Too fluid. Too aware. Every one of them kept glancing at the tree line, checking angles, tracking sounds. They had lived out here long enough to m

The mine entrance was a black mouth in the mountainside, half-hidden by dead vines and fallen rock. Hessa stood beside it in human form, her clothes torn but her expression calm. The blood on her muzzle was gone. Werewolf healing, Kaelen assumed. He had heard stories but never seen it happen."Took you long enough," she said."You could have waited at the village.""I could have." She turned and walked into the darkness without waiting for a reply.Kaelen followed. Aldric came behind him, quiet for once. The tunnel narrowed after twenty paces, forcing them into single file. The walls were rough stone, chiseled by hand, not by dwarven tools. Old work. Kaelen ran his fingers along the surface and felt the grooves of pickaxes."Who dug this?" he asked.Hessa's voice echoed ahead. "No one knows. The village found it a hundred years ago. We used it for storage until we realized it ran under the mountains.""Where does it come out?""Eastern face. Near Kaldren. It's a three-day walk if you

Kaelen grabbed the map from the table and shoved it into his coat."Books. Grab what you can carry."Dorn stared at him. "We don't have time to read.""We don't have time to argue either. Take the closest shelf. Stuff your pack. Move."The dwarves moved. Fen grabbed a stack of scrolls. Dorn pulled books from the nearest shelf and shoved them into his bag without looking at the titles. Aldric stood frozen, staring at the door."Aldric."He blinked. "What?""Is there another way out of this room?""I don't know. Your father never mentioned one."Kaelen scanned the library. Round walls. Shelves floor to ceiling. One door. No windows. No side passages.Then he saw it. A gap in the shelves near the back. Not a door. A seam. The wood was newer than the rest. Recently repaired.He crossed the room and pushed on the seam. Nothing. He tried pulling. Still nothing.The boots were closer now. He could hear voices. Moran's voice, sharp and impatient. "Spread out. They're in here somewhere."Kaele

The tunnel exit opened onto a mountain pass so cold Kaelen's breath froze on his collar.They had walked for two days through the dark, following the symbols that glowed brighter the further north they went. The tunnel had branched twice. Aldric had chosen the paths based on markings he half-remembered from Corvin's notes. Twice they had taken wrong turns and had to double back.Now they stood in the open air again. Below them, a valley stretched north, dotted with pine forests and frozen streams. A road wound through the valley, thin and gray, heading toward a cluster of buildings half a mile away."A waystation," Dorn said. "Dwarven. Probably has food and supplies.""And soldiers," Fen added. "If Voss sent word ahead, they'll be looking for us."Kaelen studied the waystation. Two buildings. A stable. A watchtower with a single guard. No banners. No military presence that he could see."We need supplies," he said. "We can't reach Ironhold on empty stomachs.""I'll go," Dorn said. "I'