They came in under a gray lid of sky that made every color meaner. East banners stayed low. No horns. No speeches. Bert lifted a hand; the column breathed and split into the shape he’d drawn on the board.

  “Lion—hold back!” Kelara’s voice carried just enough; it hung warning, not worry.

  Petric didn’t charge. He let the line dress. He looked like a man who remembered the cost of last time and had decided to pay smarter.

  It started with quiet violence. Lysa and Bradan opened the gate—arrows like punctuation, cutting runners, breaking rhythm. Jorlan’s fingers wrote in the air; a small gravity well tugged a shield wall a half-step wrong at just the wrong moment. Clarien’s warding light slid across the forward rank—thin as smoke, strong as a vow.

  Then Bert said, “Now,” almost gently.

  Nell drove the left like a battering ram, hammer finding iron and bone with that awful cheer he couldn’t turn off in a fight. Solin kept pace, surgical calm, finishing what Nell began, eyes always checking the flanks. Gung flowed where the line ragged, folding men like paper, hands as merciful as they were brutal.

  On the right, Petric, Jerric, and Bert became a thing the West would remember when they slept. Bert broke a shield with his shoulder, Petric took the man beyond it, Jerric slid under the third strike and clipped a hamstring clean—textbook if the textbook had been written by wolves. Twice Jerric wanted to chase the break; twice he checked himself and let it come back wrong-footed into his blade. Bert’s laugh cut the air, quick and pleased. “There you go!”

  The West captain tried to rally at the palisade; Josira put a knife into the post beside his ear and Tank yanked the post out of the ground like a splinter. The man had the good sense to run. Two more didn’t. Lysa’s arrows decided for them.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  They left the western half to its ghosts and took the east like they were reclaiming a room in their own house—no gloating, no burn. Petric posted his knights in pairs at each notch Bert had drawn, made sure the men had water and bread and a line of retreat that wasn’t called retreat when they said it out loud.

  By late day the Vale breathed easier. So did the Lion’s house.

  — — —

  They ate outside because it felt like the right way to measure the day. Bread. Fish. Stew. Bert accepted five compliments about his cooking and rejected seven more with mock offense.

  Tank muttered into his cup, nodding at Bert. “He can cook, too? What can’t he do?”

  “Sing,” Bert shot back instantly.

  “Like a wounded goat,” Gung said without blinking.

  The table roared, even Clarien cracked a smile.

  When the noise dipped, Tank tilted his head toward Petric with a grin. “Meanwhile, this one? Can’t fish, can’t cook, can’t land a joke. What can he do?”

  Jorlan snorted. “Lose gracefully at chess.”

  Solin’s dry tone slid in after. “If that counts.”

  The laughter rose again, warmer, sharper. Bert smirked but let it ride; Petric held the smile, though his jaw had gone tight beneath it.

  Somewhere between the second cup and the third, Josira slid past Bert with a shoulder brush that wasn’t an accident. “You give orders like they’re favors,” she said.

  “I give favors like they’re orders,” he returned, amused.

  She let that be the extent of their flirt. She wasn’t immune; she also wasn’t overeager.

  Tank watched, and the flicker of annoyance that crossed his face was gone so fast most would have missed it. He rubbed his thumb over the rim of his cup and joined the laughter a beat late.

  Petric watched the table the way a builder watches a newly set beam: with pride, with care, with a small prayer to physics. Bert bumped his shoulder again, and Petric—just for tonight—let himself be the man he’d been before the map got heavy.

  “Tomorrow’s work,” Kelara said when the lamps burned low.

  “Tomorrow’s work,” Petric echoed.

  No one spoke of omens. The woods listened on their own.