The clouds hung low, the sort of raked wool that belonged in an oil painting or a church nave, not over a line of half-awake initiates in blue. Soren watched steam curl from his lips with every breath, a portable cloud of his own to add to the morning's bleak offering.
Two weeks in, and already he saw the tricks fatigue played: the horizon shrank, the stone underfoot got meaner, and every correction from the Swordmaster's mouth scored a little deeper.
Dawn muster on the upper courtyard: Hands on hilt, toes to the line, eyes nailed forward into the next hour's cold blur.
Dane prowled the rows, boots slapping out a metronome that outpaced Soren's heartbeat. Above, the rampart mist shivered, skeining through the air as if afraid it might be mistaken for a living thing.
