Location:Wild Confederacy — Settlement Windbreak; Jessa's lane; Jessa's house
Date/Time:TC1858.03.18 – TC1858.03.19
Metal dropped on packed earth makes a flat sound, and Galen knew it before he knew where it came from.
He stopped. The four behind him stopped. They were halfway down Jessa's lane on the packed snow in the middle of it, the five of them close together as the Speaker had ordered, a lamp shaded low in Ulla's hand. It was past the second hour. The lane was dark on both sides, and every house in it was asleep on its own floor.
"Jessa's," Dace said.
It was. There was no light under the door, and then there was, a small one, somebody's taper, and a woman's voice said a name, not loud, the way you say a child's name when you have woken and found them not where they were.
Galen went to the door. He did not run. Running on the lane was a thing the five did not do, and he had told them that himself.
"Agnet," he said at the door. "It's Galen. It's the five."
