One hundred and one people needed feeding.
That was the first practical problem.
---
Aldric's people handled it without being asked. Fires going. Pots out. Whatever supplies they had shared without complaint.
I watched it happen and felt something settle slightly in my chest.
Not relief exactly. More like the first small proof that this could actually work.
People who chose to share when they did not have much were the kind of people worth building something with.
---
Riven found me standing at the edge of the main space watching everything.
"You brought them in," he said.
"Aldric said yes," I said. "I just asked."
"Asking the right people the right things at the right time is not nothing," he said.
I did not have a response to that so I said nothing.
---
Dane appeared from somewhere looking slightly less hostile than usual which for Dane meant he was in a good mood.
"Their weapons are decent," he said. "Not great but decent."
"That is high praise from you," I said.
"It is accurate praise," he said. "There is a difference."
---
"Zev trains them," Aldric said. He had come up quietly behind us.
Dane looked at Aldric.
"Your second," Dane said. "Where did he train?"
"Eastern border garrison," Aldric said. "Before they found out what he was and discharged him."
Dane processed that.
"Discharged," he said flatly.
"Politely speaking yes," Aldric said.
---
Dane made a sound that meant he understood exactly what discharged politely speaking meant for a hybrid in a pure blood garrison.
"I want to see him work tomorrow," Dane said. "Before we move out."
"I will tell him," Aldric said.
---
Soren had found a corner and was already deep in conversation with a woman from Aldric's group. Both of them bent over something on the table between them.
Maps from the look of it.
I filed that away. Soren finding information was always useful.
---
The children had found each other the way children do. A cluster of them near the warmest fire. Pip was in the middle of them somehow. Already playing some kind of hand game that had three of the smallest ones laughing.
I had not heard children laugh since I left Ashveil.
It did something to me that I did not examine too closely.
---
Maren appeared at my elbow.
"People are fed," she said. "Injuries checked. Everyone has a place to sleep tonight."
"How are the injured doing?" I asked.
"Better than yesterday," she said. "The man on the carry is stubborn enough to be walking by tomorrow I think."
"Good," I said. "We need the carry free for anyone who struggles on the second day."
Maren looked at me.
"You are already thinking two days ahead," she said.
"Someone has to," I said.
---
She was quiet for a moment.
"Can I say something directly?" she asked.
"Please," I said.
"You are doing well," she said. "Better than someone should be doing who has been carrying this for two days."
"I do not feel like I am doing well," I said honestly.
"That is usually how it works," she said. "The ones who feel most confident are often the most dangerous. The ones who question themselves are usually the ones paying attention."
---
I thought about that.
"How did you end up leading the group in the building?" I asked. "Before I got there."
"Nobody else stepped up," she said simply. "So I did."
"Were you scared?" I asked.
"Every minute," she said. "Still am."
She said it the same way she said everything. Like a fact being stated.
---
"Maren," I said. "I want you to help me manage the larger group going forward. You know how to keep people organized and moving. I need that."
She looked at me for a moment.
"Alright," she said. "But I want to know the plan. All of it. Not pieces."
"Deal," I said.
---
She nodded once and went back to moving through the space checking on people.
I watched her go.
One hundred and one people.
I needed people like Maren the same way I needed Riven and Dane and Soren.
Different skills. Different strengths. All of them necessary.
---
Zev found me an hour later.
Or more accurately I turned around and he was just there. Leaning against the wall behind me with his arms crossed watching the room.
"You move quietly," I said.
"Useful skill," he said.
"Almost as quiet as Soren," I said.
He glanced toward where Soren was still bent over maps.
"Almost," he agreed. Like the qualification mattered to him.
---
"What do you want to know?" I asked.
He looked at me.
"What makes you think I want to know something?" he said.
"You have been watching me for an hour," I said. "You are not the kind of person who watches without a reason."
---
Something shifted in his expression.
Not quite the amusement from earlier.
More like reassessment.
"The Hollow," he said. "What is your plan when you get there?"
"Establish a base," I said. "Train. Let the bloodline develop. Build numbers."
"And then?" he said.
"Take back what was taken," I said.
---
"From the Alpha King," he said.
"From anyone who is hunting our people," I said.
He was quiet for a moment.
"The Alpha King is not the only threat," he said.
"I know," I said. "Soren mentioned other factions."
"There are three main ones," Zev said. "The Alpha King controls the wolf territories. The Elven Council controls the northern lands. The Merchant Lords control the trade routes and half the inner territories financially."
---
I looked at him.
"You know a lot about the political structure," I said.
"I spent four years in a border garrison," he said. "You learn things."
"Which of the three is most dangerous to us right now?" I asked.
He considered that seriously.
"The Alpha King is the most visible threat," he said. "But the Merchant Lords are the most dangerous."
"Why?" I asked.
---
"Because the Alpha King uses soldiers," he said. "You can see soldiers coming. The Merchant Lords use money and information. You do not see that coming until it has already happened."
"Are they connected?" I asked. "The Alpha King and the Merchant Lords?"
"Everything is connected," he said. "The question is how and how tightly."
---
I pulled the pendant out slowly and looked at it.
"The throne claim," I said. "Which of the three factions would it threaten most directly?"
Zev looked at the pendant.
"All three," he said. "But for different reasons."
"Explain," I said.
---
"The Alpha King loses military dominance," he said. "The Elven Council loses political legitimacy. The Merchant Lords lose the instability they profit from."
He looked at me.
"A united hybrid claim does not just threaten their power," he said. "It threatens the entire system they have built on top of three hundred years of hybrid suppression."
---
I closed my fingers around the pendant.
Three factions. Three different threats. All of them with reason to want this pendant gone and me with it.
"You are telling me this so I understand what we are actually walking into," I said.
"Yes," he said.
"Why?" I asked. "You just met me today."
---
He was quiet for a moment.
"My mother was sold to a Merchant Lord when I was six," he said. "Because she was hybrid and the law said he could."
He said it the same way Riven had talked about his mother.
Evenly. Like a wound so old it had become just a scar.
"I have been waiting for a reason to burn that system down since I was old enough to understand it," he said. "You are the first thing that looks like a real reason."
---
I held his gaze.
"I will not waste it," I said.
He looked at me for one long moment.
Then he pushed off the wall.
"Get some sleep," he said. "Tomorrow is a long day."
He walked off into the crowd.
---
I stood there holding the pendant.
Three factions.
One hundred and one people.
Two days to the Hollow.
And something underneath my skin that had been sleeping my whole life slowly and steadily waking up.
---
I found a space near the wall and sat down.
Riven was across the room. He caught my eye for a second. Just checking. I gave him a small nod.
He looked away.
I leaned my head back against the wall and closed my eyes.
One hundred and one people.
Two days ago I had nothing and no one.
I did not know if that was terrifying or the best thing that had ever happened to me.
Probably both.
I put the pendant in my pocket and let sleep take me before I could think about it any longer.