The horn sounded before dawn, three long blasts that meant assembly, not attack, and Marina was on her feet before she was fully awake, her hand already reaching for Silvain's side of the furs.

He was already gone.

She found her dress in the dark by memory and was out the door within a minute, her bare feet cold against the packed earth of the corridor, her heart doing something it had not done in months. Not fear exactly. The specific alertness of a body that had learned, a long time ago, that horns before dawn rarely meant good news.

The pack house courtyard was full when she reached it....