The first sign came three nights later — not an attack, but a presence, subtle and deliberate, felt by the twins before any of Liora's scouts confirmed it with their own eyes. The fortress had settled into an uneasy rhythm of readiness by then, every guard doubled, every ward reinforced, and still the warning came first from the two children it was all meant to protect.

"Someone's watching," Ronan said, waking Jasmine in the deep hours of the night with a hand on her shoulder, his voice carrying none of the fear a child his age should reasonably have felt at such an hour. "Not the Hollowing's kind of watching....