Lena stood looking out across that same stretch of trees, her gaze trained back towards Howard's farm, observing her world like a princess from a locked tower. The forest was an impenetrable blanket of shadow across the moor and the only lights she could see were faint sparkles of firelight from houses far off and the flash of cold, white moonlight across the black trees.

She shivered slightly in the mounting breeze, her golden hair flickering around her face like dancing cobras, her knuckles clenched, bone white, at her sides. Beneath her feet, the vast silence of The Watch Tower slept like a great, ancient beast, her presence on its...