The road had long since stopped being a road.
What had begun as a maintained mountain path out of Minato had narrowed steadily over the better part of two hours — first to a track wide enough for the carriage but no wider, then to something that the wheels only barely negotiated, branches scraping the lacquered sides with a sound like fingernails drawn slowly across wood. The mountain gave way to forest, and the forest was not the kind that invited passage. It pressed close on both sides, old growth that had been old for a long time before anyone thought to plant a road through it, the canopy overhead dense enough to reduce the midday light to a grey, underwater dimness that lay flat against everything beneath it.
Nathan had stopped recognizing landmarks some time ago. He had also stopped expecting to.
