The mountain did not have a name that outsiders used.
It had a name the tiger clan used, in their own tongue, that translated roughly to 'the place where the sky bows' — and standing at its eastern ridge in the blue hour before the festival had turned the distant sky red, with the wind coming up cold and clean from the valley below, the name made sense.
The sky did seem lower here.
Like it had learned humility in proximity to whatever lived on this mountain.
The guard hit the stone path hard enough that the impact echoed off the cliff face.
She lay there.
One arm bent under her. Her clan vest torn at the shoulder where silver claws had passed through it without quite passing through 'her' — a precision that was somehow more insulting than if she'd simply been cut.
She coughed once.
Her whole body had the look of something that had recently been reminded it was made of flesh.
Sabrina stood over her.
