They heard their footsteps before they emerged.
Lucius's divine sense caught their energy patterns first, all of them, spaced in a deliberate pattern through the trees on both sides of the road, positioned with the kind of spacing that didn't happen by accident. A coordinated ambush, already in position, waiting for them to walk into the middle of it.
He had half a second to process this before they came out of the trees.
They moved fast, closing in from both flanks simultaneously, blessed warriors in heaven's field armour with weapons already drawn. The formation was clean and practised, designed to overwhelm before the target could orient.
Five from the left, five from the right.
Lucius reached for his solar energy. Beside him, Valeria was already gone.
He didn't see her move. One moment, she was at his right shoulder, and the next, she was simply somewhere else inside the group of five on the left flank before any of them had finished closing the distance.
