It became cold enough that he started wishing he had brought more layers. He could endure the cold. Being Central-born did not make him fragile, and St. Alfons had not spared its students from winter drills either. He had trained in frost, marched in sleet, slept beneath thin canvas while wind clawed at the edges.
But this was not like those places.
But there was something about the air beyond the Quiet Pass that unsettled him.
It was not merely the cold.
It felt watchful. Like there's always something in the air.
Fog began to gather low against the snow. He understood the principle well enough. When air cooled to a certain point, moisture condensed into tiny droplets suspended above ground, forming a dense mist that clung to the earth. It rolled softly over the white plain, thickening in pockets where the wind slackened.
The mist itself did not trouble him.
His vision was sharp. He could discern contrast even when edges blurred. The greater problem was the terrain.
The land beyond the Pass was volatile, uneven ridges concealed by snow, sudden dips masked by flat glare. It was not fit for casual hunting.
Then again, House Blanc did not pride itself on casual pursuits. They had this pride of doing the extremes.
After all, they had believed a two-colored sabercat roamed here and had ridden out thinking to track it across such ground, hoping to harvest its scrotum for some medicinal mixture, making them half-mad, at least in that moment.
The thought almost drew a humorless breath from him.
He crouched low, keeping his figure compact against the snow, and moved with measured steps. His cloak, dusted white by drifting frost, blended well enough against the pale surroundings.
He operated under a simple assumption that the Blancs would have followed established trails within their hunting grounds. Even in chaos, men revert to familiarity. He simply didn't believe they'd just willingly let themselves get lost here.
And he was right, there were marks.
Crude but deliberate carvings on stone faces such small slashes angled in specific directions. Not obvious unless one searched for them or had known them. He had to thank himself for asking for the notes. He followed these signs carefully, orienting himself with patience rather than haste.
Hours passed.
The fog shifted constantly, sometimes thinning, sometimes swallowing whole stretches of view. He adjusted, pausing often, listening more than looking.
When he found the correct trail, the signs became clearer. There, half-buried in snow and wind-packed ice, sat a cooking pot.
He knelt beside it.
It had been made in the city. He recognized the style of its rivets and the particular shaping of its iron rim. He had seen similar work in the smithy quarter when he visited Sullybane's home.
The pot was tilted on its side, partially filled.
Inside, the stew had frozen solid. A pale layer of fat glazed its surface. Beneath, chunks of meat floated within the congealed mass.
He examined a piece with the tip of his dagger.
The cut was clean.
Too clean for scavengers to have torn at it. The scraps scattered nearby were minimal, orderly. This had been a disciplined camp.
He rose slowly and surveyed the surrounding rock.
An alcove carved naturally into the stone wall offered partial shelter from wind. Bedroll impressions were faintly visible where snow had drifted unevenly over disturbed ground.
The wind picked up then, slicing through the fog and driving needles of frost against his cloak. It forced him toward the alcove for cover.
For a brief moment, he considered lighting a fire.
He had kindling. He had means.
But the thought of unseen observers, whether icy minions of hell as Captain Vandal believed, or rebels cloaked in superstition, killed the notion. Smoke carried far in cold air.
Instead, he resorted to something he had learned years ago.
He planted his boots firmly and drew a slow, powerful breath inward, expanding his belly and chest fully. He let it out through his mouth in a long, controlled exhale, unforced.
After the final breath, he held.
Held until the pressure behind his ribs demanded release.
Then he inhaled deeply again and held for a count, ten, perhaps fifteen seconds, before releasing.
He repeated the cycle four times.
Gradually, warmth spread along his core. Not heat, but a steady internal stirring that pushed back against the worst of the chill. His fingers tingled faintly. His head felt light for a moment, a thin dizziness creeping at the edges of vision.
It passed.
The method worked.
He remained within the alcove, watching as wind intensified.
The gusts came from the east, slamming against ridges and scattering snow into spiraling curtains. The fog thickened where wind slowed and thinned where it struck hardest, making the landscape shift like a living thing.
Visibility narrowed until he saw little beyond his own limbs.
He pulled his armored cloak tighter and kept close to the stone wall, mindful of silhouette. If anyone watched from higher ground, he would present as little shape as possible against the white.
The thought crossed his mind, brief and reckless, that perhaps it would be faster to reveal himself. Step into the open. Announce presence. Force reaction.
But alone, in this weather, that would be foolish.
Combat here would favor those who knew the terrain intimately. Wind would swallow the sound. Snow would obscure footing. A single misstep could send a man sliding unseen into crevasse or ravine.
* * * *
Eventually the wind stilled.
The roaring that had filled the pass dwindled to a low, restless whisper moving through the ridges. The fog that had swallowed the terrain began to thin, peeling away in slow drifting sheets until the land revealed itself again. Uneven slopes emerged first, then the deeper crevices where snow had gathered in thick ridges. The white plain returned piece by piece, as though the mountains had decided he was permitted to see again.
Cendre pushed the crusted snow from his shoulders and cloak and stepped out from the alcove.
He lifted his head toward the sky, trying to measure the hour.
It was difficult. The sun hung pale behind a veil of cloud, its light diffused so evenly that shadows barely existed. Still, judging from the dull angle of the light and the slow dimming of the horizon, he guessed it was late afternoon.
That gave him only a few more hours of workable light.
He resumed his search.
Rather than wandering blindly, he forced himself to move with structure. Every twenty minutes he paused, took note of his surroundings, and mapped the area in his mind. A jagged rock here. A split ridge there. A narrow channel where wind had carved a shallow trench through the snow.
Progress was slow but deliberate.
The land offered little comfort. Sharp inclines appeared without warning. Frost glazed the stone beneath the snow, turning simple footing into careful calculation.
Eventually he came upon something strange.
A tree lay horizontally between two hills.
Not fallen in the way trees usually did, its roots torn free and the trunk collapsed. This one seemed almost placed there, resting across the gap like a natural bridge. It was enormous, easily the width of a watchtower, its bark hardened by ice and time.
On the right side of the incline, something glimmered faintly.
Ice or what had once been water before the cold seized it.
Cendre approached cautiously.
The moment he stepped closer to the trunk, a sudden chill crawled along his skin. Not merely cold, but the sharp sensation of wind funneling through a narrow passage. He slowed, eyes scanning the slope.
Then he saw it.
Just beyond the bend of the trunk, partially hidden behind rock, stood a crude manmade contraption.
He moved carefully along the stone, climbing a narrow formation until he could approach from above. The structure became clearer with each step.
It was a wooden pipe system.
Primitive, but functional.
Segments of hollowed wood had been fitted together and angled downward from a crack in the rock, guiding melted ice or groundwater into the trunk cavity where it could be collected.
Cendre crouched beside it.
The craftsmanship was rough but practical. The sort of thing people without access to proper tools might build. Someone accustomed to surviving beyond the comforts of the city.
He ran a gloved finger along the edge of the pipe.
There were small marks carved into the wood.
Not decorative. Notes. Indicators. Measurements perhaps. Whoever built this had needed to monitor flow or pressure.
He studied the surrounding ground.
If primitives truly lived in these regions, would it make sense for them to antagonize the city? Attacking a noble hunting party was not the sort of decision one made lightly.
Then again, those same attackers had repelled eight veteran guards and forced Captain Vandal's fifty riders into retreat.
That suggested coordination.
Knowledge of the terrain.
Skill.
And teamwork.
The contraption itself had not been used recently. The ice around the intake had sealed the flow completely, and no fresh cuts marked the wood.
Cendre rose and surveyed the hills once more before moving on.
Hours passed.
He found little.
A broken ridge here. A half-buried stone there. Nothing that spoke clearly of battle or ambush.
Eventually darkness crept across the land.
Night in the tundra did not arrive dramatically. It simply dimmed the world until shapes blurred and the sky turned a dull iron gray.
With no choice left, he sought shelter.
A narrow cave offered protection from the wind. Before settling in, he spent several minutes covering the entrance partially with packed snow and loose stones, enough to break the line of sight without sealing himself in.
He did not risk deep sleep.
Instead he took micro-sleeps.
Two hours resting, then waking to check the surroundings. Listening. Watching the mouth of the cave. Then sleeping again in short intervals.
By morning he was stiff but functional.
He bit into a strip of oily jerky, chewing slowly while forcing his body to warm through movement. The salt and fat did their work well enough.
Once the faint morning light returned, he stepped out and resumed his search.
Following Kyra's notes carefully, he navigated toward the area she had marked as the likely site of the confrontation.
The terrain shifted slightly there.
The snow lay thicker, drifting heavily between jagged outcrops. Wind had swept most surfaces clean, erasing tracks that might once have told a clearer story.
Still, something caught his eye.
A rod.
Half-buried in the snow.
He knelt and pulled it free.
It was carved wood, reinforced with iron bands. At its tip was a spike designed to anchor into frozen ground. A banner hung from it, stiff with frost.
Cendre shook the cloth loose.
The sigil of House Blanc emerged from beneath the ice.
So this was where they had camped.
Or where they had fought.
He planted the rod again and scanned the slopes surrounding the site. According to testimony, the attackers had appeared from higher ground.
Which meant the vantage point would be here.
He climbed the ridge slowly, boots crunching against frozen stone.
From the top he surveyed the valley below.
Nothing.
No broken weapons. No armor fragments. No bones left by scavengers.
The wind and snow had erased everything.
He had not truly expected otherwise.
Weeks had passed since the attack. The mountains did not preserve evidence kindly.
Still, he needed to see it with his own eyes.
Standing there, overlooking the empty white ground where the Duke and his heir had fallen, Cendre felt the familiar weight of uncertainty settling over the investigation.
The painted sabercats. The huntsman's deception. The ambush in the pass.
Somewhere between those pieces lay the truth.
And yet the beginning of it all still sounded absurd even in his own thoughts. No matter how much he liked to think positively of it, it was difficult to accept that such a tragedy might have begun simply because a father and son wished to keep their manhood alive.