It sinks a fraction.
Enough.
I drag the edge of my boot across the surface, scraping away the top layer to expose the firmer soil beneath, then straighten, scanning the stretch ahead where the bank dips and rises in uneven waves.
“If they come through here,” I say, lifting my hand slightly to indicate the slope without looking away from it, “they lose their footing before they reach us.”
Kareth steps up on my right, his boots staying on the higher ground, his arms folding across his chest as he studies the same stretch. His eyes move slower than mine, measuring instead of testing.
“Or they widen their approach,” he says, tilting his head toward the tree line, “and avoid it entirely.”
I shake my head once, crouching briefly to press my fingers into the soil again, feeling the looseness beneath the surface. “They won’t,” I say, rising.
He glances at me, one brow lifting slightly. “That’s confidence.”
“That’s assumption,” I reply, brushing dirt from my hand against my thigh. “Different thing.”
“And if you’re wrong?”
I finally look at him.
“Then they adapt faster than I expect,” I say. “Which means we do the same.”
He watches me for a second longer, then exhales through his nose, something like reluctant agreement settling into his posture.
Behind us, the village is still moving, but the rhythm has changed. The frantic edge from earlier has been stripped away, replaced with something tighter, more deliberate. Wood strikes wood in uneven bursts as barricades are reinforced, voices cut through the air in short, efficient exchanges, and somewhere near the center a child cries before being hushed quickly.
Everything is compressing.
“Routes,” Kareth says, pulling my focus back.
I turn slightly, dragging the edge of my boot through the dirt again, sketching rough lines as I speak, not looking at him.
“Road,” I say, carving a straight line forward. “Fastest. Most obvious.”
I shift my foot, marking another path.
“Tree line. Cover, but uneven footing. They’ll need to break formation to use it properly.”
Another mark.
“Riverbank. Slows them. Breaks momentum.”
Kareth leans slightly, following the rough map.
“So we split.”
I shake my head, grinding the heel of my boot over the lines until they blur.
“No,” I say. “We layer.”
He straightens.
“How?”
I look back toward the village, then out again toward the approach.
“We make the road look like the priority,” I say, my voice lower now, more focused. “Visible reinforcement. Obvious structure.”
