“Orcs.”
The world doesn’t stop.
The garden doesn’t go quiet.
Leaves still rustle. Water still drips. Someone laughs somewhere near the outer rows.
But it all feels distant, like I’m hearing it through something thick and muffled.
“Not just one place,” she continues. “They’ve hit multiple.”
My fingers curl slightly against my palm.
“How far?”
“Far enough they’re changing routes,” she says. “Cutting around some of the outer villages.”
Outer villages.
My mind shifts without permission.
Fields stretching wide and open.
Low wooden fences.
The narrow path that runs between the grain rows back home, worn smooth by years of feet passing over it.
I press my thumb into the edge of my palm.
Stay here.
Stay present.
“That’s why quotas went up,” Maira adds.
I look at her sharply.
“What?”
“They doubled them,” she says. “Courier came through this morning.”
The words hit harder than they should.
Because they don’t just mean more work.
They mean loss.
They mean something isn’t coming in that used to.
They mean something is being taken.
I turn back to the soil, but I’m not seeing it anymore.
I’m seeing movement.
Patterns.
Lines.
