Tibbs dropped from the cart on the far side. He landed solidly, his pack on his shoulder, and stood very still, taking in the courtyard the way Mab had. Counting. Measuring. Looking for the threat.
"Stay close," Mab said to him, and he moved to her side without argument.
The sound came from above first. Boots on stone, heavy enough that Mab felt it in her feet before she saw the source. Then a shadow fell across the upper steps, and the Warchief of the Mountain Clan descended into the courtyard.
Targesh Ironhide was what happened when the mountain decided to walk.
Mab had thought Varek was large. Varek was large. But Varek fit inside the scale of a man—a massive man, an impossible man, but a man. Targesh exceeded the category. He stood a full head taller than Varek and broader through the shoulders, and the scars that mapped his skin were not silver with age but layered, old over older over oldest, a record of decades spent between his people and whatever came for them. His tusks were long and yellowed. His eyes were the color of iron in winter light.
He crossed the courtyard without hurrying. Warriors stepped out of his path. He carried no weapon that Mab could see, which somehow made him more frightening. A man that size did not need a weapon. He was the weapon.
Varek stepped forward to meet Targesh and inclined his head. "Warchief."
"Captain." Targesh's voice was lower than Varek's. It came from somewhere in the bedrock. His gaze swept the courtyard and landed on her.
"This is Mab," Varek said.
"Mab." He said her name like he was tasting it, turning it over against his tusks. "You came north with my captain of your own choosing?"
Mab straightened her spine. "Yes."
Targesh's gaze moved to Tibbs. The boy stiffened beside her, but held his ground.
"And you, boy?"
"My name is Tibbs." His voice came out thinner than he wanted it to. He swallowed and tried again. "I chose to come. So did Annie."
"Annie?" Targesh looked toward the supply cart, where Annie stood watching the proceedings with wide eyes.
"I wanted to come," Annie said. Her chin was up. "Drogga said there were orchards."
Targesh's mouth moved. The closest he came to a smile, Mab suspected. "There are orchards."
He turned back to Mab. Held her gaze for a count of three. Then inclined his head, the same acknowledgment Varek had given him.
"You're welcome at Northwatch. All three of you. The mountain doesn't turn away those who come freely."
The words were formal. They carried weight, spoken by the man whose word made it true. Mab felt them settle over her, beside everything else she was carrying and couldn't yet sort.
"Now." Targesh straightened, and the formality dropped from him like a cloak. "Varek, the smith's manifest—"
"Korah told me."
"Thessaly—"
"I know."
"Then you don't need me." Targesh looked over his shoulder. "Verity?"
Movement from behind the Warchief's left shoulder. A woman. Human. Shorter than Mab and rounder, with dark blond hair escaping from a knot at the back of her head and a leather-bound ledger clutched against her chest like a shield. She had been standing behind Targesh the entire time, Mab realized, tucked in his shadow the way a sparrow tucks behind a wall in a windstorm, and now she stepped out with the slightly frantic energy of someone who had been holding herself stillfor as long as she could physically manage and had reached her limit.
"Are you quite finished?" Verity said to Targesh, in the tone of a woman who had decided long ago that the Warchief's size was not going to stop her from being impatient with him.
Targesh looked down at her. The iron eyes warmed. "I am finished."
"Good. Excellent." Verity turned to Mab. Her eyes were brown, quick, and already cataloguing. "Hello. I'm Verity. I keep the records. I need your full name, the children's full names, ages, dates of birth if you have them."
Mab stared at her.
