“The scar?” Reece asked quietly from beside him.

  Zak nodded. “That’s a good way to describe it. I wonder what happened.”

  Reece wobbled, but before he lost his balance, both Zak and Toby reacted in the blink of an eye and steadied him with a hand.

  “Careful,” Toby said.

  “You don’t have to tell me twice,” Reece said, then shivered—probably at the thought of falling.

  Toby didn’t blame him. He hadn’t thought he was afraid of heights, but looking over the edge made his legs uneasy in a way he could only call fear—as if the ground called to his legs, begging to be reunited. Jump. He crushed that thought immediately and put his hand on his forehead. It burned with warmth; the sun was taunting him.

  “Do you see it?” Reece asked, pointing toward the settlement.

  Toby nodded. His mouth had gone dry. “By the sag,” he said. “Between here and the scar.”

  “Village,” Zak said. He squinted, then tilted his head. “Elves?”

  Toby thought of red eyes in fog. Of armor that drank light. Of the way elves had moved through Brindle Hollow’s streets like knives through straw.

  “Could be them,” he said. “Or something tied to them, but the homes look small.”

  “The elves are pretty thin despite their terror,” Zak said.

  Reece let out a slow breath. “So do we go there, or go back? Ser Maxwell’s arm won’t thank us for adding another few days’ hard riding.”

  Zak glanced sideways at Toby, then back toward the distant smudge of houses. “I’m not eager to get myself killed,” he said. “But Sire Kay sent you out here.” His chin jerked in Toby’s direction. “What do you think?”

  Toby swallowed. From up here, duty felt as wide as the world. Highmarsh lay somewhere beyond the horizon, full of people who had no idea what did or didn’t wait on the far side of the plains. The marshes squatted like a wound. In front of them, this village sat in the open, nameless and unexplained. If they turned back now, they’d bring news that the land folded this way, that there was a scar in the south, that herds still ran wild. Useful, maybe. But that cluster of roofs would stay just a shape in the distance.

  “I want to see it,” he said at last. “At least close enough to know whose it is. But Ser Maxwell decides. His arm, his call.”

  Zak grunted. “That’ll be the first time he’s let an arm decide anything,” he said, but there was agreement buried in the words.

  They stayed a little longer, marking what they could—where the creeks twisted, where the ground darkened, where rock broke the grass. Then, one by one, they turned back to the center of the fang. Getting down felt sharper than going up. The drop was no longer a thing imagined; it was a measured distance his bones now believed in. Still, the training held and no one slipped. By the time Toby’s bare feet found earth again, his legs felt oddly hollow. He stepped back, craning his neck up to where they’d just been, and saw the fang anew—not as an impossible wall, but as a thing they’d climbed and left behind.

  Ser Maxwell had not been idle. Half the camp was already broken. Bedrolls were rolled and lashed. Spare gear was stacked near the horses. With one hand and his teeth, he’d tightened a strap on a pack; Piper stood saddled and waiting, reins looped loosely over a jut of rock.

  Toby blinked. “Ser?” he asked. “What are you doing?”

  Maxwell straightened, sling settling against his chest, and gave them a once-over—bare feet, scraped hands, the lingering tremor in arms that had not yet realized they were back on the ground.

  “About time,” he said. “You’ve seen enough to be worth the bruises.”

  Zak frowned. “Worth the bruises for what?”

  Maxwell nodded toward the distant dip in the land, where the faint suggestion of roofs lay waiting. “For a direction,” he said. “We’re done staring at this rock. It’s time to scout that village.”

  They broke camp faster than Toby would have believed possible a week ago. What little they had went onto horses and backs: bedrolls, pots, the last tight-wrapped bundles of smoked meat, the bow strapped to Piper’s saddle with a care that made Maxwell’s jaw tighten only once. The fang shrank behind them with every step, turning from looming wall to pale tooth on the horizon.

  The world looked different now that they’d seen it from above. They didn’t wander. They cut across the plains along the line they’d marked with their eyes—skirting the deeper dips where water clung, aiming for where the land began to sag toward the scar. The ground under the horses’ hooves still held the memory of the storm; each stride kicked up damp earth, the air thick with a faint, rich smell of things turned and stirred.

  By midmorning, the sun had found its strength. Cloaks were unfastened, sleeves shoved up. Sweat slicked Toby’s back beneath his gambeson, the leftover damp of days of rain turning the heat close and sticky instead of clean.

  “There,” Maxwell said at last, nodding ahead with his good hand.

  The plains rolled down into a shallow fold. A small creek ran along its spine—the same thread of water they’d seen from the fang, now fattened by the storm. It chattered over stones, slipping past cropped grass and the occasional tuft of taller reeds, then vanished toward the south, in the direction of the distant scar. Beyond the next low rise, the land fell away more sharply. They drew up short before the drop, horses snorting, ears twitching at the murmur of the unseen village below.

  “Off,” Maxwell said. “We see first, decide second.”

  They dismounted. Toby murmured a quiet word and ran a hand down Oak’s neck; the big gelding snorted and shook his mane but stood as Toby looped his reins around a scrubby bush. Flint flicked an ear at Zak, Daisy leaned into Reece’s hand, and Piper, for all his earlier shock, stood solid beneath Maxwell like he’d never known what it was to falter.

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  “Keep them back from the edge,” Maxwell said. “No silhouettes on the skyline.”

  He stayed with the horses, his broken arm tight in its sling, positioning himself just below the crest of the rise. Toby, Reece, and Zak dropped to their bellies and began to crawl. The grass was still damp at the roots, wet seeping into Toby’s sleeves as he worked his way forward. Dirt pressed cold against his hands. His heart beat quieter than it had on the climb. Part of him wanted to turn his head south, to follow the creek’s path with his eyes until it spilled into that distant, impossible scar. What did a wound that size look like from its rim? Did people live down there? Elves, buried in the earth like rot?

  Focus, he told himself. Maybe they’d go another time. For now, there was this. He reached the break in the ground and eased forward until his chin hovered over the lip.

  The village lay below. It sat on both sides of the creek, huddled low along its banks where the land dipped enough to hide it from anyone not looking from just the right place. Round huts made of dirt and clay with reed roofs clustered in loose rings, some half-sunk into the earth, others rimmed with stone. Smoke curled from holes in the roofs—thin and pale, quickly losing its fight with the wind.

  And between those huts, the people. They were smaller than he’d thought from the fang. Four feet tall, perhaps, some a little taller, some shorter. Their bodies were lean, almost wiry, covered in small overlapping scales that caught the light in shades of dark brown, lighter sand, and a dusty red that reminded him of old brick. Long, narrow heads sat atop flexible necks, snout-like faces tipped with blunt little horns or ridges. Their eyes were the strangest part. Set forward, wide and bright, pupils thin and vertical like a snake’s, flicking in quick, precise movements as they worked.

  They moved with a kind of restless purpose: carrying baskets; tending cooking pits near the creek; checking lines that disappeared into the water; scrubbing what looked like strips of hide or cloth against flat stones. A couple of children—if children was the right word—chased each other through the trampled dirt with quick, darting steps, their small tails flicking for balance.

  Their clothing was simple. Rough tunics belted at the waist. Some wore short cloaks or vests made from patched deer or bison skins. A few had bits of metal—bangles, thin collars, small plates sewn into leather—that caught the light when they turned. They were nothing like elves. No red eyes, no black armor, no sense of the air bending itself around them. Just… small, busy creatures making a life in a hidden fold of land.

  “What are they?” Zak whispered. His voice barely stirred the grass.

  “Well, they’re not elves,” Reece murmured.

  Toby let the sight soak in. The way they clustered. The way none of them looked up, as if the sky had never given them reason to fear it. He watched a pair haul a basket from the creek, water streaming off it, the silhouette of fish inside thrashing faintly. Another group worked at a rack near the edge of the village where something smoked over a low, controlled fire.

  “Never seen folk like that,” Toby said at last, voice low.

  “Scaled like lizards,” Zak said. “But walking about like people.”

  Reece chewed on his lip. “Could they still be tied to the elves?” he asked. “Or just… neighbors the marsh kept to itself?”

  Toby stared another heartbeat longer, memorizing the layout, the way the creek cut the village in two, the lack of any visible walls or gate. Then he eased back, inch by inch, until the lip of the rise hid the village again. They slid down to where Maxwell waited with the horses, the grass giving way to bare, damp earth under their knees.

  “Well?” Maxwell asked.

  “Not elves,” Toby said.

  “Definitely not elves,” Zak added. “Small. Scaled. Walk around like someone taught a snake to stand upright and gave it a tunic.”

  Reece nodded. “They’ve got a proper village,” he said. “Huts by the creek. Fires. Fish racks.” He hesitated, then added, “No weapons in the open that I saw. No armor either.”

  Maxwell’s mouth tugged to one side. “Scaled, short, big eyes, tails?” he asked.

  Toby blinked. “You know them?”

  “Kobolts,” Maxwell said. He said it like a name he hadn’t expected to use today. “I know them as little river-folk. Soft as mud when you catch them alone, sharp as rats when they’re in a pack.” He tilted his head slightly toward the hidden village. “They crop up along creeks and marsh edges. Some tribes farther east trade with our kind—a few even speak our language. Others don’t bother with talking unless it’s about who fishes which stretch of water.”

  Zak rubbed the back of his neck. “You’ve met them?”

  “Once or twice,” Maxwell said. “Farther than this. Far east of Swanshire and beyond. I haven’t heard them in the same sentence as elves. They’re not friends unless they decide you’re worth more alive than dead. But they’re not the worst neighbors to have.”

  “So what do we do?” Toby asked. “We’ve seen them. We know they’re there. Is that enough?”

  Maxwell’s gaze flicked toward the rise, as if he could see straight through dirt and grass to the little scaled figures below. “We came to scout,” he said. “Scouting doesn’t stop at naming shapes from a distance. If they know anything about what prowls their borders—elves, that scar, anything—they’ll have heard it first.”

  Zak shifted his weight. “Ser…” he began. “There’s a lot of them. Dozens, at least. Maybe more inside those huts dug into the ground.” He jerked his chin toward the unseen village. “Walking into a crowd like that with four of us—three and a half, if we’re counting arms—feels like volunteering to be outnumbered in every direction.”

  Maxwell’s good hand settled lightly on Piper’s neck. His eyes didn’t lose their distance, but a faint smile creased the corner of his mouth.

  “Zak,” he said, “even you could take ten of them without breathing hard.”

  Zak stared pointedly at the sling. “And you?” he echoed.

  “Fifteen,” Maxwell said, deadpan. “And that’s in my current condition.”

  Reece huffed a quiet laugh despite himself. “And if they bring twenty?” he asked. “Or thirty?”

  “Then I trust the three of you to keep the spare ones busy,” Maxwell said.

  Zak rolled his eyes hard enough that it was almost a stretch. “Wonderful. I always wanted to be described as ‘spare.’”

  Toby glanced between them, then back toward the rise where the kobolt village sat unseen but very present. The nerves were still there, buzzing under his skin, but something in his chest had steadied.

  “We came to scout,” he said. “Not guess. If they’re willing to talk, they might know what’s south of here. What’s in that scarred land. Whether elves pass this way.” He met Maxwell’s gaze. “I say we try.”

  Maxwell held his eyes for a moment, weighing something Toby couldn’t see, then nodded once.

  “Good,” he said. “We go in slow. No blades drawn. Let them see hands, not steel. If they chatter at you, try not to look too offended. Their manners can’t be worse than Zak’s.”

  “Impossible,” Zak muttered.

  Maxwell ignored him. “If they reach for weapons, we fall back uphill and make them climb into open ground to get us. We’ve longer legs and can move faster.”

  Reece adjusted his grip on Daisy’s reins, jaw set. “So we won’t ride down?” he asked. “Smile. Try not to start a war.”

  “Exactly,” Maxwell said. “You’re knights of Highmarsh, not raiders. Remember it.”

  Toby laid a hand on Oak’s neck again, feeling the warm, solid life under his palm. Village, scar, kobolts, elves—all pieces on a board he was only just starting to see. Would the kobolts attack? What secrets would they learn?

  “All right,” Toby said. “Let’s go introduce ourselves.”