While Jared cultivated inside the Pentacarna Tower, the Tribunal’s army arrived at the Skywolf Tribe.

It was a sunless morning.

The sky hung heavy and gray, clouds sagging so low it felt like they might collapse onto the earth at any moment.

Violent winds tore across the Wastelands, snapping tents hard enough to make them crack and whip through the air. Beast-race banners twisted violently in the storm, bent crooked beneath the gale.

Hadrian stood on the training grounds, practicing with his axe.

His wounds still hadn’t fully healed.

During the battle at the northern mine, his left arm had been torn open so badly the bone was exposed, and the holy-radiance burn across his chest still throbbed with lingering pain.