Back in the iron-wood manor.
Roxy stood on the second-floor landing, leaning over the wooden banister to survey the ground floor. She let out a long, deliberate breath, ensuring her perfectly orchestrated plan was holding together.
She had spent the last hour meticulously, ruthlessly putting every single male in the house to work.
Zarek was out back by the forge, happily deafening himself by hammering a massive pile of scrap iron to reinforce the outer perimeter gates.
He seemed to like that Roxy was ordering him around.
Torian and Kaelen had been dispatched on a highly specific, totally exaggerated "perimeter sweep" deep into the northern woods, hunting for fresh venison.
Syris was locked inside his makeshift apothecary, brewing a week's supply of nutritional tonics for her pregnancy.
