Cordwell did not look like a place worth closing.
That was Vane's first thought when they finally saw it.
A handful of low houses sat between terraced fields already gone gold, half the harvest cut and stacked, the rest still standing. Thin smoke rose from ordinary chimneys. Someone had left washing out behind one of the houses.
Nothing fortified.
Nothing threatening.
Nothing that looked remotely important enough to justify Imperial attention.
"That's the problem," Hale had told them on the walk in. "Places that still look ordinary are the ones the Empire worries about most."
A functioning settlement meant people had stayed.
People staying meant roots.
Roots became something harder to move later.
So they took their positions an hour before the patrol gap.
Exactly as rehearsed.
Ashe went east with two of Hale's fighters, watching the road the patrol would need to clear before anyone moved.
Nyx took the ridge above the valley.
