Torin's POV
The mist was almost gone. What was left of it sat low between the trees in thin scattered patches, burning off slowly as the morning moved forward.
The road ahead was clear. The sky above was still grey but the kind of grey that had accepted its situation and was not going to do anything dramatic about it.
We had been walking for a while without talking. Not uncomfortable. Just three people moving through the same space in the same direction and no particular need to fill the quiet between them.
Then I stopped.
Azura took another step before she realized I was not moving. She turned. "What is wrong?"
I did not answer her.
I was looking at the trees. Both sides. The left first and then the right. The way the branches sat. The way the undergrowth was arranged. The particular stillness of a space that should have had small sounds in it and did not.
No birds.
No wind was moving through the lower branches.
Nothing.
"We are not alone," I said.
