A little while later, Eyal walked in, raising his hands to stall the onslaught of questions that came right away. “Nothing is happening yet. Go back to sleep, guys.”

He was mostly ignored, though some people did seem to have fallen asleep with their heads on the tables. Eyal looked around until he spotted the corner where Lane, Andrew and Nathan sat, and walked over. He sat down and leaned over the table.

“We might have a problem on our hands,” he said without preamble.

“No shit,” Nathan muttered.

Eyal looked at him without even a hint of a smile. “Oli is missing,” he explained. “He left the camp right after Ragna did, before I could order the guards to not let anybody out. Rhuad and Anthony want to go after him. Considering what Ragna told us might be out there, I don’t think it’s a good idea for them to go.”

He didn’t have to say anything further.

“I’ll go,” Lane said.

“Like hell you will,” Nathan sneered.

Lane opened her mouth and closed it again. It had to be her; Andrew had already admitted that he wasn’t a very good tracker, and Nathan – well...

“Yes, I’m injured,” Nathan said calmly, but with a hint of steel to his voice. “I’m still a better tracker than Andrew, so it’s gotta be either you or me. And let’s be real here, losing you would hurt Loegrion much worse.”

He glared at her and then his brother, challenging them to argue. Lane glanced over to Andrew, who had closed his eyes. After a few seconds, he nodded.

“Nathan is right, Lane,” he said softly.

Lane wanted to protest, to ask him if he only said that because she was a woman, but then she settled back in her seat. It likely was part of the reason: even though the two Feleke-brothers probably didn’t doubt her skills, other people would still fault them if they let a “girl” go out in a situation like this and something happened to her.

Nathan had already acknowledged that she was better than his brother, that was likely the best she could hope for in this situation.

She still had to ask: “You are certain you can do this, Nathan? What if the phantom pain comes back?”

“That won’t matter,” he said flatly. “That won’t be the issue, Lane. Dealing with the hallucinations will be the problem.”

Lane had to admit that she didn’t want to go and face that.

“We can help a little with that, too,” Eyal said.

He waved to Mr. Digger, who was standing in the doorway, a bundle of cloth under his arm. The other navvy quickly came over.

“This is all we have,” he said, dropping and unwrapping what looked like another old tarp. Inside, there was a helmet, one of the completely silver-coated ones, and at least a dozen small protective amulets.

“Where did you get that?” Lane asked.

“It’s our collection,” Digger explained. “We bought all the amulets at Mannin we could afford, and that we thought might have an effect on the Rot. Then our men wore them out at the bridge, to see which ones actually helped. Neither of these is particularly powerful, but together? They should get a rider through the breach and to First Camp, in case the telegraph line is disconnected.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

Lane shuddered. Nathan’s mission was going to be a lot more dangerous than that. Still, the helmet alone raised his chances tremendously.

Nathan had already reached for it, and carefully lowered it down over his black locks. It covered his forehead and both cheeks, leaving only a narrow opening over his eyes, nose and mouth.

“Quite heavy,” he noted. “But yeah, this feels a lot better. Do I have to wear all the amulets around my neck?”

“In your pockets should be fine,” Digger said, the same moment that Eyal said: “It’s safer if they touch your skin.”

“Gotcha,” Nathan said. He flung a bunch of the amulets around his neck, and then wrapped some more around his wrists like bracelets. Lane bit her tongue on a comment on how the navvies were really trusting him with a lot of money – it probably only sounded funny in her own head.

A minute later, they were all moving: Nathan to get his crossbow and hunting gear, with Andrew at his side. Lane, Eyal and Digger went to inform the lieutenant nominally in charge of the camp of the new plan, and also to calm Rhuad and Anthony down.

It only took Nathan a few minutes to meet up with them at the camp’s gate, where Eyal had to order the guards to let him out. Andrew hugged his brother, and then Nathan threw his arms around Lane’s shoulders too, whispering: “Take care of David for me,” into her ear.

“Take care of yourself,” Lane muttered back.

Nathan was nearly out of the gate when Eyal called: “Nathan. You heard Ragna. There absolutely cannot be another one of these – Rot-queens.”

Nathan mock-saluted and took off into the night without another word.

Andrew stared after him until the gate was closed. “Do we know how big Oli’s headstart is?”

“A couple of hours,” Eyal said. He rubbed the back of his neck. “Let’s hope Nathan finds him before the Rot does. Maybe Ragna really will manage to draw it away...”

He shook his head and went back inside. Lane and Andrew climbed the walls instead. Nathan was just reaching the edge of the clear-felled area surrounding the camp. He didn’t look back though. Andrew stared after him long after he had vanished in the dark, not moving, barely even blinking. Lane wrapped her arms around herself and decided to keep him company, just in case.

Lane and Andrew stayed up at the wall despite the cold until Nosson the cook called everybody over to the kitchen to get their breakfast an hour before sunrise. At the signal, Andrew finally stomped his feet. “Let’s get warmed up,” he muttered.

He led the way over to the kitchen, picking up his bowl of fresh bread and what looked to Lane like last night’s leftover potatoes.

She shook her head when the cook looked at her questioningly.

“You don’t want anything?” Andrew asked as they sat down.

“It’s Saint-Velija-Day,” Lane said. “A fast-day,” she added, because that clearly didn’t mean anything to him.

“Right. You don’t think you should skip the fasting, considering that we’ll probably have a battle on our hands soon?”

“I can hunt just fine on an empty stomach,” Lane pointed out. “I don’t think I’ll fight any worse. If we can fight at all against what’s coming.”

Andrew didn’t argue with that. He didn’t finish his own plate, either.

Isaac joined them with food of his own. He told them that while Company headquarters in Eoforwic kept querying the camp’s commanding officer for more information about what was going on and didn’t seem to grasp the urgency of the threat, First Camp had messaged that they had passed on the call for aide to the Morgulon directly.

“Praise be to Mithras,” Andrew muttered. “Looks like Reed learned something from his own screw-ups.”

“Any news from Calder’s camp?” Lane asked.

“Only a ‘message received’ hours ago, right after the telegram that Ragna was trying to distract whatever is out there.”

“Let’s hope they’re still there,” Lane muttered.

There were a couple of voices at the next table debating making a run for it while the daylight lasted, but the idea was shot down fast, to Lane’s relief. Most people seemed to realize that their best hope lay in defending their current position.

“Is there any word if the werewolves know where Ragna is?” she asked. “Or Oli?”

Isaac shook his head. “The only one of them who can reliably sense her is Oli, and, well.”

Andrew left maybe an hour after breakfast, muttering: “I’ll go check on Dolly,” while Lane stayed with Isaac. The two of them just sat around their table in silence, waiting for news, any news. But the only thing that happened was that Eyal told them all to keep their weapons close by just in case. Lane already had her crossbow, so she didn’t move, and Isaac had his axe, too.

Andrew returned in time for lunch. Nathan didn’t. Neither did Oli.

That wasn’t unexpected. But it still made Lane’s stomach turn into knots, and not with hunger. Andrew only ate his ration of bread this meal and barely finished even that.