The plan was elegant. That should have been the warning.
Make Damien charge. Let his grievance-army pour out of the quarry fortress into the open dark to slaughter the twelve wolves and the king who'd dared come for him and while the stronghold stood empty, a second, smaller team slipped in behind them and took it. Hold the fortress, and the charging army has nowhere to return to; its wounded, its stores, its whole base, gone. An army that abandons its stronghold to chase a lure and finds it can't go home is an army that breaks.
We split the column. Cain would lead the lure himself, visible, unmistakably the true king, drawing Damien out. I would lead the smaller team into the emptied fortress. It was the right division. Cain was the bait Damien couldn't resist; I was the one who could f
