I woke at four-thirty to a sound I couldn't immediately place.
Not an alarm. Not the mate bond's frequency. Something else — soft, outside the window, the specific quality of the east side at that hour when the cliff absorbed the wind differently from the west.
I lay still.
Zevran was asleep. The room was dark. The city below was in its deepest quiet, the bridge still lit, both halves waiting for the morning.
Then my phone lit up on the bedside table.
A message.
Not a number I knew. Northern corridor area code but different from any I'd saved.
I picked it up.
*Dr. Voss. My name is Serin Ashveil. I know what today was. My sister told me. I wanted you to know that I stood outside the Hold at midnight. I didn't go in. But I stood at the gate and I looked at the light in the east tower
