The concealed stair opens beneath the field camp into a cramped stone service hall. Muffled boots and clipped orders pass overhead between canvas shelters, while blue sparks leap from a cold hearth into hair-thin channels along the walls.
The sparks do not feed the campfire. They crawl through the stone in branching lines, following Benashi’s magical signature and carrying the Council’s surveillance through the hills.
Jerashi Heladine
They have threaded the whole camp with a listening ward. Stay close, little sister, and do not touch the channels.
Jerashi presses herself against the wall and studies the sparks through infravision. Arion follows with his sword lowered, while Guildmaster Thorne keeps to the rear, guarding the stair they used.
Arion Touvengard
The ward is not merely watching. It is teaching the camp how to find her. Break the pattern, and their advantage ends.
Above, a command rings out, followed by the scrape of many boots repositioning. The blue sparks brighten around Benashi’s hidden presence, and one channel bends toward the service hall’s sealed exit.
Guildmaster Thorne
The enforcer stayed behind the stone door, but the camp is waking. Whatever you do, do it before those sparks reach the surface.
✓ Quest Accepted
Disrupt the camp’s listening ward