Chapter 7 - THE RECKONING AT THE BORDER
The winds at the northern border were always fierce, carrying the bitter chill of the permanent ice fields that marked the edge of the known world. It was a desolate wasteland where only exiled criminals, disgraced warriors, and rogue packs dared to tread.
A heavy wooden carriage rattled to a halt near the frost-covered watchtower.
The door swung open, and Evelyn and Preston were shoved out onto the hard, frozen ground by two royal guards. Their expensive furs and jeweled rings had been stripped away, replaced by coarse, rough-spun woolen coats meant to withstand the biting frost, not luxury.
"Move," the guard captain grunted, tossing a single pack of basic rations onto the snow before climbing back into the carriage.
The horses turned around, their hooves churning up the slush, and sped back toward the warmth and safety of the interior territories, leaving the disgraced couple standing alone in the freezing wind.
Evelyn fell to her knees in the snow, sobbing hysterically as the cold bit through her thin gloves. "We're going to die out here... we have nothing... absolutely nothing..."
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Preston didn't cry. He stood motionless, staring out into the vast, white nothingness of the northern wastes. The silence he had loved so much—the silence he had used as a shield to hide from his own cowardice—now surrounded him completely.
It was a cold, inescapable prison of his own making.
