The second hour struck somewhere during Col’s mental count. He reached out and tapped Hod’s shoulder once.

The hollow emptied of twenty men in groups of three, with twenty seconds between each departure. Six groups moved down the dark slope ahead. Col waited until they had opened a distance of forty yards, then started after them with Ulf on his right and Bern on his left.

They crossed the first stretch of flat ground at a composed walk. Wind from the pass swept low over the broken terrain ahead. That worked in their favor. Any small noise they made would be carried toward the mountain instead of back across the valley.

Above, the three watch fires marked the fort as it emerged from the darkness.

The slope began where the soil gave room to fractured stone. Every step required more care here. Ulf lowered each boot onto the rock toe first, checking for stability before shifting his weight. The method reduced the chance of loose stone sliding beneath a heel. exactly.

Col copied it exactly.

The scrub was thin up here, little more than patches clinging to the rock. Above them, the wall continued to grow against the night sky.

They reached the base of it.

Col pressed his back against the old stone. It felt cold and damp.

He remained motionless and counted the men by his side.

Twenty one.

Two sentries patrolled the parapet. They crossed the lit part, vanished into the shadows returned to the light, then disappeared again. The rhythm repeated every time.

Noise carried through the fort.

Through several meters of stone came the gate guards’ voices from the far end of the yard. The words were lost, reduced to distant vowels. Beyond that lay the barracks, with approximately two hundred sleeping men in a constant rhythm of breathing, broken now and then by someone shifting on a cot.

The checkpoint fire crackled on the inside of the wall, muted but steady.

Ulf waited at the wall base with the grapple wrapped in cloth. Bern held the second rope at an alternate point three feet to the right.

The four-man vanguard stood ready.

The shift change started.

The sentries crossed the parapet and headed toward the checkpoint below. The checkpoint door opened. A brief conversation followed.

The next pair of sentries would soon arrive at the wall.

Col touched Ulf’s shoulder.

The grapple rose in a tight arc.

The cloth absorbed most of the impact. What remained reached the stone as a muffled scrape, followed by the iron hook settling firmly onto the parapet.

Nothing else changed.

The normal sounds of the fort continued.

Ulf seized the rope, checked it with a sharp pull, and began climbing.

"Go," Col whispered.

Hod’s hand found Col’s arm for a moment.

Eadig followed Ulf immediately. Bern took the second rope and climbed. Sigg went after him.

All four men climbed the wall within forty seconds and moved toward the shadows between the corners before anyone below could spot them on the parapet walk.

The remaining seventeen climbed in pairs. Each pair climbed the wall before the next began.

Col went last.

He dropped onto the interior of the fort in a single motion and stayed still for two seconds while he watched the interior.

The distance between the checkpoint building and the near corner of the barracks was roughly six feet across. It ran from the gate area toward the parapet.

Ulf held the forward position. Eadig waited eight feet behind him. Bern covered the far side of the alley. Sigg guarded the near side.

The incoming sentry pair approached from the checkpoint. One walked slightly ahead of the other.

Ulf stepped from the shadows behind the lead sentry.

His left arm locked across the man’s chest while his right hand clamped over the lower half of his face. The knife entered the left side of the neck beneath the jaw. Ulf drove the blade through the soft skin toward the airway and major vessel there, then drew it forward through both.

A cry escaped the sentry’s throat when the airway opened.

Wet.

Low.

Contained.

It lasted only a couple of seconds.

The man’s hands clawed at Ulf’s arm, then lost their strength.

Ulf controlled the descent carefully, lowering the body in stages until it rested against the left wall of the alley. Blood spread dark across the man’s collar and pooled on the stone beneath him.

The second sentry had only an instant to realize something was wrong.

His mouth opened.

Bern reached him first.

He drove his knife into the man’s throat from the front, the blade downward through the skin. At the same time, his left hand gripped the back of the man’s neck and guided the fall.

Air escaped through the wound in a soft burst that carried no farther than their surroundings.

One leg kicked against the stone.

Then Sigg caught him from behind and brought him down.

Blood spread quickly across the front of his coat and onto the ground.

Bern straightened and wiped his knife hand on his trousers. Ulf pulled his sleeve down to cover the blood on his wrist.

The rest of the soldiers finished climbing.

Seventeen men crossed the wall in less than two minutes.

The bodies of the two sentries remained hidden in the deepest part of the shadowed alley.

Col stopped to observe the fort.

Third hour past midnight.

The barracks stood to the left, its windows dark. The steady exhale of two hundred sleeping men pushed faintly through the stone walls.

Twenty yards ahead sat the supply depot, a low building with crates stacked two high and coils of rope along a shelf on its near side. The checkpoint fire cast light inward toward the lower gate but left the depot’s far side in shadow.

Beyond it, the yard opened up.

The torch at the main gate burned sixty yards away.

The groups of three left the wall walk and moved through the corridor of darkness between the barracks and the depot. Col’s group led along the depot wall. The others maintained their distance behind him.

Two guards sat against the barracks, between the depot entrance and the corner of the building.

They were not part of any patrol route.

Likely between rotations, or simply outside by choice.

They leaned against the stone and talked in the relaxed tone of who expected nothing to happen for some time.

Their position blocked the planned route.

Col’s group halted.

The next groups behind them stopped as well, reading the signal from the movement ahead.

He studied the guards.

One gestured toward the barracks door while speaking. His attention followed the motion.

The second guard turned to look at the door.

Col walked over and touched the arm of the nearest group leader. He pointed left toward the far side of the barracks, then raised two fingers toward the eight-yard stretch of exposed ground between the end of the depot and the partition wall beyond it.

The rerouted group moved at once, taking the longer path around the corner.

The waiting group watched for the opening.

When the guard’s hand rose again and the second man turned his head, they crossed the exposed ground in one continuous movement and slipped into the partition wall’s shadow.

The conversation behind them never paused.

The soldiers were thirty yards from the start of the yard and compressed into the darkness around the supply area.

"Seven groups through." Hod’s voice was barely audible.

"Move."

Col studied the yard.

Nine guards.

Three moved through the open center on irregular patrol paths that crossed without coordination.

Four held fixed positions.

Two stood at the gate flanks facing the gate itself, their backs toward the yard.

Two more watched from positions along the perimeter walls.

Above the gate, two silhouettes stood on the parapet against the glow from the towers, watching the road below.

The gate torch hissed as tallow burned.

Sixty yards separated it from Col’s position.

He tracked the movement of the three roaming guards and fixed their patterns in memory.

If the crossbar lifted while all nine guards remained alive and alert, the nearest threats would reach the soldiers in roughly twenty seconds. The barracks would react to the disturbance in perhaps forty.

If they were killed beforehand, it was one less preoccupation thereafter.

Col and the soldiers could hold that position easily before the main company arrived.

He stopped to consider the attack routes.

Each roaming guard passed through shadows on the yard at predictable points in the rounds.

The four perimeter guards could be reached from the edges without crossing the center of the yard.

The two gate flankers would be taken last, immediately before the crossbar moved.

The men on the parapet were different.

Before the gate.

He turned toward Hod and Ric, both pressed beside him against the nearby wall.

"Nine in the yard before we touch the gate. Get the groups into position. Wait for my signal."

"Aye."

"Aye."

The order passed through the squads by touch.

Each group leader received it, then relayed it onward.

Groups of three broke away and disappeared into the supply area’s shadows, moving toward the targets Col had assigned.

The three roaming guards had reached the far end of their current routes.

They would complete the round and return toward the near side of the yard in about forty seconds.

That gave the groups enough time.

Col could already see it.

He watched them vanish along the edges of the yard, shadows melting into darkness beside the perimeter walls and the structures flanking the gate.

The gate torch cast a bright strip of light through the center of the yard.

The two gate flankers stood within it, unaware, their backs still turned.

The guards remained alive and unsuspecting.

The soldiers had spread through the shadows of the yard.

The forty seconds continued to count down.