There were two passageways through the mountain range isolating his fortress from the rest of the world. One was used by the people and visitors who wanted to reach the secluded, well-fortified hold at the seat of his kingdom. The other was for use by the Shadow Knight's army commanders and messengers only, an expedited means of facilitating important news to and from those in the hold.

No one outside of his inner circle in Black Moon Draw knew the location of the secret pass between mountains, the one the men of Brown Sun Lake had taken him and the witch through. It was his second sign that aught was not right with the welcoming party, one that warned him more than the Jackal-headed man was a threat before revealing himself.

Brown Sun Lake had armies on his land and the means to pass through the mountains and destroy Black Moon Draw before his warriors returned. If the armies of Brown Sun Lake were this deep in Black Moon Draw, they had moved with help from his own people. There was no other way for them to hide such an enormous amount of warriors pouring into his lands, if someone were not actively suppressing any word of it.

Worse - Brown Sun Lake armies were between him and his warriors. Even if his messengers reached his men, there was a very good chance that Brown Sun Lake captured the hold on the cliff before help arrived. His enemy had a bargaining chip he would do anything to recover: the battle-witch needed to break the curse.

Frustrated and furious, the Shadow Knight defeated his enemies a couple of candlemarks after the battle-witch left the pass. He had no way of knowing how large the army waiting for him at the other end of the pass was. He turned back and tore out of the narrow path towards the fortress, mind racing.

He had miscalculated, stretched his armies out across the realm, marching steadily towards his final battle with his main enemy, only to learn the older, wisened, wily Desert Knight had circled behind and cornered him.

There were no warriors in his hold, and he doubted his former ally at White Tree Sound was going to help anyone but the victor.

The Shadow Knight wanted to roar in anger, most of which was aimed at himself for being too arrogant in battle and assuming he had the upper hand against an enemy like the Desert Knight. Instead, he hunched over the horse's neck and urged it to run faster along the foothills towards the cliff where his hold sat.

Attack at shadow moon. Capture the Heart. The messages conveyed by the Desert Knight to the Red Knight now made sense. The shadow moon was the first night after a full moon, called such because it stayed out all day and disappeared soon after nightfall.




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