The inner ring held.
Barely.
Aliyah's withdrawal had been executed with the precision of a commander who understood that retreat, done correctly, was not defeat but transformation. The outer defenses were abandoned in sequence, each section covering the next as soldiers fell back through pre-planned routes to the secondary fortifications. Mages maintained frost barriers at critical chokepoints, buying time with walls of ice that the orcish advance had to pause and break through.
The inner ring was smaller, tighter, more densely defended. Every soldier who had survived the outer wall now stood shoulder to shoulder on fortifications that had been reinforced over weeks of preparation for exactly this scenario. The frost-weavers, their reserves dangerously low, positioned themselves at the four cardinal points of the inner perimeter, ready to concentrate their remaining power on whatever direction the main assault came from.
And the Griffon Knights took to the sky.
