Aldrath reached the depression at dusk and found it empty, and the finding of it empty was more instructive than finding it occupied would have been.
An empty position told him several things simultaneously.
It told him that the Verakh network was faster than his camp movement had hoped it would be.
It told him that the orcish commander had received the report of the movement and had responded with a displacement rather than a reinforcement of the position, which was the response that accepted the premise that the combined force had successfully taken the timing initiative and denied it simultaneously by vacating the ground before the initiative could be exercised.
And it told him that wherever the Horde had gone, it had gone in the four hours between the Verakh's report and the combined force's arrival at the empty depression.
