The Curse Egg pulsed beneath Klaus's coat—not in warning this time, but hunger.
Its appetite scraped steadily through him, consuming almost as much vitality as Dragon's Blood restored. The rhythm had quickened after his echolocation touched the hollow beneath Aegulus's inner wall, as though the damned thing had sensed his unease and decided to contribute.
"Calm down," Klaus muttered, pressing a hand over the mark beneath his coat.
Another pulse answered him. Talking, perhaps. Complaining, more likely.
Klaus drew a slow breath. "That applies to both of us."
From behind the stone, he studied Aegulus once more. Nothing emerged from the passage he had sensed. No patrol crossed the battlements. No horn announced that some nosy bastard had discovered what was supposed to remain buried.
Only silence.
Silence usually meant one of two things: the passage had been abandoned, or whoever built it was confident no intruder would live long enough to use the information.
Neither possibility appealed to him.
Klaus crouched and placed two fingers against the stone. Echolocation traveled through the rock, sank into the earth, then spread outward and deeper. The burned plain returned to him in layers—shallow craters, fractured stone, buried weapons, bones melted by the Goblin King's flames.
And beneath it all, the tunnel.
Wide. Hollow. Deliberate.
He withdrew his hand.
Aegulus wasn't merely defended aboveground. Whatever lay beneath it was part of the fortress.
Perhaps part of the attack.
Klaus glanced toward the distant camp. Its lights were little more than specks across the scorched plain, almost like fireflies if one ignored the army surrounding them. The distance had seemed prudent when he left.
Now it seemed unnecessarily fucking long.
He rose, adjusted his shadowy cloak, and started back.
The plain offered miserable cover. Burned rocks, shallow depressions, half-melted shields—nothing substantial enough to hide him if the Goblin King happened to look his way. Klaus kept low where possible, moving between remnants of the previous battle.
A cold wind drove ash against his face. He paused beside a ruined orcish shield and looked back.
Still nothing.
That should have reassured him.
It didn't.
The Goblin King had incinerated an enormous stretch of land, killing enemies and subordinates alike. Klaus had felt their bones beneath the soil. Something capable of that destruction had little reason to cower behind walls, yet the King remained inside Aegulus.
And now Klaus had found tunnels beneath those walls.
Perhaps the monster was cautious. Perhaps wounded.
Or perhaps it was waiting for the Kollus army to march exactly where it wanted them.
Klaus quickened his pace.
Three theories in less than a minute, all based on the assumption that the Goblin King behaved like a competent commander. Monsters had an irritating habit of ruining intelligent theories by choosing violence for reasons no sane person could predict.
Still, Eason needed to know.
Their plan was simple beneath all the formations, contingencies, and expensive maps: march on Aegulus, destroy whatever defended it, breach the walls, take the fortress.
Everything depended on one assumption.
The enemy would fight for Aegulus.
The tunnels complicated that. Goblins could shift beneath the battlefield unseen, reinforce threatened positions, strike the army's rear, perhaps even abandon the fortress while Kollus wasted men capturing empty walls.
Klaus stepped over a breastplate fused into the earth.
Or the tunnels were bait.
That possibility had teeth.
The sentries spotted him as he reached the camp's outer watch. One lowered his spear across Klaus's path before recognizing him and quickly raising it again.
"Enigma."
Klaus slowed. "Were you expecting someone prettier?"
The young soldier straightened. Apparently he still believed posture made a man harder to kill.
"We were ordered to stop anyone coming from the fortress."
"Am I anyone?"
The second sentry peered past him toward Aegulus. "Did you find something?"
"Yes."
Both waited.
Klaus continued walking.
Behind him, one whispered, "What did he find?"
"If he wanted us to know," the other replied, "he would've said."
A clever soldier.
Klaus hoped the army had several more.
The camp had changed during his absence. Servants secured wagons while soldiers checked straps and sharpened blades, everyone finding something useful to do while pretending dawn might arrive later if they worked slowly enough. Subjugators clustered around smaller fires, repairing equipment and comparing old trophies.
The slaves remained apart from everyone else.
They had tents, technically. Comfort was another matter. Some preferred sleeping outside despite the cold, perhaps because canvas walls reminded them too much of cages.
A few watched Klaus pass.
Most looked away.
He understood the habit. Showing too much interest in powerful men sometimes encouraged powerful men to return the favor.
Two years ago, Klaus would have been among them—limbs chained, weapon worthless, wondering which part of him would break first.
The memory pressed somewhere uncomfortable.
He left it there.
The command tent stood near the camp's center, guarded by soldiers wearing Solrien colors.
"Enigma," one greeted. "Lord Eason is inside."
"I assumed so. A command tent without its commander would be disappointing."
The soldier didn't smile.
Discipline or poor taste. Hard to tell.
Klaus entered.
He had expected Eason, a map, and perhaps one unfortunate officer trapped listening while the old man explained why everyone else was wrong.
Instead, nearly every Keeper had occupied the tent.
Rio Falamin stood at one end of the table, red coat open despite the cold. Charles Ironfire had claimed the opposite side and studied the map with the expression of a man locating the precise point where somebody else's stupidity would become his problem.
Samantha leaned against a wooden support, apparently relaxed, though the deliberate distance between her and Rio suggested otherwise.
Peter Madlock sat on a supply chest, turning a small metal ring between his fingers.
The Subjugator leaders and captains were absent.
Eason stood at the head of the table.
His gaze passed over the ash coating Klaus's cloak.
"You took your time."
"I considered bringing back the fortress. It proved heavier than expected."
Eason merely tapped the map. "What did you find?"
Calm. Composed. Not even particularly curious.
Klaus approached.
The map showed Aegulus from above: gates, towers, slopes, burned fields. Neat black lines described everything the scouts could see.
Nothing beneath it.
Klaus planted a finger against the inner wall.
"There's a passage here."
Charles leaned closer. "Escape tunnel?"
Klaus shook his head. "Too large. Too complicated. Multiple branches at different depths."
"How large?" Samantha asked.
"Large enough to move more than fugitives." Klaus traced beneath the wall. "Possibly an army."
The ring stopped between Madlock's fingers.
Rio's grin diminished.
Eason remained still.
"It runs beneath the inner foundation and branches farther inside. I couldn't determine the full layout from outside. There may be chambers, other exits, perhaps entire sections beyond my range."
"Perhaps?" Charles asked.
"Would you prefer likely?"
Charles's jaw tightened, but he let it pass.
Klaus looked at Eason.
"If we advance according to the original plan, the goblins can maneuver beneath us unseen. Reinforcements, ambushes, withdrawals—we won't know until they surface. They could abandon Aegulus while we waste men taking the walls."
The tent quieted.
Good.
Klaus placed both palms on the table.
"We need to change the plan."
Rio answered first.
"Then that's easy." His grin returned. "Worry not, Enigma. I'll burn the ground until those filthy goblins crawl out. I'll make sure they're smokin' hot."
Klaus almost admired the simplicity.
Charles sighed. "And when your fire reaches our soldiers?"
"They'll move."
"Or burn."
"They're soldiers."
"Precisely. Soldiers. Not fireproof idiots."
Rio spread his hands. "Then they shouldn't stand in the fire."
Samantha cut in before Charles could answer.
"Your flames aren't even close to the Goblin King's."
Rio's grin stiffened.
"If the King survived his own inferno, what exactly do you expect your curse to accomplish?" Samantha asked. "Congratulations. You've warmed the tunnels for him."
A few Keepers snorted.
Rio clicked his tongue. "You really know how to ruin a man's confidence."
"Reality ruined it. Not me."
Madlock ignored them.
He watched Eason.
The old commander hadn't moved since Klaus began speaking.
Madlock rolled the ring once between his fingers.
"What's your plan, Old Eason?"
The tent fell silent.
Even Rio stopped smiling.
Klaus watched with everyone else. Good. At least he wasn't the only one wondering.
Eason rested both hands on the table and studied the map.
Then he laughed.
Not loudly. Not mockingly. Just a weathered chuckle better suited to a tavern than a command tent facing one of the deadliest fortresses on the continent.
"Stick to the plan."
Klaus waited.
Nothing followed.
No revised formation. No countermeasure. No explanation.
Four words.
Charles recovered first. "Old Eason, if Enigma is correct, those tunnels change the engagement."
"They do."
"Then we revise the assault. They could attack our rear."
"No."
"They could evacuate the King."
"And?" Eason tapped his cane once. "Our objective is Aegulus. The King comes second."
Charles stared at him.
Klaus almost pitied the man. Arguing with Eason was like punching a wall that politely acknowledged every blow while refusing to crack.
Rio folded his arms. "So we pretend the tunnels don't exist?"
"No."
"Then what?"
"We continue."
Samantha's eyes narrowed. "You expected underground movement."
Not a question.
Eason neither confirmed nor denied it.
Instead, he pointed toward the fortress.
"Did those tunnels bypass our scouts?"
Klaus considered the question. "No."
"Do you believe an army is hidden beneath us?"
"No."
"Can those passages reach beneath our present position?"
"Not from what I sensed."
Eason nodded.
"Then nothing has changed."
Rio frowned. "The hell do you mean nothing changed? He found a damn underground city."
"The objective remains the same."
"That's the same objective, not the same battlefield."
"The battlefield changes every hour."
That silenced him.
Eason returned his attention to the map.
"If I discard a plan whenever the enemy reveals another card, I stop commanding and start reacting."
His cane touched Aegulus.
"The Goblin King knows we're coming."
Then the open field.
"We know he'll defend his fortress."
Back to the tunnels.
"This is another weapon."
Finally, Eason looked at Klaus.
"Useful information."
A pause.
"It changes nothing."
Klaus held his gaze.
An argument rose to his tongue and died there.
The problem wasn't that Eason disbelieved him.
That would have made sense.
The old man had accepted everything. No demand for proof. No challenge to Echolocation. No suspicion that Klaus had misread the underground structure.
He simply wasn't surprised.
Klaus looked toward the dark silhouette of Aegulus beyond the tent.
Either Eason had already accounted for the tunnels...
...or one of the empire's most experienced commanders had just overlooked the greatest threat beneath that fortress.
Klaus didn't believe the second possibility.
Not after watching him.
His eyes narrowed.
The old bastard knew something.
Klaus just had no idea what.