Page 288 of Salt Between the Wolves

The shadows beneath her eyes seemed slightly deeper than before.

"Anyone killed?"

"No."

"Yet."

Soren looked at her, and she held his gaze; neither needed to explain the word. It existed inside every conversation at White Pass, every negotiation, every patrol route, every order given to armed men growing colder and more impatient by the day.

Eventually Eira exhaled slowly, then looked past him to the north, toward the pass itself, toward Frostvein, toward the problem she had ridden across half the continent to face.

"When do I speak to him?"

The question arrived so quickly that several of the warriors visibly stiffened—not whether, but when.

Soren watched her. Part of him had expected caution, but another part had known better.

"Today."

Her attention returned to him. "Today?"

"Before someone gives us a reason not to."

For the first time since her arrival, Eira looked genuinely troubled—not frightened or uncertain, but simply aware of the scale of what stood ahead.

Soren understood the feeling; he had been living with it for nine days.

For a moment neither spoke, then Eira nodded once—a small but completely decisive movement.

And just like that, they were no longer standing on a snow-covered road, but at the edge of whatever happened next.

By the time they reached White Pass, word had already spread.

Eira noticed it almost immediately, not because people stopped what they were doing, since most didn’t, but because something in the air had shifted.

The camp remained occupied with the same tasks it had been performing for nine days, with horses being fed, fires tended, and weapons maintained as life continued.

Yet she felt the glances all the same.

A warrior carrying firewood looked up as they passed, while a woman standing beside one of the supply wagons paused briefly before continuing her conversation, and several younger hunters watched openly, their expressions a mix of curiosity, hope, and worry.

Eira could not tell which was worse, perhaps all three.

No one approached her, no one challenged her presence, and no one demanded explanations, which for some reason made her more uncomfortable.

She had spent much of the journey imagining this return, yet none of those imaginings had included kindness, normalcy, or people simply accepting that she had come back.

The feeling settled heavily somewhere beneath her ribs.

Ahead of her, Soren exchanged brief words with several officers, moving through questions, reports, and updates as the machinery of command never seemed to stop around him.

Eira's attention drifted across the camp, taking in faces, voices, and fragments of familiar places.

She recognized more than she expected, from the blacksmith's shelter to the southern watchtower and the training grounds, and for a brief moment it felt as though no time had passed at all.

Then she noticed one of the warriors standing beside a supply cart, young, with dark blond hair and broad shoulders, familiar not because she knew him well, but because she had seen him countless times standing beside Riven.

The recognition arrived before the memory, and Eira looked away immediately as the weight returned, heavier this time.