Davin heard the mountain speak.
He was waist-deep in the south face of Quarry Seven when the sound reached him — a flat, hard crack that echoed off the Ironvein ridge and rolled down the valley like something enormous snapping in half. Thunder built slowly, rumbled, faded. This was instantaneous. A single pulse of sound with no warning and no echo pattern he recognized.
He set down his chisel. Around him, four other quarrymen paused. Renn, the overseer, was halfway up the scaffolding with a surveyor's line. He stopped mid-step and looked north, toward the military testing range that occupied the flat ground above the quarry's eastern rim.
"What was that?" Davin asked.
Renn shook his head. Not I don't know — don't ask.
