The valley of Oakhaven did not possess the structural dignity of a ruin. It had been reduced to a stagnant settlement of gray silt, where seventy-two surviving members of the northern border clans huddled within the hollowed-out hulls of long-dead transport cruisers. The air here was heavy, saturated with a dense concentration of limestone sediment that coated the throat like wet mortar.
Gwen stepped through the perimeter of calcified fence posts, her hand resting flat against the cold, dead iron of her belt harness. Beside her, Luna walked with a quiet, unhurried grace that seemed entirely foreign to the jagged, ballistic rhythms of the wasteland. The girl was fourteen internal rotations old by the mirror's logic, yet her pale blue eyes possessed the deep, absolute stillness of a subterranean lake.
