Wind dragged grit across the ridge while the last workers shuffled between Juna's cut markers in single file.
Eirwen walked at their tail with an arrow nocked loose, counting heads every time the path bent.
Wren jogged back down the line, breathless and muddy, "That's the whole yard crew, my lady, nobody left behind."
"Then keep them tight to the markers, Juna cleared the ground, not the sky above it."
A bowstring snapped somewhere above them, and a barbed hook hissed down the slope into the line.
It bit through a young worker's sleeve and yanked him sideways toward the open scree just beyond the safe markers. A cord trailed from the shaft to a firing ledge, where an officer crouched with eleven Shards circling his arms.
"Down!" Eirwen shouted, loosing her own arrow before the young man's feet left the path.
Her shaft split the cord a hand above his elbow, and he sprawled flat against the safe ground.
