Morning light filtered through the high, frost-rimmed windows of the private estate in the upper district of Azure Fall City, casting pale golden beams across the thick velvet carpets and the bronze braziers still glowing with the embers of aged spirit-sandalwood.
Outside the courtyard walls, the crisp sound of iron shovels scraping snow off the stone avenues echoed across the fortress city as the seventy thousand soldiers of the border garrison began their morning drills under the new command of General Cui Hao. Inside the warm dressing chamber adjacent to the main bedchamber, Archmage Alaric Steele stood before a tall bronze mirror while adjusting the simple linen sash of his gray healer's robes.
