There are moments when a war stops being something that happens to you and becomes something you choose.
The supply train was one of those moments.
We moved at dawn, leaving the ravine behind like a shed skin. No songs. No speeches. Just the sound of boots on stone and breath in cold air. The hills ahead rose in uneven waves—rocky spines and narrow passes where the world felt closer, tighter, more willing to choke an army to death if it misstepped.
This wasn't Lowwater.
No river to shape the field.
No obvious trap.
This would be proof the hard way.
I gathered the captains as we climbed, keeping voices low. "The train passes through the southern cut at midday. One road. Steep walls. Not enough space to deploy properly."
Hadrin frowned. "Which means they'll put their best men at the front and rear."
"Exactly," I said. "We don't smash through. We suffocate them."
Ril crouched beside me, scratching lines into the dirt with a knife. "Archers here and here. Stones ready above the bend. We don't kill the guards first—we break the wagons."
Senrick nodded slowly. "No supplies, no army."
"And no glory," Hadrin muttered.
I met his eyes. "Glory gets men killed. Results change wars."
He grunted, which I took as agreement.
By midmorning we were in position. The pass was narrower than I'd hoped—two wagons abreast at best, cliffs pressing in on either side like teeth. Loose rock littered the slopes. Good footing for no one.
We waited.
Waiting before a fight is worse than fighting. Your body burns energy it doesn't need to. Your mind invents failures. I lay on my stomach behind a boulder, staring down into the cut, fingers numb around my spear shaft.
Ril lay beside me. "If this goes wrong—"
"It won't," I said.
He snorted softly. "That wasn't what I was going to say."
I glanced at him. "Then say it."
"If it goes wrong," he said, "we don't die pretty."
I smiled thinly. "We never do."
The sound came first—iron-rimmed wheels grinding against stone, the creak of axles, the low curses of drivers urging animals forward. Then the train itself emerged around the bend.
Six wagons. More than Kaelen had said.
Guarded by maybe two hundred men.
Better than I'd feared.
Royal colors marked their shields. These weren't Merovan's troops—fresh men, confident, unaware. Some laughed as they walked. One was eating an apple.
I raised my fist.
Every man froze.
The lead wagon rolled into the center of the pass.
I dropped my hand.
The world exploded.
Stones thundered down from the cliffs, smashing into the road with bone-breaking force. One struck the lead wagon dead on, splintering wood, hurling a horse sideways in a screaming tangle of limbs. Another crushed two men flat before they understood what was happening.
"Archers!" I shouted.
Arrows rained down—not a volley meant to kill, but to scatter. Men raised shields instinctively, bunching together, breaking formation exactly as planned.
"Rear wagon!" Ril yelled.
I was already moving.
We charged downhill, boots slipping, bodies hurtling forward with a kind of savage joy. The rear guard tried to form up, but panic had already taken hold. A second wagon toppled as its wheel snapped, blocking the road completely.
Trapped.
The fight was brutal and fast.
No lines. No elegance.
I stabbed a man through the shoulder and felt the shock run up my arm as he went down. Another swung wildly at my head—I blocked, felt the impact rattle my bones, then slammed my shield into his face until he stopped moving.
Someone screamed behind me. Someone else laughed.
Ril fought like a mad thing, blade flashing, face set and furious. Senrick's men locked shields and advanced step by bloody step, turning the center of the pass into a crushing wall of iron.
The guards fought hard. I'll give them that. These weren't cowards. They rallied twice, tried to break out, tried to save at least one wagon.
They failed.
When it was over, the road was clogged with wreckage and bodies. Smoke rose from smashed crates where grain had spilled and caught fire. The smell of it—burning food—felt almost obscene.
We lost men. Too many.
But the wagons never left the pass.
I stood among the ruins, chest heaving, blood soaking into my sleeves. Ril leaned on his sword beside me, breathing hard.
"That'll do it," he said. "Merovan won't be marching anytime soon."
"No," I agreed. "And neither will anyone who was counting on those supplies."
As if summoned by the thought, horns echoed faintly in the distance. Not close. Watching.
The hills had eyes.
We didn't linger. Took what we could carry, destroyed the rest. By the time we melted back into the high ground, smoke was still rising behind us like a signal fire.
By nightfall, messengers found us.
Not Kaelen this time—three different envoys from three different houses. Each cautious. Each polite. Each pretending this was merely a discussion, not the opening move of something much larger.
I listened. I nodded. I promised nothing.
But when they left, I knew.
Lowwater had made me a survivor.
The pass had made me a threat.
As I lay awake that night, staring at a sky full of cold stars, I finally understood the shape of the road ahead.
The king would not forgive this.
Merovan would not forget it.
And the hills… the hills were starting to believe.
War was no longer chasing me.
I was leading it.