They left Vashari two hours before dawn.
Sael had suggested the timing, not for secrecy, she said, but because the Ashplain's first fifty kilometers were open savanna, and crossing open savanna in full daylight meant announcing their position to every vantage point between the coast and the eastern mountains. Leaving early would put them deep into the plain's central corridor before the sun gave anyone a clear sightline.
Owen had agreed. He had also noticed, without saying so, that Sael's suggestion showed a detailed knowledge of Ironmane surveillance patterns — more detailed than she had let on in the compound meeting.
He walked the Ashplain in his humanoid form. His traveling coat didn't do much against the pre-dawn chill, not cold by human-continent standards, but dry in a way the coast hadn't been. The air smelled of mineral soil and dry grass, and underneath that, something harder to name. Old. Like the land had a particular quality to it that the city didn't.
