The days following my introductions blurred into a routine of learning and observation. Elara continued her patient guidance, showing me the rhythms of the fortress and explaining the complex web of relationships that held Frosthold together. I met more people, learnt more names, and absorbed more of the endless details that would eventually make me part of this place.
But I also began to hear the whispers.
It started subtly—a fragment of conversation caught as I passed an open doorway, quickly silenced when the speakers noticed my presence. A glance exchanged between two servants, loaded with meaning I could not read. A warrior's careful pause before responding to my greeting, his eyes assessing in a way that felt different from before.
At first, I dismissed it as my own insecurity, the natural paranoia of an outsider trying to find her place. But the fragments accumulated, and gradually, a picture began to form.
