Skrit crossed the border at dusk.
He didn't plan it that way. He'd been walking for three days straight — through grassland, across two rivers, over the rocky stretch between Demeterra's outer farmlands and the unclaimed territory that served as buffer. His legs had stopped hurting on the second day, which was worse than the hurting because it meant they'd gone numb. His travel pack was empty. He'd eaten the last of his dried grain two days ago and had been surviving on river water and the desperate stubbornness that kept Kobolds alive in environments that should kill them.
He felt the border the way drowning people feel air.
One step — the foreign press of Demeterra's Growth domain, that warm-wrong sensation in the soil that he'd endured for three months. The next step — the Voice. Not words. Not instructions. Just *presence*. The familiar divine warmth of the Grand Ordinator's territory flooding back into his body from the ground up like an incoming tide.
Skrit collapsed.
