The captain burst into the council room like a human gale, his armor groaning with the abrupt movement. The smell of dust and terror came off him like a visible cloak.

  "My Lord!" his voice failed, hoarse from the dust inhaled during the desperate run. "The sentinels... the scouts... it's confirmed! The main force of the Republic's army... They're coming... straight for us!"

  His bulging eyes swept across the faces before him. Inês felt the air leave her lungs. The captain continued, swallowing dryly:

  "The dust columns are already visible in the valley! They'll be at the foot of the castle... before the last ray of sunlight!"

  The word was still echoing in the cold stone when silence descended upon the room. Before the last ray of sunlight, thought Inês, feeling the ice of her own frost forming around her heart. Her hands, under the table, trembled slightly before she controlled them with sheer willpower.

  Peixoto looked first at Garcia, then at Inês, then back at Garcia. The true lord of the castle, owner of the walls, the lands, and most of the mercenaries, remained motionless. The final decision would always be his, everyone knew.

  Garcia did not move for long seconds. His right hand gripped the handle of the knife embedded in the table, his knuckles white from pressure. His eyes, small and deep under thick brows, did not blink. He stared into the void beyond the oak table, but everyone in the hall could feel the physical weight of the fortress on his shoulders. The stones seemed to speak to him, they were an extension of his blood, his lineage.

  The sound of crackling fire in the fireplace filled the silence. Inês could smell the burning wood mixed with the damp odor of stone and the faint fragrance of spilled wine from before the interruption.

  "One hour," said Garcia, finally.

  His voice was a low growl, like stone dragging over stone. Everyone leaned slightly forward to hear.

  "Do they really think they can invade my lands?" he continued, the words coming out measured, heavy.

  He yanked the knife from the wood with a brusque movement. The final thunk seemed to mark the beginning of a countdown everyone felt in their bones.

  "Peixoto."

  The intellectual visibly flinched, his monocle nearly falling from his eye. He adjusted it with fingers that trembled slightly.

  "Garcia, listen to reason..." Peixoto began, his voice higher than normal. "The math is clear, the probabilities..."

  "Calculate this for me, then," Garcia cut him off, rising to his feet.

  His stature, once seeming merely robust, now loomed in the hall. Torchlight cast his enormous shadow against the stone wall. He was the warlord in his own fortress, and every line of his body screamed that truth.

  "Three hundred and twelve mercenary Adepts," enumerated Garcia, counting on his fingers as if listing treasures. "Nourished by the Rose-Gem my grandfather buried in the heart of this castle. Walls that have held for a century against barbarian tribes, against Quilombos, against the very corrosion of time."

  He took a step forward, and Peixoto instinctively recoiled.

  "And me, Garcia," continued the castle lord, pounding his own chest with a closed fist. "Whose hand has never trembled to cast the stone that crushes. You calculate the probabilities. I'll give you the result: blood in the valley and silence from their noisy weapons before the full moon."

  Peixoto swallowed dryly, his Adam's apple bobbing convulsively. Garcia's bravado wasn't empty—it was the granite pride of a man who knew every stone of his domain, every crack, every strong point. A man who believed, with absolute faith, that those walls would not fall while he drew breath.

  "And if their weapons..." Peixoto tried, his voice weak. "If those iron carts, the cannons they reported..."

  "Break stone," Garcia completed, his eyes gleaming with a dangerous light, like embers under ashes. "I know. I heard the reports from Ouro Branco. I saw the drawings you yourself showed."

  He approached the window, his heavy boots echoing on the stone floor.

  "But here there is no fragile fort," he continued, pointing to the walls visible through the stained glass. "Here there is a carved mountain. They'll spend their precious ammunition trying to make a dent. And every minute they spend..."

  Garcia turned suddenly, his cloak swirling with him.

  "...is one more minute for us to dig deeper, to hurl more stones, for their panic to grow at the foot of my hill."

  He fixed his gaze on Inês, his dark eyes piercing her.

  "Baroness. Your illusions. Are they ready?"

  Inês nodded slowly, a shadow of genuine respect in her gaze. Garcia, on the defensive, was a different animal from the man she'd known in peacetime. More dangerous, more focused, more... interesting.

  "Final preparations are being made," she replied, her voice a calculated whisper that nonetheless filled the room. "My whispers already permeate the servants' corridors, the mercenaries' barracks. Terror can be an anchor or a wind. I will direct it."

  "Do it," ordered Garcia, an almost imperceptible smile touching his lips. "Poison the air they breathe. Make them see shadows where there are none, hear footsteps behind every door. Make them feel death's chill before they even see a blade."

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  He then looked back at Peixoto, and the smile vanished.

  "And you. The administrator. The calculator. You have a choice."

  Peixoto felt cold sweat trickling down his back, dampening the thin shirt under his doublet. The smell of his own fear, acidic and familiar, rose to his nostrils.

  "Choice?" his voice sounded shrill, almost childlike.

  "Yes," Garcia confirmed, pointing the knife at him. The blade caught a ray of light and threw it back like a glittering eye. "You can stay and use your fire staff to show them what hell is. Or die here and now, by my hand, as a traitor who doesn't deserve to see the sunrise."

  It wasn't a choice. It never had been.

  Peixoto looked at the massive oak door, then at Garcia's impassive face, then at Inês, whose red eyes promised nightmares for anyone who wavered. His intellect, his survival instinct, fought for a moment in the vacuum of his chest. Escape was an incalculable risk, with sentries on every tower, mercenaries in every corridor. But staying... was signing his own death warrant with ink made of his own blood.

  "I... I'll fight," he said, the words coming out as if they were being ripped from him. "I'll coordinate the fire Adepts in the castle wall. But..."

  He paused, swallowing again.

  "...I request th... when... the situation becomes untenable, I'll have free passage to attempt a negotiation. My diplomatic skills could..."

  Garcia let out a grunt that could have been a dry laugh if there were any humor in the sound.

  "Negotiate with Specter if you want," he cut him off. "He likes to make statistics with traitors. Counts bones, they say. But yes. If the time comes, you can try your luck. Now, go."

  Garcia pointed the knife at the door.

  Peixoto left almost at a run, his robes flapping, relieved and terrified at the same time. The door closed behind him with a final thud.

  With him gone, Garcia turned to the captain, who had remained motionless throughout the exchange.

  "Status. Detailed."

  The captain, sensing the shift in command to his rightful lord, straightened his posture, his elbows hitting the armor with a metallic sound.

  "Mercenaries in position, my lord," he began, his voice firmer now. "Earth Adepts ready to reinforce the walls on your order. Fire Adepts on the east and west towers, aiming at the approaches. Ice Adepts, few but experienced, positioned at the gates and dungeon windows, to freeze any breach."

  He took a deep breath before continuing:

  "The Rose-Gem is at 85% capacity. The channelers report slight instability in level three flows, but nothing compromising."

  "Good," murmured Garcia, walking to the large window overlooking the valley.

  Down below, the brown dust of the Republican column was a growing stain against the green of the hills. Even at a distance, it was possible to discern the slow, relentless movement, like blood flowing toward a wound.

  "They'll try the gates first," Garcia analyzed, speaking more to himself than to the others.

  He turned, his face illuminated by the light from the window.

  "Our response will always be the same: stone and fire. No heroic sallies. No waste. We wear them down. Until they tire of beating their heads against this mountain."

  His eyes met the captain's.

  "Captain, you stay with me on the wall defense."

  Finally, he looked at Inês over his shoulder, an almost intimate gesture.

  "Inês," he said, and for the first time his tone held a thread of something that might be respect. "The castle is yours to poison. Fill every shadow with suspicion, every whisper of the wind with a murmur. I want their soldiers to advance with their hearts already tightened by the madness you'll blow over the valley."

  Inês gave a slight bow, a blade-like smile on her thin lips.

  "With pleasure," she whispered. "They won't have a moment of peace, not even in their own thoughts. I promise their nightmares will begin even before the first cannon shot."

  The transformation of Castelo Garcia under its lord's iron command was unlike any military preparation Inês had ever witnessed. It wasn't the frenzy of a fort about to fall, nor the silent resignation of the condemned. It was the methodical preparation of a beast in its den, every movement calculated, every resource optimized.

  The orders were short, clear, given in a tone that brooked no questioning. Fear was there, yes—Inês tasted its bitterness in the air, smelled the acrid stench of cold sweat in the stables, felt the tense silence of servants huddled in the kitchen like cornered animals. But it was a contained fear, directed, channeled by Garcia's absolute presence.

  The castle lord himself went to his armory alone. Inês watched him from afar, through a half-open door. He donned silver armor inlaid with the brown Earth-gem—not ceremonial armor, but battle armor, marked by scratches and dents from past conflicts. The largest gems were in the gauntlets, pulsing with a soft, steady light. Finally, he drew a long sword from a plain sheath, testing its weight with a fluid motion that spoke of years of practice. Without a word to anyone, he headed for the base of the walls.

  Inês followed a different path, descending to the lower courtyards. While Garcia took the visible command of the defense, her work was in the shadows. She wandered the lowest corridors, the dark kitchens, the damp storerooms where moss grew between the stones.

  At every strategic location—a dark niche under a staircase, a wall joint in the latrines, a forgotten corner of the wine cellar—she left small, dark-green gems. They seemed almost inert to the touch, but when Inês whispered over them, a dull light pulsed in their depths, like an eye opening in the dark.

  Her power could only be activated when they entered the castle, she thought, stroking a gem before placing it in a crevice. At a distance, it was useless. But once inside... once they breathed the air she had prepared...

  On top of the walls, a different defense was organizing. Peixoto, pale but functional, coordinated the Fire Adepts with an efficiency that surprised even Inês. Men and women wearing flaming insignia positioned themselves behind the battlements, their staffs already glowing with potential heat. The air smelled of ozone and contained anxiety.

  "Do not fire until my command!" Peixoto shouted, his voice firmer now that he had a specific task. "Remember energy economy! The Rose-Gem feeds you, but it's not infinite!"

  A younger Adept, no more than a teenager, trembled visibly. Peixoto approached, placed a hand on his shoulder.

  "Breathe," he said, surprisingly gentle. "Calculate the trajectory. Wind speed. The weakest point of the armor. Math has no room for fear."

  Meanwhile, Garcia walked the walls like a silver ghost. He stopped here and there, placed a hand on the stone as if feeling its pulse, whispered orders to subordinate captains. Wherever he passed, the men straightened, the fear in their eyes replaced by fierce determination.

  "They'll come through the east valley," Garcia told a group of Earth Adepts. "When they start climbing, I want the hill to tremble under their feet. Not to kill—not yet—but to tire, to unbalance, to remind them they're treading on soil that doesn't belong to them."

  The Adepts nodded, their hands already pressing against the wall stones, feeling their vibrations, establishing a connection that would soon be tested.

  From the walls, Inês could see the dust column approaching. It was no longer a distant smudge—now it was possible to discern shapes within the dust, the occasional glint of metal in the sun, the rhythmic movement of an organized march. The sound arrived belatedly, but soon she could hear the distant echo of drums, the metallic clatter of equipment being dragged.

  Worms, thinking they can take what is mine? she thought.