Black Pines

Before noon the wind had shifted. The wind that was pursuing them along the borderlands became brisk and dry-scented, with a trace of iron in it. Any frozen soil made the ground underfoot dark. The snow became melted away into patches, and the trees in the vicinity of the snow became increasingly taller, thicker, blacker in the space of every mile.

Ezra glanced one time over his shoulder. "We've left the border," he said. "No signs of pursuit."

Annabelle didn't slow. Then we ...