The first tree was six hundred meters south of the compound's outer gate.
Darro led her to it without a hand lamp. She'd memorized the route during her scout, navigating by the shapes of trunks against the fractionally lighter sky. River followed close, her feet finding the path Darro's feet had already tested.
Cal was ten meters behind them. She'd told him to stay at the compound. He'd put his boots on and followed her out the door. She hadn't told him again.
Darro stopped at a Douglas fir. Thick trunk, old growth, the bark rough enough to hold cuts well.
"Here," she said.
River put her hand on the trunk. She couldn't see the marks in the dark so she read them with her fingers. Two parallel cuts, horizontal, each about a finger's width apart. A diagonal crossing them. Below: four vertical hash marks.
She ran her thumb over the cuts.
Fresh. The wood underneath was still damp, not dried. These had been made within the last two days.
"Next one," she said.
Darro moved south.
---
The second tree was a hundred and forty meters further. Same pattern on a different species, a western red cedar with softer bark that took the cuts differently but showed the same marks. Two parallels, diagonal, four hash marks.
The third was another hundred and fifty meters. Same.
The fourth was where the pattern changed.
"Different number," Darro said. She'd brought River's hand to the marks. "Feel the bottom."
River felt. Six hash marks instead of four.
"Heavier assignment," she said.
"Yes. And the parallels are angled differently. The first three trees had horizontal parallels. This one angles northeast." Darro was crouched beside the trunk. "If the parallels indicate approach direction, this position's team comes from a different axis."
River stood up.
She looked south into the dark. She couldn't see anything beyond twenty meters but she could feel the forest continuing, the trees going on, each one a potential marker she hadn't reached yet.
"You found seven total," she said.
"Seven in the stretch I covered. Two kilometers, moving east to west along the southern approach." Darro stood. "I turned back when I realized the pattern was repeating. There will be more."
River ran the math.
Seven positions on the southern approach alone. Four to six operators per position. If the pattern extended around the Sanctuary's full perimeter, even partially...
"Thirty to forty operators minimum," she said. "For the south alone."
"If the staging extends to the east and west approaches, double that," Darro said.
Sixty to eighty.
Maria Santos had said twelve.
"We need to talk to Maria," River said.
"Now?"
"Now."
---
Maria Santos slept in a room attached to the archive building. Petra was outside the door, sitting in a chair with a radio on her lap and the posture of someone who didn't really sleep during watch shifts, just lowered her eyelids partway.
She stood when River came around the corner.
"I need Maria," River said.
Petra looked at her face. Then at Darro behind her. Then at Cal behind Darro.
She knocked on the door. Three quick beats.
Maria opened it in under a minute. Dressed. She hadn't been asleep either, or she slept in her clothes. Given the QH situation, River guessed both.
"What," Maria said.
River held up the bark piece Darro had cut from the first tree. "Staging markers. Southern perimeter, six hundred meters out. Seven positions in a two-kilometer stretch. Four to six operators assigned per position."
Maria took the bark. She held it close, squinted at the cuts in the low light from her room.
Her jaw tightened.
"Where exactly," she said.
"I'll show you the map." Darro stepped forward. "But first: your perimeter scouts. How far south do they go?"
Maria looked at Darro. The look of someone assessing whether to answer a stranger's question about her operational security. She answered anyway. "Four hundred meters. Standard patrol radius, maintained since we established the perimeter three years ago."
"These markers start at six hundred," Darro said.
Maria held the bark piece.
She was quiet for five seconds. River counted.
"Inside," Maria said.
---
Maria's room doubled as her office. A table against one wall held mapsâhand-drawn, detailed, the kind of maps that took years to build from observation and survey. The Sanctuary compound in the center, the valley around it, the mountain approaches from all directions.
Darro marked the positions she'd found. Seven small X marks on the southern approach, outside the four-hundred-meter patrol radius.
Maria looked at the map.
"We patrol to four hundred meters," she said. "Because four hundred meters gives us a thirty-minute warning window at walking pace. Enough time to close the gates, arm the checkpoints, get non-combatants to the safe structures." She looked at Darro. "You're telling me they staged just outside our detection range."
"They knew your patrol radius," River said.
Maria's hand went to the table. She pressed her fingers against the map, against the four-hundred-meter line she'd drawn years ago and maintained as if it were enough.
"We've had scouts out further," Maria said. "Irregular patrols, extended range. But not daily. Not systematic." She looked at River. "We're a community, not a military installation. I have seventeen people trained for perimeter duty. They rotate in shifts of three. That gives me coverage, not depth."
"That gives you a gap," River said.
She said it flat. No accusation in it. Just the fact.
Maria looked at her.
The room was small enough that the silence between them had texture. Petra was in the doorway. Cal leaned against the wall. Darro stood beside the map with her hand still on the positions she'd marked.
"I've been running this community for nine years," Maria said. Her voice was controlled. Level. The voice of someone who'd been questioned before and didn't enjoy it but didn't avoid it either. "The four-hundred-meter radius has kept us alive through three separate incursions. It works against the threats we've faced."
"The threats you've faced aren't the threat you're facing now," River said.
Maria held her gaze.
River didn't look away.
"The QH aren't raiders," River said. "They're Overseer-trained. They'll have mapped your patrols before they placed a single marker. They staged at six hundred because they knew you stopped at four. They assigned operator counts because they know how many people you have on perimeter duty. They're planning a coordinated approach from multiple axes with enough force to overwhelm your checkpoints." She pointed at the map. "And they've had six weeks to do it."
Maria looked at the map.
She looked at the seven X marks.
She looked at the map for a long time.
"What do you propose," she said.
"Expand the scout range. Map every marker between here and the tree line. Get a full picture of what they've staged and from which directions." River looked at Darro. "We need to know how many positions, how many operators per position, and which approach axes they're planning to use. Without that, we're guessing."
"That's a lot of ground to cover," Maria said. "The perimeter is eight kilometers if you follow the managed tree line."
"Then we need more scouts," River said.
Darro nodded. "I can run the southern approach again, full coverage this time. But I need someone on the east and west simultaneously. If they've staged to the south, they've staged everywhere."
"I'll take the east."
The voice came from the doorway behind Petra. Dae. She'd come from somewhereânot from the quarters, River thought, because her boots were damp and she had her jacket on. She'd been outside already.
"You should be resting," River said.
"I heard you leave." Dae stepped past Petra into the room. She looked at the map. She looked at the X marks. "I ran tactical assessment for the northeast network for three years. I know what staging markers look like and I know how to read approach patterns." She looked at Maria. "I can cover the eastern perimeter by dawn if I start now."
Maria looked at Dae. Then at River. Then at the map.
"Fenno takes the west," Dae said. "He's got mountain experience and he knows what he's looking at."
"We don't know this terrain," River said. "You've been here half a day."
"I've been navigating unfamiliar terrain for three years," Dae said. "This is what I do."
River looked at her. Dae held the look. She'd decided, and she wasn't going to have it undone.
"Fine," River said. "East approach. Mark positions, count operator assignments, note any changes in the parallel angles. Don't engage if you see anyone. Back by dawn."
"I know the protocol," Dae said. She was already turning toward the door.
"Dae."
Dae stopped.
"Take a radio," River said. "If they've staged that close, they might have people inside the six-hundred-meter line already."
Dae looked at Petra. Petra unclipped the radio from her belt and held it out.
Dae took it. She left.
---
Fenno was harder to find.
Not because he was hiding. Because he was sitting outside the quarters building, on the ground, his back against the wall, looking at the sky. Not resting. Thinking about something he hadn't resolved yet.
River crouched beside him.
"I need you on the western perimeter," she said. "Same job as Dae on the east. Staging markers. Positions. Counts."
Fenno looked at her. He was youngâshe kept forgetting how young. Twenty, maybe. The angular face, the careful way he held himself. Eight months on the circuit. Not enough time to stop being careful about everything.
"I can do that," he said. Then: "There's something I should have said earlier."
River waited.
"When we came in. The approach from the east, through the tree line, before we reached the first checkpoint." He was picking at the edge of his jacket sleeve. Nervous tell. "I saw a light on the eastern ridge. Above us, maybe a kilometer east of the path Petra brought us in on."
"What kind of light."
"Short. Like a hand lamp with a shutter. Three flashes, pause, three flashes." He looked at her. "I thought it was a Sanctuary patrol. Signaling that they'd seen us coming in. I didn't mention it because it seemed like part of the system."
River held still.
Three flashes, pause, three flashes. A signal pattern. Repeated.
"When," she said.
"Late afternoon. Maybe an hour before we reached the compound."
She stood up.
"Come with me," she said.
---
Maria was still at the map table when they came back in. She'd been adding to itânotes in her own handwriting, distances, the beginnings of a defense assessment.
"Fenno saw something on approach," River said.
Fenno told her. The light. The ridge. The pattern. Three and three.
Maria stopped writing.
"Which ridge," she said.
Fenno pointed at the map. The eastern ridge, the high ground above the approach path. A kilometer east of the route Petra had used.
"You said you don't have patrols on the eastern ridge," River said.
Maria looked at the map.
"We don't," she said.
The room was quiet.
"Someone was up there with a signal lamp," Fenno said. "Someone who knew we were coming in and wanted someone outside the perimeter to know it too."
Maria put her pen down.
She looked at River. She looked at Petra. She looked at the map with its seven X marks and its four-hundred-meter patrol line and the eastern ridge that nobody was supposed to be on.
"The QH knew we evacuated the outer settlement," Maria said. Slow. Working it through. "They knew before we moved. They were at the site within hours of our people pulling out."
"Someone told them," River said.
"Someone inside the perimeter," Maria said.
Petra straightened in the doorway. Her hand went to the radio that wasn't on her belt anymore.
"Fenno," River said. "Western perimeter. Now. And don't tell anyone else what you just told us."
Fenno nodded. He left.
River looked at Maria.
Maria looked at the map. At the compound drawn in her own hand, the buildings, the pathways, the hundred and eighty people she'd been responsible for.
One of them was signaling the enemy.
"We have two problems now," River said.
Maria didn't answer. She was staring at the eastern ridge on her map, her pen motionless in her hand, her mouth a straight line.
The lamp in her room flickered once, the wick catching an air current from the open door where Fenno had just walked out.
Neither of them moved to close it.
