Wren stops at the first oak wide enough to give her back a solid wall — three steps off the path, where the roots make a dry shelf above the mud. She tells herself it will take a moment. She tells herself a moment is not the same as time she does not have. The sun-sigil is worn almost smooth on the breastplate — she has to tilt the armour toward the thin light sifting through the branches to see it properly. A circle divided into eight spokes, each ending in a small forked line. She knows this shape. She has seen it somewhere that is not a dead man's armour. She opens the box a sliver, just enough. The Ember's light spills across the etched lid — and the sun clasp is not almost-matching the sigil. It is the same mark. Exactly the same. The armour and the box were made for each other, or made by the same hand, or made to find each other eventually. Something shifts in the canopy above. Not wind. Wren closes the box and tells herself to think about what that means while she walks — fast — back toward the road.