You pocket the pouch and vial, feeling the weight of your last three silver coins disappear. Elara watches from the doorway, her breath steadying but her eyes still haunted. Margot turns away without another word, already grinding something in a mortar, and you step back into the mist-thickened street. The rain has nearly stopped, leaving the cobblestones gleaming like dark mirrors under the gray sky. A faint wind carries the smell of wet wood and distant smoke, and the northern gate looms at the end of the lane, its iron hinges rusted and groaning.

Elara presses a hand to her bruised jaw and points toward a crumbling stone tower just visible beyond the gate. 'The watchtower's outer door is unbarred,' she says, her voice low and urgent. 'But the coven keeps a guard in the yard—a man with a sword and a dog that sniffs out lies.' She looks at you, her hope a fragile thing. 'We could try the old smuggler's tunnel that runs beneath the cooper's yard. It comes up in the tower's cellar, but it's dark and narrow, and the bones of the old town are restless down there.'