12. First Seal #2
The Knight’s Brand pulsed warm, not feeding me strength but sharpening my focus in ways I didn’t fully understand yet.
This wasn’t the full power of the card. I could feel that much.
The Knight stirred but didn’t truly wake.
What I was experiencing was the edge of something larger, a taste of what the Brand might offer when it finally opened its eyes all the way.
For now, it responded to combat, to motion, to the need for violence.
It didn’t grant new reserves, but it made the reserves I had count for more.
Footsteps crunched across frost behind me.
“Early morning for practice.” Rulfen’s voice came before his shape did, his cane tapping against stone as he crossed the yard. His scarred face showed no surprise at finding me here before dawn. “Or couldn’t sleep?”
“Both.”
He studied my stance, the way I held the spear, the placement of my feet on frozen ground. His good eye narrowed as he catalogued the changes that a single night shouldn’t have produced .
“Show me yesterday’s sequence. The cavalry defense.”
I went through the pattern. The movements came faster and cleaner than before, each form building into the next without conscious thought.
The spear responded to my intent the way it used to respond in another life, when I had the reach and mass to make it sing.
When I finished, silence stretched between us for a long moment.
“Interesting.”
Rulfen circled me slowly, his cane tapping rhythm against frozen stone. His good eye took in everything, the altered stance width, the adjusted grip on the shaft, the footwork that had tightened overnight from adequate to precise.
“Your form’s changed overnight. The movements are sharper.” He stopped and faced me directly. “You look as if you’ve been fighting for years instead of months.”
The Knight’s Brand pulsed warm between my shoulder blades, responding to Rulfen’s scrutiny with increased heat. I kept my face neutral.
“Growth spurts happen,” I said.
“This isn’t natural progression.” His scarred face gave nothing away, but his voice carried the weight of someone who’d watched hundreds of boys train and knew the difference between talent and something else entirely.
“I’ve trained hundreds of boys. I’ve watched them develop over years, not overnight. ”
My grip tightened on the spear shaft. “Are you going to report it?”
“Report what? That Lord Henrik’s bastard shows promise?” His mouth twitched upward at one corner. “The boy’s finally living up to his mother’s blood. About time. ”
The tension in my shoulders eased slightly, but his gaze stayed sharp. He’d given me a story to hide behind, and we both knew it was a lie.
“Whatever’s happening to you, keep it quiet.” He glanced across the empty yard, checking for ears that shouldn’t be listening. “The wrong people notice sudden improvements, and they start asking dangerous questions.”
“What kind of questions?”
“The kind that end with bodies in the river.”
He paused, scanning the yard one more time before continuing.
“Whatever’s waking in you, it needs direction. Needs purpose. Without that, it’ll tear you apart reaching for everything at once.”
“The next test is coming,” he said after a moment. “Day of First Wetting. Your team will be strong enough for what they send you against.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“The monsters won’t be your true concern.
” His scarred face hardened, the old wounds pulling tight across cheekbone and jaw.
“Other teams pose the real threat. Ambitious instructors look to cull promising bastards before they become problems. Accidents happen in the deep woods, and nobody files reports about dead children who weren’t supposed to matter. ”
“How long do I have?”
“Two months. Maybe if winter runs long, a bit more.” He turned toward the main house, where legitimate children still slept warm in proper beds behind proper walls. “Train hard. Trust those you bunk with. Don’t trust anyone else.”
“Why are you helping me? ”
The question stopped him mid-step. His cane hovered above frozen stone while something moved behind his weathered features, a calculation he’d been running for a while that had finally produced a result he was willing to share.
“Because you’re going to kill people.” His voice carried no judgment, only certainty. “Real people. Important people. And when you do, you won’t do it for sport or cruelty.”
He turned back toward me, his good eye reflecting what little starlight penetrated the overcast sky.
“This family breeds killers, boy. Always has. The different kinds matter, though.” He adjusted his grip on the cane. “One son kills because he enjoys the power. Another kills to prove his worth. One daughter kills to protect what’s hers.”
“And me?”
“You’ll kill because it needs doing.” He studied my face with the intensity of someone reading a field report and deciding whether to commit troops. “I saw it in how you handled Kasimir. No anger, no satisfaction. Only the willingness to go as far as the situation required and not a step further.”
He looked toward the eastern horizon, where gray light was spreading slow and cold across the estate.
“The realm’s heading toward something dark. When it arrives, we’ll need people who can do what’s necessary without losing themselves to it.” His mouth twitched downward. “Being a bastard is forgivable. We already have enough monsters wearing noble colors.”
◇ ◆ ◇
That night, I lay awake and took stock of what had changed .
The first seal had cracked. It was the crack in the gate rather than the gate thrown open, the beginning of an awakening that might take years to complete.
The other two Brands still slept, though I could feel them shifting in the dark places where Hel had planted them.
The Emperor twitched when I gave orders, when I organized the team, when other children looked to me for decisions.
The Magician stirred when I absorbed lessons, when I puzzled through Cromwell’s etiquette exercises, when I sat in the library and read books meant for children twice my age.
Neither was close to waking. But they were listening.
Two months until the Day of First Wetting.
Two months until teams of bastard children were sent into the deep woods to hunt or be hunted by whatever the estate’s handlers released from the menagerie pens.
Two months until ambitious instructors got their chance to arrange convenient accidents for children who’d shown too much promise too soon.
Rulfen was right. The monsters would be the least of our problems.
I turned onto my side and stared at the wall, where frost was creeping across the stone in patterns that looked almost deliberate.
The Knight’s Brand burned steady between my shoulder blades, a warmth that I was learning to carry the way I once carried the weight of a command sash and the lives that came with it.
Years of preparation had brought me to this point.
Everything I’d built in this new life, the alliances, the training, the team that fought beside me in the dark, would be tested in the proving grounds.
If we survived, we’d advance to the Stone Yard and the real training would begin.
If we didn’t, we’d join the empty beds and the official explanations that nobody believed .
Sleep took me eventually, and this time no gods came calling in my dreams.
◇ ◆ ◇
「Hel’s Ledger」
Vessel: Danarre de Blaise | Year 824 | Age 9
House de Blaise | Status: Bastard (Unacknowledged)
Location: de Blaise Estate, Junior Trainee Barracks
「Knight of Swords」 — Stirring
「Emperor」 — Sleeping
「Magician」 — Sleeping
Active Charge: Find the one who broke Hel’s claim.
The first seal cracks and the vessel moves like a man who remembers being one. Hel pressed her thumb to the glass and watched the faltering fracture spreads.