A crack like bone splintering ripped through the dark.

  I jerked awake with a gasp, my eye flying open. Pale morning light spilled across the ceiling. I was back in my room. Safe. Awake. My shirt clung to me, soaked through, my skin slick with sweat as if I had been sprinting. My chest hitched, breath coming too fast, too shallow, my heart still trying to outrun something that was no longer there.

  For a moment, I couldn’t move.

  The smell of stone and blood lingered in my nose. My fingers twitched, half expecting claws instead of hands.

  Slowly, I turned my head.

  The sword rested beside me.

  I stared at it, my pulse gradually slowing.

  I had no sense of how long the memory had lasted. Hours, maybe. Or days. In that place, time had not behaved normally. There had been no dawn, no dusk, only hunger and the chain and the pale man. Whether that stretch of darkness belonged to the creature’s past or had spilled into my present, I could not tell. All I knew was that it had felt endless.

  The sound of bone snapping had stayed with me. It wasn’t just a sound, but a feeling. Whatever the sound was did not belong to the creature nor the man. It was something else.

  I wanted to press for answers but, the sword didn’t hum nor did it stir. It offered no reassurance, no explanation.

  I swallowed and tried to speak, not aloud, but inward. The way I always did. The words tangled before they could form. Whatever door had opened for that memory had closed again.

  At least one answer had surfaced from the dark.

  Whatever Doyle meant when he spoke about soul blades, this weapon fit the shape of it. Not forged empty. Not enchanted from nothing. Something had lived. Something had hungered. And what remained of it now lay bound in steel, its instincts and scars pressed into the blade as surely as any rune.

  The thought sat heavy in my chest.

  I rested my hand near the hilt, not touching it, just close enough to feel its presence. Pity crept in before I could stop it. Not the clean kind. The uncomfortable sort that came from imagining confinement without end, awareness without freedom.

  I wondered what choices had led to that chain.

  I wondered who had decided the creature belonged in a sword.

  The blade remained silent.

  So, did I.

  I glanced out the window.

  Night had slipped away, leaving the world washed in thin blue light. The hills beyond the glass were little more than shapes, softened by fog that clung low to the ground. It was quiet, the kind of quiet that made you listen.

  I stood there breathing slowly, my thoughts drifting to what lay beyond. Trolls, maybe, waiting for someone careless enough to wander too close. Doyle’s words echoed in my mind, a reminder that the beauty outside the window hid teeth just as sharp as the dark.

  It was peaceful to look at.

  It was not safe.

  I pushed myself up from the bed, leaving the blade where it lay.

  The thought had been nagging at me for a while now. The disguise rune. How far did its reach extend?

  I took one step away.

  A familiar ache stirred under my skin, deep and sudden, like something waking up that should have stayed asleep. I glanced down at my hands, flexing my fingers as the sensation crept over my skin. But the disguise held.

  Another step.

  The pain sharpened, then steadied, as if testing me.

  I took two more.

  The pull toward the sword thinned, stretching like a thread drawn too tight. The air around me felt wrong, lighter somehow. When I took a fifth step, the change came all at once. The borrowed shape of my face slipped away, bleeding out of me like heat leaving cooling metal.

  I exhaled slowly.

  Five paces.

  I turned back toward the window, my reflection faint in the glass. For a heartbeat, I barely recognised myself. My real face stared back. Tired. Marked.

  “Wait,” I breathed.

  I leaned closer.

  The scars were still there, but not as they had been. They no longer crowded every inch of my skin. Dark strands of hair fell across my face, and I brushed them aside with trembling fingers. The marks beneath were thinner. Pulled back. As if something had eased its grip.

  My breath caught.

  As I stared, the scars shifted. Just slightly. A ripple beneath the skin. A subtle tightening that made my stomach twist.

  Was it the light?

  I lifted a hand and pressed my fingers to my cheek, ignoring the spike of pain. The flesh felt wrong beneath my touch, tense and restless.

  I turned and crossed the room, closing the distance to the bed. The moment my fingers wrapped around the hilt, the sensation stilled. When I returned to the window and looked again, the scars lay quiet. No twitching. No movement.

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  My pulse thudded in my ears.

  The relief that settled over me was unmistakable. Not healing. Not safety. Something closer to being soothed. Like a pressure that had learned where to rest.

  A cold realisation crept in alongside it.

  I was beginning to rely on the blade.

  Not just for power. Not just for protection. But for peace. Five steps away was all it took for the world to start biting again. Five steps to remind me what I was without it.

  Bonded, the sword had said.

  I swallowed, fingers tightening around the hilt as I stared at my reflection, tethered by an invisible distance I could now measure.

  A low rumble drifted up through the floorboards.

  I paused, listening. The sound was steady and familiar. Stone shifting. Iron being moved. Doyle, most likely.

  I slid the sword into its scabbard and settled the silent blade against my hip. It felt heavier than it had yesterday. I eased open my door and made my way downstairs, careful with each step.

  The cottage was already awake, even if the sky outside was not. Pale light seeped through the lower windows, catching dust motes in the air. I could hear Doyle moving about below, not loud, but constant. The rhythm of someone who had been at work for a while.

  Our guests were arriving today.

  The thought sat oddly with me. I didn’t know who they were or what they wanted. I could not decide whether that made me curious or uneasy.

  At least there would be more training.

  The thought sparked something close to excitement. Brent’s sessions hurt in ways I was still feeling, but there was a strange satisfaction in them too. Pain with direction. Failure that taught you something if you survived it.

  Doyle stood at one of the long tables, sleeves rolled up, moving through a stack of supply sacks with brisk efficiency. He looked completely at home. Flour dusted his hands and forearms. Crates had been shifted. Shelves reorganised. The kitchen smelled faintly of grain and oil.

  “Have you even slept?” I asked.

  He glanced up, eyes bright, and grinned. There was no sign of fatigue in him at all.

  “Enough,” he said lightly.

  He picked up a quill, scratched a quick label onto a tag, and tied it neatly to the mouth of a sack before moving on to the next. “We’ve got a delivery coming sometime this morning. Supplies for the guests.” He paused just long enough to glance at me. “But you three will not be here to help, I’m afraid.”

  I frowned. “Why not? Not that we mind, but…”

  “Well,” he said, already turning back to his work, “you have other plans.”

  That got my attention.

  He reached for another sack, weighed it in his hands, then slid it into place. “Brent has been tasked with clearing the road.” He paused, just long enough to matter. “And he is bringing the three of you with him.”

  The words did not settle at once. “What?”

  The farm flashed in my mind. The smaller troll, its weight, the way the ground had shaken when it moved. Then the forest. Larger shapes. Armoured hides. Too many of them. “One troll nearly killed us. What help could we possibly be?”

  “I doubt you will be fighting trolls,” Doyle said, still working. The quill scratched steadily as he labelled a sack of flour. “Jerald’s men are handling that.”

  I frowned. They had been hunting trolls all week, with only a few victories.

  Doyle capped the quill and set it aside. He adjusted the shelves with precise movements, straightening everything until the room felt measured. Ordered. “This is on Jerald’s orders,” he said. “And I suspect it has less to do with the monsters than it does with the road. I believe you four will be acting as an escort.”

  I stopped breathing for a moment. “Escort…”

  He nodded once. “You will be showing our guests the way.”

  Something shifted in my chest. Not relief. Not fear. Excitement?

  “I see,” I said.

  Doyle finally turned to face me, his expression unreadable but focused. “Which means you will want to be ready.”

  I met his gaze. “And who exactly are these guests?”

  “You’ve heard about the changes to the trials.”

  I nodded.

  “They are no longer limited to our kingdom,” he went on. “Other powers are sending their own candidates.” He hesitated just long enough for the word to matter. “Including the druids.”

  I stiffened.

  Doyle set the sack down and rested both hands on the table. “Trond Cottage has served as neutral ground for a long time,” he said. “Longer than most people remember. It was built to house those who could not safely stay elsewhere.”

  The pieces began to line up. Jerald pushing himself to exhaustion. The patrols. The careful clearing of the surrounding land. Doyle’s quiet war on dust and disorder. None of it had been about comfort.

  It had been about safety.

  “Ambassadors,” I said slowly.

  “And others like them,” Doyle replied.

  I exhaled, some of the tension I hadn’t realised I was carrying finally loosening its grip.

  “So, these visitors,” I said, choosing my words carefully. “They are not just travellers.”

  “Technically,” Doyle said, picking up his quill again, “they are aspirants.”

  I frowned. “Druid aspirants?”

  He nodded once. I turned that over in my head.

  “But these children… the reason they are staying here rather than the city… they matter,” Doyle said. “Even among their own people. Which means we need to be accommodating.”

  I let out a slow breath. “Alright,” I said. “I can behave.”

  Then another thought crept in. “What about Rob?”

  Doyle’s mouth twitched, just slightly. “I have already accounted for that.”

  My brow lifted.

  “I gave Amelia very clear instructions to keep him under control,” he said. “Very clear.”

  I snorted softly. “Let’s hope she can.”

  Doyle resumed his work, the faintest hint of amusement following the scratch of his quill.

  Doyle laughed softly. “You would be surprised what she can get him to do.”

  I nodded. The two of them had a rhythm I didn’t fully understand. Rob blustered and joked his way through most situations, but when Amelia spoke, he listened. He might not realise it yet, but she had a way of steering all of us without ever raising her voice.

  Doyle set a plate in front of me before the others stirred. He made sure I ate, then went straight back to work. By the time Rob and Amelia drifted downstairs, the cottage had already shifted from quiet morning to motion.

  We ate quickly and readied ourselves.

  Doyle covered the essentials while Amelia packed with careful efficiency, turning food and supplies into a bundle that looked lighter than it should have been. Rob and I checked our gear, straps tightened from habit. The sword settled at my side without a sound, familiar in a way that still unsettled me. My rune pocket rested at my hip.

  We stepped outside to wait.

  The air was cool and clean, fog thinning as the light grew stronger. Somewhere down the path, hooves struck stone.

  The smell reached us first. Leather. Sweat. Horse.

  A moment later, Brent rounded the bend, seated easily atop a large black horse. Three ponies followed behind, hitched in a short line, ears flicking as they took in their surroundings.

  My chest tightened. Fear and excitement tangled together.

  “I’ve never…” I started.

  Rob glanced at me, eyebrows lifting. “Really? I practically grew up on one of these.”

  Amelia stood very still beside me, her expression guarded. She did not share Rob’s enthusiasm, though there was curiosity there beneath the caution.

  “Oh, come on mate,” Rob said brightly. “You’ll be fine.”

  He moved to the largest pony at once, voice softening as he reached out. “Look at you,” he murmured, rubbing its neck with easy confidence. “Aren’t you a beauty.”

  The animal shifted its weight and snorted, accepting the attention without complaint as Rob unhitched the reins.

  I watched, impressed despite myself. “I didn’t take him for a country boy.”

  Amelia smiled faintly. “He doesn’t like to talk about home. But I knew he came from a farm.”

  “That explains it,” I said, still watching Rob move with practiced ease.

  Brent swung down from his horse and walked us through the basics. How to check the tack. How to settle the saddle. What not to do unless we wanted to end up on the ground. I fumbled my way up after a few attempts, hands clumsy on the reins, heart hammering as the pony shifted beneath me.

  Amelia fared worse. She wobbled, jaw tight, fingers white where they gripped the saddle horn.

  Rob, by contrast, looked like he belonged there. Relaxed. Balanced. Grinning.

  Brent watched us with quiet amusement. “Alright, let’s go. We have a fair way to travel, so let’s not waste the daylight.”