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“BEGIN!"

The bark rang out across the ring, the line of novices and squires alike watching with intent as the mailed hand of the Master-of-Arms cut the air like a blade, the two men poised at either end of the sandy circle gripped weapons and slowly advanced.

The air smelled of steel and sweat, sun streamed through in glorious shafts that bathed the courtyard in a blooming glow of warm spring light, the shift and murmur of men interspersed with the clatter of steel. They were assembled in various states of dress; squires in simple doublets and hose, men-at-arms in jerkins and gauntlets, and full-fledged Order members in glimmering steel and blazing bright white and black surcoats.

They were here to watch. To judge.

The men on the sands were arrayed in like fashion — unimpressive, functional armor and closed helms covered them, each brutally pragmatic in design. Bart gripped the haft of his axe, his heavy mitten gauntlets more like small bucklers than anything else, his opponent, a lean man of greater years by the name of Bowen, tightened his hands around the hilt of a longsword. Their eyes met through the slats of their visors as they circled, closing the distance slowly.

Bowen struck first, his sword held at a high forward guard as he stepped in hard and thrust hard at Bart's face - the bigger man twisted at the trunk, slapping the blade aside with the thick oak haft of his axe, the sword ringing like a gong in the tense, otherwise silent air as he continued the motion to raise a high guard to Bowen's return stroke — the leaner man redirecting the parry with a deft roll of his shoulders that swung the blade down at an angle towards Bart's neck. The blade rang against wood once more, Bart pushing forward as it did, shoving it aside and bulling his way forward with the momentum gained - driving his shoulder into the smaller fighter, shoving him back off balance, and forcing his sword-arm away from Bowen's core — creating a gap. At once, the big man raised his axe to a crisp vertical ready position and dropped it with aplomb, the bearded axe's blade whistling as it cut the air.

Bowen's years ahead of seasoning assured everyone he was no slouch in a fight, and true to form he recovered with a neat bit of footwork - shifting his weak side back in a step so fluid it was almost invisible and slamming his sword form into a variant of high port arms, catching the axe just beneath the blade and swatting its path aside with an elegant half-moon sweep, leaving the two men once again squared off. They stood at the ready, studying each other.

They clashed again, swings and swipes coming hard and fast, Bart was taller, stronger and every hit clearly rang Bowen's smaller frame, his armor's plates clattering with brassy reports, Bowen was far more seasoned than his larger, younger opponent however, and gave ground to reposition with his own strikes, each so quick and crisp in their execution that Bart was forced to put all of his effort into defense when Bowen pressed the attack. Back and forth they went: swing, parry, riposte. It was almost a textbook match-up of large versus small, where Bart lacked in speed he more than made up for in unyielding brute strength, able to dead stop Bowen's strikes and reverse them — and much the same Bowen's fluid grace kept him coming at the larger man from surprisingly high and low angles, forcing him to improvise and mind his footwork. Each clash was met with murmurs, but no yells, no hooting or shouting from the crowd, they were watching with cold, clinical detachment.

Finally, it seemed to be more than the bigger warrior could handle. Bowen's assault grew faster - more fluid - as the veteran swordsman worked out Bart's weaknesses and began to hammer him with flurries of cuts, thrusts, and decisive blows - which Bart only seemed capable of barely warding off. Bart seemed beaten back, until with a grunt of effort, the bigger man pushed in with a horizontal cut, which Bowen almost casually raised his sword to guard — but it was a ruse.

Bart's aim was not at his body, but his limb, and rather than cut — he hooked the beard of the axe blade over the man's sword arm, and he pulled with great violence. Bowen's eyes flashed wide, white all around behind his visor as Bart heaved him forward, stumbling at the shift of weight - directly into a clenched, steel-plated fist.

Bart's right straight smashed into Bowen's visor like a catapult stone. He felt the shock of the hit rock up his arm into his shoulder, lighting up in barely-felt pain in each joint as he drove his fist into the older man's armored face like he was trying to drive him into the earth. It was a spectacular hit that drew a few gasps from several members of the crowd, Bowen wavered and seemed as if he would crumple, clearly dazed by the blow, and the bigger man drew his axe back, sweeping it at a wide angle to drive it down at the dazed man's head.

Yet, Bowen was not made of paper. He dropped down, dipping his head under the swing with such last-minute timing that sparks flew from where the axe dragged a gouge across his helmet's peak, he swung his own fist, a southpaw uppercut that seemed to come screaming out of nowhere with so much speed that it was a literal blur.

A blur that connected with Bart's chin up under the visor of his sallet, smashing into his bevor like a precision thrust from a fencing master, his teeth rattled in his head and his eyes crossed as he lost his balance, up became down and down became up, and he staggered, ears ringing as he lost his footing, and fell to one knee.

“Yield." came the hoarse demand, and a gleam of light caught the dazed warrior's attention. It was very close, he blinked away tears as he cleared his concussed head...

The tip of a blade was mere finger-breadths from his eye, pushed through the slat of his visor. Wisely, he raised his free hand in surrender, letting his axe drop to the floor in a clatter.

“I yield, I am bested." the young, deep voice stated somewhat bitterly, and there was a light chuckle as the blade slid back from his eye, and the smaller man dipped his point down, raising his visor to reveal a clearly broken nose and two gruesomely darkening black eyes.

“I wouldn't say bested, a second faster and I'd be the one kneeling in defeat," he said, reaching forward to grasp the larger man's arm, hauling him to his feet. Bart raised his visor in return, his tongue swirling around his mouth, checking for loose teeth, causally spitting out a rivulet of blood from his split lip, a bruise angrily turning purple from chin to cheek.

“I still lost," he said ruefully, his voice a low thing as he scooped his axe back up, both of them turning to the three center-most armored men, the Master-of-Arms staring down at them imperiously as they both sank to one knee, heads bowed reverently. Bowen shot him a little wink as the Master-of-Arms raised his voice.

“This Trial of Steel is ended." he boomed, an older man, jaw wide as a mountainside, made wider still by his fierce gray beard and shorn scalp, covered in an array of pale, faded scars. Master-of-Arms Bennett. His stern gray eyes were hard, but kind as he looked down at them, the knowledge of years weighing and measuring him in an instant. Bart had seen much of those eyes in the past two decades of his Novitiate. He found comfort in their sternness.

“Novice Bartholomus, you have been bested on the field of combat." he continued, looking hard at the bulky young man; “However, you displayed uncommon valor and ferocity belying your experience and years." he continued... and a slow smile crept over his grim face.

“Yet - you were never supposed to win," he said, Bart blinked and Bowen grinned, turning to him slightly and shifting his armor to display an amulet beneath his neckline. A single spiraling Horn, straight as an arrow — same as the one crowning the patron of their order — surrounded by a circle of geometric thorns. Bart's eyes went wide, a Knight of the Thorn. Bowen was only briefly known to him, Bart spent much of his time among his fellow novices — Knights of the Thorn were the preeminent sword masters of the Order, each of them seasoned warriors with a decade or more of warfare under their belts — and on top of that fully-anointed Paladins, each with the full might of the Lady behind them. Bowen winked again.

“I may have gone a bit too easy on you," he said, grinning and wincing as the expression caused his broken nose to twinge. Humbled by the truth of the man's position, Bart was in agreement. The Master-of-Arms continued.

“The truth of the Trial of Steel is not to test the mettle of your blade." Master Bennett said, stepping forward, placing his hand on the young man's shoulder; “But your resolve. We face you with an unwinnable battle, an insurmountable opponent, and we judge how well you fail." he stated bluntly, Bart's eyes fell, downcast... failure was all too familiar for the brawny novice. He had failed to take well to the sword nor shield and had struggled to maintain the trim physique he'd needed, he'd slimmed down greatly from the husky, doughy lad that'd been given to the order as a squire... but it never got easier.

“Was it my weapon again, Master Bennett?" Bart asked with an honesty in his tone that belied his concerns. Bennett chuckled, armor rattling with it.

“No, lad. Not everyone is built to be a swordsman like Ser Bowen here. He is a rare breed born with a blade in his crib and the taste of steel on his tongue." Bennett assured him.

“I remember it being more that of mother's milk..." Ser Bowen said under his breath, getting a sidelong look from the Master-of-Arms.

“Nevertheless," Master Bennett continued, drawing himself up properly “Failure is hard to accept, harder still to learn from. Many of us who fail, do so fatally. So we teach that. We teach loss, we teach failure. Because one must experience it to learn from it. Weak is the warrior with numerous victories and no losses, for his strength is sharp, straight but brittle like glass."

Bart's head lowered still, his father would be so disappointed, He'd felt the desperation in his moves before, he'd fought his hardest but towards the end it was all... reflex, he'd abandoned the form and tactics of battle for fluid solutions — and it'd lost him the duel yet the Master's hand raised up and cupped his cheek, he looked up reflexively, and met the old man's kind eyes.

“Rise, Novice Bartholomus." The master-of-arms said, offering his other hand.

“Rise and greet me as a brother."

It was then the cheers finally sounded. Clashing of fists against breastplates, squires hooting, and Bowen's grin practically split his face in half, broken nose be damned. Bart took the hand, and the Master-of-Arms hoisted him effortlessly to his feet.

“You weathered failure with the stoicism of a fortress, we Masters-of-Arms have watched you for some time now, Brother Bartholomus. We've seen your tenacity, your flaws holding you back, and yet you persevered time and again at great cost to your pride." he grasped his hand fondly.

“You are humble, and you are steadfast. Over-matched and out-maneuvered and you still struck like a thunderbolt," he said, grinning at Bowen, who had also risen. “I daresay the Ser here hasn't had his bells rung like that in some time."

“Not since the Grey Plagues and their Purges, Milord," he stated blandly, sniffing with a wince. “The boy has the strength of an oxen, and a jaw about as hard," he said, idly shaking his hand out to the laughter of the surrounding men. Bart felt his back straighten a bit with pride.

“With this, we admit you to our order. No longer are you Novice Bartholomus, instead you attain now the title of Ser Bartholomus, Knight-Brother of the Radiant Order," he said, drawing his own sword, raising it in a salute, then touching it twice to either side of the youth's head.

“May you serve our Lady in White with honor, humility, and a humble heart."

Bart bowed his head and murmured his thanks, his face flushed around the bruising, overwhelmed with pride and gratitude. Tears glimmered in his eyes, but he raised his chin again and smiled through his open visor.

“I will my lord. Until the Pale Dawn calls me," he replied in the ritual response. It was then... he felt something inside of him... click. As if something long loose had welded firmly together, a warmth suffused him for a moment, and he blinked it away in mild bemusement.

“Well, no sense in leaving two men bleeding on the carpet, Hospitaller Davis, if you would?" The Master-of-Arms asked, stepping aside for a narrow, blade-like man to his side, wearing a surcoat of darkest black emblazoned with whiter edging and a spiraling geometric horn device vertical across its breast — topped by the Lidless Eye of the White God. His severe Darrowmite features were clinical but his face was kind, offset by the traditional tonsure of the Hospitaller: his hair shaved close on both sides and left long on top, like a Unicorn's mane. He raised a hand and there was a brief glow as he touched the two warriors in turn — a thin golden outline of radiance that limned his hands, and flowed up each of them to sink into their flesh like sunlight, that warmth again as the positive energies flooded Bart's body, soothing the pain and the swelling in his jaw abating rapidly, he glanced to his left and saw the same treatment done to Bowen, and watched the bruises drain away from his smashed face like water from a sieve, leaving him completely intact. The Radiant Order were indeed paladins, sworn to The White God and his servant, The Lady in White — the Unicorn of Love, one of the three Holy Beasts who strode the land, Godhome's might made flesh. The Radiant Order served her directly, their oath: was to preserve life and rout the unclean and rotting from the land, and in return, she granted them the power to heal and cleanse the weak, wounded, and sick.

“There." he said, his voice soft as he drew himself up straight, the Hospitaller bearing statuesque as he inspected them both; “Good as new, though I can't do much for that nose of yours, Brother Bartholomus." he said, looking critically at the young man's mostly hidden face.

“It's fine Milord, I'm used to it," he said, the newly-christened Knight-Brother's only visible defining feature was his hooked, crooked nose — broken at an early age, and never properly healed. There was a story behind it, one he was proud of — but that was for another time.

“My thanks, Brother Davis. Your healing always feels so much warmer and more vibrant than mine own." Bowen said with exaggerated mirth, the healer rolling his eyes mildly as he hooked his thumbs back into his swordbelt.

“You would do well to spend more time meditating on the blessings of our Lady in White, rather than chasing maidens and tankards, and then it might deign to warm you as mine does," Davis said with an equally exaggerated sniff of imperious disdain — Bart paused for a moment before he saw Bowen's wicked grin, and the gleam in Davis' eyes, realization dawned on the new Knight and he averted his eyes for a moment.

“Maidens? Hardly, more like their mothers." Bowen said, laughing. As he unbuckled his helmet, pulling it free from his head, he had dirty blonde hair and a thin mustache and strip of beard along his chin that gave him a decidedly rakish look, around them the assembled novices and squires were milling about as they received orders from the instructors, and others went about their prescribed tasks for the hour, the five observers exchanged a few nods and excused themselves as the Master-of-Arms cleared his throat.

“Brother Bartholomus, now that you have taken the oath in its finality, there's some small ceremony as you know, but today you must make an effort to be ready for your pilgrimage," he said, clapping the man on the shoulder, Bart brightened at this.

“To meet the lady? To get my powers?" he asked excitedly, his bevor-covered face almost childish in its glee, the Master-of-Arms laughed softly from his belly, grinning at the young soldier.

“Eager, are we? I'm sure you've all heard stories of her now," he said, looking around as they were left mostly alone by the other novices and instructors, behind them drills starting with staves among the squires.

“Aye, no fairer lady have I ever laid eyes upon." Bowen said, laying his hand on his chest dramatically; “Her gaze was like liquid fire to my soul, a luminous glow that bore me away to Godhome on wings of bliss and jo-OW!" he said as the Hospitaller casually reached over and pulled on his mustache. Hard.

“That's enough of that, don't fill Brother Bartholomus' head with your frippery. The Lady in White is a creature of pure holy power, and she should be respected," he said, his eyes clearly warm with his own memories of the meeting.

“Frippery he says, the man who fell asleep during his meeting with her." Bowen groused, rubbing at his upper lip and throwing a rude gesture at his friend, who glared at him.

“I did not 'fall asleep', the Lady bid me to rest so she could impart upon me the healer's touch, were you not just praising my 'warmth' a moment ago?" he said, drawing a chuckle from the master-of-arms, who looked back to Bart with a raised eyebrow.

“Lad, we are not at arms, pray; remove your helmet before you sweat the color out of your hair," he said with a quirk of his lips, shifting his formal armor with a pull at his gorget, the older man clearly a bit uncomfortable in the heavy steel plate. Bart blinked and scrabbled clumsily at his helm and bevor before the realization that he was still wearing his gauntlets sank in, Bowen smirked as he pulled them off, and then unhooked the helmet from his head, pulling it off with a puff of exhaled breath.

His broad build extended to his features, the young knight's jaw wide and his chin firm, beset with a deep cleft in a way that seemed to somehow exacerbate the youth of his face. His signature crooked nose was angular and broad at the tip beside the break both that and his deep-set eyes a gift from his mother's coastal heritage. His hair was similarly a gift of that sunny land along with his tanned skin: curly, black, and cropped close to his skull — though currently lathered in sweat. Clean shaven save for a thick mustache perched under his crooked nose, its ends curling up ever so slightly, much like the rest of his hair, and making the thick planes of his lips and cheeks stand out.

“Ah, a fine mustache," Bowen said, twirling his own thin, waxed topiary gaily with a grin, Bart smiling a bit and smoothing it with a finger, dumping his gauntlets in his helmet.

“A proper knight always had a good mustache in the stories, didn't they?" he said, looking between the seasoned warriors, feeling the weight of their years in their gazes, all three grinned and laughed, it was true enough all of them save Davis' clean shaven face bore similar grooming.

“Aye lad, you wear it well. It'll look good with your formal armor, rather than this drab training raiment." the Master-of-Arms agreed, rapping his dented, unadorned breastplate with a knuckle, Bart nodded, standing up a bit more straight as Davis and Bowen fell into another conversation about something called a 'keg stand' and how Davis found the entire thing deplorable, the Master-of-Arms pulled him away, walking towards the novice barracks with him.

“We'll set about fitting you for your armor, in the meantime, go collect your things and meet the steward by the barracks door, he'll set you about settling into your private chambers. Good work, Ser Bartholomus." he said, clapping his back again with the emphasis on the new title, he felt butterflies flutter through his guts as he nodded, clapping his fist over his heart in salute to the man, who nodded and turned to some other novices, clearly waiting on their instruction, barking orders of attention as Bart gathered his practice axe and returned it to the racks, stepping lightly along towards the barracks.

It took everything he had not to skip.

~ ~ ~

“YOU DID IT!"

The cheer that went up when he arrived at the novice barracks was expected, but still startling, all the other novices cheered and stomped feet in a salute to their brother in arms, Bart lowered his head with a rueful smile as he was mobbed by the other boys, ruffling his hair, clapping his back and clasping hands with him.

“Big Bart's gonna be a proper paladin! I knew you'd make it."

“Horse-shit, you bet me a gold crown he'd get his clock cleaned."

“Shut it."

Bart shook his head as he pushed past the bantering novices to his bunk towards the center of the room, the crowd following him and offering congratulations and praise, as was proper every time one of them was initiated into the knights proper. He felt the camaraderie, it filled his heart with courage and resolve even as the salutations dissolved into banter, the room busy with novices dressed, relaxing, and moving about, the warm straw scent of their mattresses and the sun streamed through the far window in the wall, his heart felt about to burst as the memories of this place rushed over him, he sucked in a breath; what more may come in his new beginnings?

“Over here, Bart. I'll help you with your armor." the voice was soft, almost feminine, and his eyes tracked to the thin man by his bunk, he was pale, albino actually. White skin, white hair, pink eyes. Lucian was his name, He'd joined the Order with Bart as a pair, both of them already fast friends from their own rocky childhoods. Sickly as a youth; Lucian had been healed and brought back to strength by an Order Hospitaller, and pledged that he'd be one himself someday — a desire he shared with Bart.

“Thanks, Lu, I guess I'm gonna have to get a squire now," he said, shifting around so the lithe young novice could reach the buckles on his pauldrons. He and Lucian had done this many a time, thick as thieves.

“That you will, they'll probably assign you, someone, after your pilgrimage," Lucian said, unhitching both of the sleek metal plates from his shoulders as he worked on his vambrace and couter on his left arm, looking up quizzically.

“After you say? I figured before since I have to set out with my full gear," he said, he knew the traditions well enough, but Lucian was always the better student of ritual, and the albino boy shook his head.

“No. The Pilgrimage must always be done alone, the journey is part of it but the first of our order did it this way," he said, turning him to unbuckle his cuirass as Bart pulled one sleeve of his armor off, going to work on the other, he recognized Lucian's story voice and opened his ears.

“History says the founder of our order, The First Paladin, fell into her grove in the twilight of a battle he'd lost against the Empty Queen's forces, wounded and pursued by harriers from the enemy army, he fell to his knees bleeding out in the woods, praying to God to grant him strength for one more battle," he said, turning him again to lift the heavy breastplate away, Bart taking a breath as the weight left his chest.

“It's said she came to him then, just a whisper of power. She staunched his wounds and lifted him with her love and strength, he met his attackers on his feet, blade in hand, and slew them to a man, the Lady's power giving his arms might," he said, frowning a bit as he fiddled with a stubborn lace on the larger youth's remaining rerebrace. Bart raised his eyebrows:

“Is not our Lady herself mighty?" he asked conversationally, helping the other man, finally freeing both of his arms and sitting down on the bed next to Lucian, working on his greaves. The pale man nodded. Both men enjoyed discussion and opinion on theory and theology, they were still clergy, soldiers or not.

“The Unicorn they say, the real one. Possibly the last, The Oath of Gold teaches she is the only one - but who can say of such mythical beings as the Triune of Beasts?" he shrugged, waving it off; “But she sensed in him a great capacity for love, and she gave him the strength to defend himself as part of a bargain: take her power out into the world and with it, do good. Heal, fight evil, bring the warmth of life to the coldest corners of the world." he said, holding out his hands as if presenting a gift. He was thoughtful a moment, pursing his lips; “I hope it's true as they say. I wish to meet her." he added, shaking his head before continuing. Bart also knew these stories, his battered novice's copy of the Oath of Gold sitting well-worn and threadbare in the trunk near his feet. He was enthralled by her, her stories, her words recorded in the Oath. He read them nightly, as time allowed. She was a being of love and grace so profound he barely dared believe she was real, and she often graced his dreams with blissful images of beauty, snipped and assembled from a hundred illuminations, stained glass windows, and frescoes in her honor.

“So there it is, every Knight of the Order must make the same pilgrimage as our Founder, to do good with their bare hands on their way and present their heart to our Lady; alone and unassisted." The remaining armor on Bart's legs clanked to the floor and he stood, gathering the armor and storing it in the trunk at the foot of his own bunk.

“It's a lot to take in. I've never even been away from the Abbey for more than a day or two," he said with a nervous sigh, peeling off his gambeson and storing it away too, revealing more of his frame.

To say that Bart was a bulky lad was, to put it mildly, an understatement. He was just about eight-and-half spans tall and broad across the shoulders, trunk, and chest; putting him slightly above average height for his mixed Reiklander and Mistport stock - but well beyond average brawn. He favored his father here, easily broader and thicker than any other member of his Novitiate. He shamelessly changed into the simple homespun hose and doublet they wore in the off hours — the novices shared these bunks for years, and all had grown very used to casual nudity among each other, but even so people still paused to look now and then. Bart had been a fat child when he'd arrived, to be perfectly blunt. He'd say as much himself if asked, but a decade and change of effort had turned him into a practical fortress of doughty muscle, even Lucian cast an admiring eye at him as he dressed.

“You'll look good in the armor. You've really outdone yourself since we were lads." the other novice said, rising to dress as well for his own continuing training; “I remember how we both looked when we arrived, so wide-eyed and overwhelmed, seems a thousand years ago." Bart chuckled.

“I've about killed myself a dozen or more times since we were boys." he lamented, looking at the arrangement of myriad scars on his hands and arms, training with blades was not a bloodless endeavor, and he had hurts a-plenty to show for it, Lucian laughed and peeled his tunic off his head, finding his own gambeson, Bart glanced up at his friend.

Lucian himself should be proud, still very thin — he'd filled out his sickly body with whipcord-tight muscle thanks to the ministrations of the Order Hospitaller who'd saved him as a boy, he'd never be as big as Bart, but his friend was by no means a weakling anymore — though the pale man's talents lay not in battle, but his mind.

“Looks like we kept that promise," he said quietly, sitting down to pull on his boots, Lucian looked up, buckling his padded sparring armor, raising an eyebrow quizzically.

“When we first got here you were so skinny still I could get my fingers around your thighs." He said, and Lucian laughed ruefully, returning to dressing.

“I remember, you were such a pudgy little thing." the pale man added, Bart snorted.

“I was fat, call it like it was. That's what happens when your family is millers and bakers," he said, shrugging it off with a grin, setting about gathering his effects from around his bed.

“No shortage of sweetrolls, eh?" he chuckled, tying back his long hair; “But yes, I remember." he held up a hand and affected a reedy falsetto like a child.

“I'm gonna be da bess healer in the whole warld! I'm gonna be big and strong like dad!" the pale man lisped as if he were missing his front teeth, Bart doubled over at that, laughing out loud, shaking his head he nodded, adding;

“And I was gonna be big, and handsome, and brave and marry a princess," he said, getting a titter from the young man as he put the last of his meager effects into his ruck.

“Yeah, well... we're not there yet. I'm not a healer yet.

“And I'm still a virgin."

“But we're both big and strong I guess." Lucian finished for them both, looking up at his tall friend, Lucian smiled, it had some vulnerability to it, but he extended his hand.

“You're the best friend a man could have, Bart." he said, the only man who used the short form of his name regularly. “I'm so glad we met."

Bart clasped his arm, pulling him in close, the big man hugging his friend powerfully, the younger man laughing as he was crushed a bit; “As am I Lu, as am I." he said, squeezing his arm one more time before there was a knock at the door frame to the barracks, a robed member of the abbey monks stood there, hands tucked into his sleeves.

“Ser Bartholomus? I am here to escort you to your new quarters," he said softly from under his monk's habit. Bart and Lu exchanged one last look.

“Don't be a stranger, Bart. When you're a big damn hero, don't forget me yeah?"

“Of course I won't," Bart said, smiling wide, mustaches bristling. “I'll need a good healer, I'm kind of a klutz, so I'll pick the 'bess healer in the warld.'" he added, both of them laughing as he slung his ruck up onto his shoulder, turning and leaving out the door with the steward.

“Good luck, friend," Lu said, smiling as he sat to tie his own armor on. Their paths split here... but he was confident it wasn't the end.

Lucian looked up at the door and smiled.

No, they'd meet on the other side.

~ ~ ~

The next days were a blur of activity, he settled into his personal quarters for the first time in his life, and yet found himself drawn away from the solitude, he'd always craved his own space but once given it, he felt lonesome and disconnected and found himself finding reasons to stroll the practice fields in his quiet moments, to speak with the friends of his novitiate and feel their companionship — knowing full in his mind these connections would themselves be fleeting: the pilgrimage looming before him, and its threats and dangers with it, real and ominous.

The fitting of his armor came as well, it was an awkward process of measurement and invasion of his various personal spaces; the armor of the Order was not uniform, it was fitted to each Brother for his own purpose and style and the process for that was an ordeal. The armorer himself was a wiry man named Balgus, bald all over save for an impressive mustache that bristled over his lip as he thought and a jawline like the anvil he worked, he was not a big man, but his body was an edifice of leathery sinew and his grip was like the iron he shaped. The scars of some illness marred his body as he gleamed in the light of the forge, another broken, sickly soul saved by the Order Hospitaller, so they said.

“Oy, yer a right big cunt aren't ye." the forgemaster groused in a raspy tenor, looking at the measurements he'd marked off on string then back up to Bart, who stood there in naught but his smallclothes. He thumped a leathery calloused knuckle across the brawny man's slab-like pectorals.

“Breastplate'd be a bitch in heat, training armor pinches ye here -" he jabbed a finger at a raw spot near his waist and he winced; “An' here." he poked him again under the arm, drawing another yelp of discomfort from the big man.

“Yes, it's a little tight when I swing my axe." he agreed, shifting awkwardly, sweat beading off him as the forge's heat washed over them. Balgus furrowed his brow, curly mustache alive on his upper lip like a sooty black serpent.

“Axe you say? Mmn. Mmn." he pulled at his mustache a moment, before thumping Bart's sternum again, making the young knight blink.

“Brigandine," he said with finality, nodding crisply. Bart blinked.

“Brigandine?" the knight asked quizzically, but the forgemaster had already turned and was barking orders at his apprentices. The forge was a dim, sooty place; vaulted ceilings and reinforced buttresses made it imposing, heavy. Tools hung from the walls and armor and weapons in various states of completion were scattered about the shop. The crackle of the forge itself was complimented by the lapping of water outside, a waterwheel affixed to the side that fed into the stream that ran through the abbey, powering several devices, including a massive auto-hammer.

“Jack o' Plates." Balgus continued tersely, but his eyes lit up with a gleam that had nothing to do with the fire. “Big cunt, with a big axe like you has to move more, run harder. Solid armor'd slow ye down, bind ye up more than some wee thing like Ser Bowen, got tae use a lot more steel to cover that ale barrel yer usin' for a chest." he rumbled, passion in his voice as he set about taking a new set of measurements around his arms.

“Ser Bowen's fighting is more acrobatic than mine is." Bart protested, and the smith scoffed.

“Bowen is a bloody ponce." he agreed; “But he's also fightin' in the style his armor was made for. Plate like that is made for a sword an' its movements. Not for somethin' with a short haft like a waraxe." he explained, wrapping the string-tape around his bicep, his thick eyebrows going up at the size he marked off.

“So..." Bart continued, groping for something to add, but Balgus continued:

“Brigadine. Interlockin' plates o' steel in a coat, flex more across here-" he thumped his middle again, Bart wincing silently; “An' all around here." he continued, tapping his collarbone and shoulders. “Uses less steel too, lighter. That matters for a big cunt like ye." Bart nodded, he understood now.

“Big arms, God's Teeth. Should have snatched ye from the order, arms like this could bend steel like flax." he groused further, looking at his measurements again, jotting them down into a ledger he kept at hand with a charcoal pencil. “Gonna need asymmetric pauldrons, rerebraces and vambrace should be fine." he continued, narrating his choices as he walked around the mostly nude man.

“Ye. Arms and legs need to be bulked up. Axe fighters take a lot o' nicks on the limbs. Mitten gauntlets, double vambraces. Mail sleeves too, we'll sew 'em to fit the gambeson." he said, looking critically at the knight's head, well above him.

“Sit." he grunted, producing a box and withdrawing a series of tapes and calipers from it, he kicked a stool under Bart's legs, forcing him to sit heavily and off balance.

“So is this going to be hard to put on?" the knight asked as Balgus began measuring his skull with the calipers, jotting down notes again and again, snorting at him.

“Easier than plate. Brigadine's good for lone lads, can equip yerself fairly easy, no squires or frippery needed." he continued, wrapping the tape around his neck and whistling, making a strike-through on his ledger and scribbling a new note.

“Neck like a god-damned bull. Gonna need tae be able to turn your head. Visored Barbute and a gorget should do it. Close helm maybe later once yer seasoned." he nodded, standing up and slapping the knight brazenly across the ass.

“Get dressed, yer done. Armor'll be ready in a few weeks. Go pick yerself an axe from the racks." he said, pointing over towards a series of hanging weapons, he started but the smith caught his arm.

“Only pick from the black racks. My own work. I dinnae give apprentices' steel to Sers." he said sternly, eyes hard; “Yer trustin' your life and the life o' innocents to it. It must be the best.

Bart's eyes grew solemn and he nodded his thanks to the man, he felt the passion for his work through his words and the steel of his grip as he said it, the wiry smith nodded firmly, a tight grin on his face as if all was correct in the world, and he turned and began barking in that scousey accent at his apprentices, stoking the forge as he hefted a pair of tongs, Bart's presence entirely forgotten as work was had.

Taking a moment to pull up his hose and snug down his jerkin again, the knight walked to the black-stained racks across one wall, wonder in his eyes. Steel gleamed there, along with other, exotic alloys he couldn't readily identify; some with a glittering silver sheen, another few black and dull as pitch except for wicked gleaming ground edges. Swords, axes, spears, everything was there. He shied away from the exotic metals, feeling even as a 'Ser' he was unworthy yet of such extravagance, and down the length of the racks he walked, hand trailing across hafts as he went.

Then, he saw it. Tucked behind a bardiche and an elegant longsword was nestled the mean, angular shape of an axe blade. Gingerly, he disentangled it from its brother weapons and pulled it out. It was a bit too large for most people which suited the bit-too-large man who held it fine, his hands slid over the haft and nestled into woven-cord grooves set into it as if it were made for him, the squared-off, oblong haft of the weapon stout and full in his palms.

The weapon itself was perhaps five and a quarter spans long, the same length as a good longsword, the haft a deep mahogany hue where it was unwrapped by leather, and the single-bitted blade was a bearded design with a deep distil taper that drew to a durable, wicked edge with a straight top. its back end was balanced with an extremely stout, square-edged hammer face that would dent armor and crush skulls. It was unadorned save for some minor scrollwork engraved into the haft, and a stylized swirl of a unicorn's horn that decorated a short spike at the butt end. He stepped away with it, the blade easily resting just under his breastbone, and hefted it experimentally. The balance was perfect, he blinked as he rolled it about his hands, across the back of his knuckles, idly twirling it before taking it up into a high guard, and giving it a few experimental chops and swings — it cut the air like fresh bread, the squared-off hammerback making it have a unique wailing whistle as it slashed through the air in his hands.

“Oh, that one." came Balgus' gruff tenor again, Bart jumped, turning with the axe still in his hand, The Smith holding a glowing piece of stock in a pair of tongs as his apprentices unlatched the auto-hammer

“Some o' my favorite work. Unassumin', solid. Ne'er had many axe fighters big enough for it, so it waited." he said, taking the stock into the auto-hammer and beginning to pound it to shape, the sparks flying freely, but the smith's gaze stood, unwavering.

“it's not special, steel and ash to give it a little springiness. No Absolute Iron, Truebrass, or sidhe silver there.“ he looked up at him; “it's direct. I think it suits ye." Bart couldn't help but nod, finding a leather cover for the blade in the same rack it'd hung from.

“Does it have a name?" Bart asked, and Balgus snorted.

“Axe." he stated bluntly, and the knight frowned.

“A good weapon should have a name," he said, and the smith looked up, holding the glowing stock in his grip.

“Aye, a weapon earns a name perhaps, but it isn't given one. Only cunts name a weapon before it proves itself," he said with a sniff, spitting into the fire.

“it's an axe, a good axe. Maybe it'll earn a name, maybe you'll lose it in a lake." he groused, taking the stock back to the hammer, sparks flew.

“Take it. I'll be glad to see it on the back o' someone worthy."

Bart looked at the axe again, covering the blade with its sleeve-like scabbard as he nodded.

“Thank you, Forgemaster Balgus. For everything." he intoned, saluting him with a short bow that got the blacksmith to groan aloud and drag his stock from the hammer, much to the chagrin of his apprentices who scrambled to avoid the hot arc of metal as he reached over, and with surprising strength dragged the knight straight.

“Listen here, laddie," he grunted, waving a hot piece of glowing steel under Bart's wide-eyed gaze.

“Ye worked for this, ye don't bow tae me. Ye don't bow tae nobody but God and the Lady. Take it. Earn its workmanship if ye feel you owe me, but you do it back straight, eyes forward. Ye are the best o' the best to make it this far. There are nary a feckin' shortcut for us in this life, don't pretend you took any to get this far." he barked, eyes locked on his before he snapped his fingers roughly under his nose.

“Eyes forward. Back straight." he said, his gaze was intense, burning hotter than the steel he held... and Bart understood immediately.

“Eyes forward." he repeated, hefting the axe onto his shoulder, the smith's lips spread in a wicked grin, showing a gleaming silver cap over one canine.

“Aye that's it lad. Now get the hell out o' my forge, you're too feckin' big, takin' up all the cool air."

~ ~ ~

It was early on a sunny spring day when he found himself before the gates of the abbey, a crowd behind him; a horse at his side, his gleaming surcoat luminous in the sun's rays. The Abbey's walls rose like a fortress over the town down below, a sleepy hamlet of craftsmen and former refugees who sought the Radiant Order's aid, and paid their benevolence back with fealty. No stouter men and women had he met than the townsfolk of Fairharbour, built on the river that ran through the abbey, it nurtured trade and families with the milk of commerce and the honey of faith. It was hard to believe, looking at it now as he had — that not ten years past it was a smokey haze of refugees, and before that — a besieged and embattled warzone. The Grey Plagues and their purges had been the last major conflict in Northsea, and it was quietly savage. Windmills spun in the distance, fields of wheat and grains swaying in the spring breeze, the scents of baking bread and woodsmoke wafting up with the subtle spring aroma of flowering plants. Fairharbour had weathered it all, it like its people — was tenacious.

“You look the part." A soft voice intoned, Bart's eyes shifting away from the horizon to Lucian, who'd as usual seemingly appeared by his larger friend, he was dressed in his formal armor as a novice, a hauberk of gleaming mail hung about his sinewy frame, matched to the white and gold-limned surcoat laced around his trim chest, his long white hair had been freshly cropped into the Hospitaller Tonsure, and fell loosely down his back in a glossy wave, Bart always thought the order's chosen style suited his friend more than most, his pale skin and hair made him look ethereal, otherworldly when done up in their regalia, like the paintings of the unicorn themselves.

“I suppose so, Forgemaster Balgus is a miracle worker," he said, looking down at his new armor. The big knight had been properly outfitted in the intervening weeks since his measurements; his torso was wrapped in a sleek set of brigandine armor, its internally riveted set of plates covered externally by a sheathe of leather, that itself was stitched over with the signature surcoat of the order. its flexible outline emphasized the depth of his chest and made him look towering, powerful — the rest of it smoothly built, hanging down to his knees where it split from the semi-rigid jack-o-plates into a flexible skirt of tassets that draped like a longcoat across his thighs. His powerful arms and legs were clad in glittering steel greaves, vambraces and heavy couters and pauldrons — the latter of which were asymmetric, the leftmost one sporting a highly raised ridge that protected his neck and face when facing an opponent with his strong side. It was all topped off with an intimidating helmet that had a T-shaped visor slit that made his bright blue eyes stand out against the darkness like fierce points of light, tucked into his belt were even heavier mitten gauntlets set in their backs with heavy studs. A light brown traveling cloak was clasped at his throat, and under it glittered the symbol of their order — an ivory cameo of a unicorn's horn topped with the Lidless Eye.

“You look like a hero of legend," Lucian said, grinning at his friend and handing him something... his axe.

“Oh, did I drop it?" he asked, looking about clumsily in his armor, it moved well with him but he was still adjusting to the extra motion in his waist, he patted his saddlebags cautiously, he was so clumsy, Lucian laughed and shook his head.

“No, no silly. I nicked it when you were staring at the wide world, look at the haft," he said, pointing. Bart turned his axe over in his hand; the new weapon gleamed with oil and fresh polish, and tied around the buttcap near the spike, was an odd multi-colored braid of twine of some sort, he inverted the weapon and looked at it more closely.

“We all took the tonsure for this, us novices. You're more liked than you realize," he said, and it clicked with him then — it was hair. Each part of the braid was a different color, sandy blonde, jet black, chocolate brown... and one part that was pure, snowy white.

“It's all of us, we can't go along with you in body, so we're sending you a token. We prayed a blessing over it, we can only hope you'll come back and tell us wondrous stories to warm our hearts until we ourselves can make the pilgrimage," he said, grasping his friend's hand, linking their thumbs in a warrior's grip, squeezing it firmly.

“Look I know we're just soldiers, but somehow this feels important. Call it... a vision, but I think you'll need that reminder before it's done." he said, and Bart seemed shaken by that for a moment: Lucian had his 'feelings' fairly often, they weren't perfectly accurate, but it was enough that Hospitaller Davis theorized he may have a touch of magic in his blood — a Sidhe or fae ancestor perhaps. He couldn't predict if it would rain, but his gut feelings tended more often than not to be true. Privately he wondered himself if his best friend's bleached countenance was a mark of being touched by some sorcerous power as well.

“Thank you, Lu." he said in a quiet tone. Clearly overwhelmed by the events of the last weeks, he drew a shaky breath, trying to keep the tears back. He always was a crybaby.

“Look sharp, it's the Lord Protector," Lucian said quickly, his pink eyes wide as dinner plates, there was a brazen fanfare of trumpets and the gates swung wide. The pilgrimage of a Knight-Brother was an irregular event. Even talented, capable novices can take years to reach where they were, and young as they were, it was two decades and more that both he and Lucian had trained, and even still Lucian's particular desire to be a Knight-Hospitaller demanded yet more of him than Bart's desire to be a Knight of the Thorn, requiring more time and study of the human body and its humors. This meant that a knight-brother going to seek the Lady's Blessing was an event, a celebration however humble — and the Lord Protector would be remiss to not take part.

Out came several men in glittering steel, surcoats bearing the crown of thorns atop the unicorn's horns in place of the Lidless Eye, the insignia of the elite guard of the Lord Protector's personal escort, the most seasoned members of the Knight's council. The thorns symbolize their fealty to be the Lady's bulwark, the very blades of the order — a briar of steel to harry evil. They carried standards in one hand, their other across their breast as they fanned out, creating a corridor with the draping banners, the fanfare blew again, and at the far end emerged a powerful, ingot of a man.

He stood perhaps eye-level with Bart, which was to say a half-head taller than most, built heavily with the muscle of a Reiklander man who worked fields and toiled for years... and not a scrap of bare skin was visible. His armor clanked as he advanced down the cobblestone path with purpose, itself gilt with gold only at the edges, but otherwise dented, scarred and weathered with battle. His helmet bore a heavy white veil that obscured his entire face, and his hands and fingers were wrapped in cloth as well, draping with written prayer shawls as lappets at his shoulders and elbows. A brutally utilitarian sword swung at his hip, the blade thick and single-edged, a kriegsmesser — a soldier's weapon, also nicked and dented with clear use. His surcoat bore the Eye and Horn sigils, and his holy symbol was replaced by a woven, dangling piece of shimmering, almost writhing white hair — cut from the mane of the Lady in White herself or so they said. It seemed to dance in an invisible breeze no matter the weather; one of its ends stained bright red. His heavy greaves clanked with a visible limp as he approached, the scent of almonds and preservative herbs wafted up from his armor, and as his veiled face drew closer to Bart, he could see the ragged, warped flesh around his penetrating golden eyes — the Lord Protector had been a leper, doomed to die before finding the Lady's grove and receiving her blessing, she took his contagion, but the scars remained by his choice. A symbol.

Lord Protector Baratus the Unyielding, the seeming-immortal head of the Radiant Order of Our Lady in White, hero of the Verdant Crusade, mentor to kings, slayer of horrors, stood before the two. Lucian melted into the crowd, saluting and bowing his head — Bart fell to one knee.

“Rise, brother mine." he rasped, his voice like a landslide, ragged and hoarse, his hand upturned. Bart stood, his back straight as a lance.

“Allow me to bless you," he said, turning his hands over, Bart mirrored the gesture and the Lord Protector himself knelt slightly, drawing his veil aside he kissed the upturned palms of the knight each time in turn, closing them together as he stood.

“The eyes of the Lady are upon you, God is with you. Dark times loom on the horizon, The Auguries of the Learned One in Al-Reza have seen them. Blood and fire, poison and woe... but also light and triumph. We will have need of strong brothers in the times to come." he said, turning his head slightly, those piercing eyes settling on Lucian, who seemed to somehow pale more under the timeless gaze.

“Certain sources even suggest that perhaps there is more to you than even the Lady is yet aware, God's plan ever mysterious," he said, a hint of bemusement in his tone, his thrumming, hoarse voice soft. It seemed Lucian's touch of prescience had not gone unnoticed by those on high.

“I put no stock in rumor and only perfunctory consideration of prophecy. We make our fates as God intended. You are a strong lad, tenacious. Tenacity is a blessing of God, his gift to the races of men with Free Will." he said, raising his hands to the sky, a quiet murmuring of 'amen' from the crowd as he paused a moment, then lowered his hands, placing one on the hilt of his sword.

“But that is the purview of God. We can't expect him to do all the work," he said bluntly, Bart nodded... to say he was scared of the Lord Protector would be inaccurate, but he could feel the strength of the man, both divine and terrestrial as a physical presence, a mantle that preceded him by several spans and stood the hairs of your arms on end. He was intimidated, he was awed.

“Go with God, my son. My Brother," he said, and reached out and clasped Bart's hand in an extremely familiar fashion that took him off guard, his eyes crinkled at the edges to belie the smile he wore beneath his veil; the young Knight returned the grasp, both of them briefly testing one another's strength with a squeeze: he could feel the almost electric energy of his divine blessing coursing through him, and in turn the Lord Protector tilted his head slightly, acknowledging Bart's own considerable might — and then he pulled him inexorably, intimately close for a moment.

“When you meet the Lady." he began in a quiet, personal tone. “Tell her the old wolf won't be coming home just yet, he's got one more pack to see off." he said, smiling; “Always one more. She'll understand."

Bart nodded, and at last, found his tongue, thick and heavy in his mouth.

“I will, Milord. Is she as beautiful as they say?" he asked quietly, and the older man's eyes went distant, seeing another place. Another time.

“My boy, she is lovely beyond words. She stirs a man like the very energy of creation, when I glimpsed her first my pain melted away, it was like my blood had been replaced with warm mead, and I was drunk in her loveliness and comfort." he turned his eyes back to him, agate hard now. “Leaving her side was the most difficult thing I have ever done in my life, and even now I feel her absence like a wound," he said, reaching up to touch the wafting lock of hair tied around his throat.

“I... I am afraid but also excited."

“You are alive my brother. Cherish that."

With that, it was like a door that had been opened slammed shut again, and both of them drew apart, the Lord Protector's voice ringing out in a bark: “MOUNT UP!"

Bart wasted no time, and for once he found no hesitation, no clumsiness, the presence of the Lord Protector filled him with confidence as he swung himself into his saddle with aplomb, taking his axe and sliding it into its loop near his saddlebags. He stood at attention, awaiting orders.

“There are reports of marauders in the wilds near the Glade of Eternal Spring and the Sidhewood in general, I've sent word ahead of you to Fort Ivory near its border, they will lodge you for the night to ready yourself. You are alone, but I expect you to do our order proud. There is no timetable, you return when you return and you render God's Will upon those who need it as you go." he paused and looked up at him with a hard stare.

“And God's judgment on those who would harm the innocent. You will be tested. Impress me again." he said and clashed his breastplate against his chest.

“IN THE NAME OF GOD!" he bellowed, raising his fist. The entire crowd, Bart included shouted back in answer.

“HIS WILL BE DONE BY THE LADY'S MIGHT!"

Filled with zeal, Bart spurred his horse, the cheers of the crowd following him as he set out to find his destiny.

~ ~ ~

Fairharbour was almost more of a city than a town, built on the Ruhrk river coming up around the Abbey, which itself was an old fortified church during the Verdant Crusade, which grew into a proper hill fortress and then over the decades expanded out to a fully-walled town as support and refugees poured into to the Lord Protector's holdings, it was situated at the base of a natural tor that the original church had been built upon, and it was a goodly mile or so ride from the top to the town proper, the river snaking the long way around to form the border that split the living districts from those dedicated to trade, a large bridge visible even from the Abbey spanned the wide, lazy channel, flocked by trade barges and small ferries carrying passengers up and downriver.

Mentally, Bart reviewed the lessons he'd been taught as he looked out across his homeland, history was an important measure for the Radiant Order, and Fairharbour and its holdings were part of the Northsea Confederation, a small federation of independent kingdoms that had banded together in trade and support in the wake of the Verdant Crusades — massive, earth-rending wars that had lasted two-hundred years and then some after an unprovoked invasion by forces from the south edge of the Sea of Glass — wars that had nearly seen the extinction of mankind before the coming of the Triune of Beasts — the Lady in White. A grim time, instigated by the southern forces' eldritch leader, The Empty Queen. She'd used dark magics and ancient pacts with unspeakable things to drag the bones of the earth up the center of the Sea of Glass, erecting the grim, horrifying structure known as the Ossuary of Man and its surrounding isle, miles high — one could see it still anywhere in the realm, even now were he to turn southward enough, Bart could glimpse its foggy outline across the horizon, a constant reminder that the world needed good men of strong arms: for evil lurked ever near.

His horse's hooves struck cobblestones after only a brief ride down the bluff from the Abbey, and the sounds of life came to him: laughter, screaming children, baying hounds, and clucking chickens, the rattle and hum of the common man. It wasn't unknown to Bart, his young life had been here, in this town; beyond the horizon he saw his father's mill, spinning its slow turn in the distance, and on pure instinct he guided his horse along familiar paths. 'Round the bend he went, two stops down Baker's row, careful not to hit the sign at McClusky's on the way past — it all flowed as if an elegant dance.

There it was, a small place. Too small really, big enough for a few clay ovens and a lovely rack of displays, the scent of fresh-baked bread washed over him, along with the faint honeysuckle scent of favorite flowers growing wild and messy through the trellis that wended its way around the rustic building. He dismounted, tying his horse to a nearby post idly, eyes not leaving the little bakery as he walked forwards, hands touching a familiar doorpost, the wood worn pale and smooth by hundreds of little hands over the years — but a series of deep-carved notches still stood out, tiny names and dates carved in next to them. A smile spread across his face, mustache bristling as it did.

“Oh, excuse me Ser, we're not yet open today, still baking the day's bre-OH!" came the surprised response from behind the counter, a willowy, tiny woman behind, hands covered in flour and apron spattered with dough said, covering her hands with her mouth. She had dark hair, and brilliant blue eyes. He had her eyes.

“Hello, mother." he said smiling as he ducked a little to come in the doorway, the hanging bundles of herbs dusting his hair with bits of pollen.

“its today? I can't believe it!" the woman said, almost hurdling the counter as she bustled out from behind it, running up to hug her son but stopping short at the last minute, pulling her flour-dusted hands back.

“O-oh I don't want to ruin it, its so nice-looking!" she said, and Bart laughed and enfolded his mother in a metal-clattering but extremely careful bear-hug, the slip of a woman laughing and putting her arms around her son's massive frame. Sophia Mueller was a fixture of Baker's Street and had been for at least three decades, and he didn't just think that because she'd birthed him — her sweetbreads were a favorite, even among the Order Brothers who came into town for supplies.

“I don't care if it gets a little messy, its armor and you're my mom." he said, his deep voice a rumble compared to the light tones of the tiny woman, who looked up at him with a smile that crinkled the deep creases around her face and eyes, she touched his face... and promptly then wiped a smear of flour off it with the hem of her apron.

“You look so... so amazing! Like you strode out of one of your father's woodcuts, big as life," she said, looking all over him, taking him in. It wasn't as if they didn't see each other, however, he only had time to come down from the Abbey to visit sparingly, his training demanded much of him.

“Courtesy of Forgemaster Balgus," he said, standing up straight so she could get a look at him, walking around. She smiled and touched his face again;

“You grew your father's mustache." she said, laughing as he wiggled his upper lip, making the thick brush dance like an ornery caterpillar, “It suits you, you look so gallant I could just cry." she said, sniffling a little as he settled his hands into his belt where his dirk and pouches hung.

“Is he here?" he asked, looking around for the burly older man, his mother shook her head.

“No, he's down at the mill as usual. Harvest being what it is." She replied, the wheat harvest meant he was hard at work manning the mill with his workmen. Bart nodded, taking a moment to look around, take in the sights and smells again, his mother's eyes brimmed again.

“I want you to stay forever, but I know I can't ask that." she said, wiping her tears; “I'm so very proud of you, I want you to know that. God only gave me one son, but I think he put all the love of five whole boys in you." she said, her hand absently folding on her belly, a stab of old regret hit him: his mother was so small, his birth had been hard, too hard on her — it was what brought them to the Order, but even under their divine care they said she would never have any more children. Bart opened his mouth but she held up a hand.

“No, just let me look at you a moment." she breathed, tears now streaming trails down her flour-dusted face. She stared at him, and for once he didn't feel self-conscious, drawing himself up straight and true for her benefit.

“Mother." he finally said as her breath shuddered in, and she blinked, meeting his eyes. “I have to go away now, its going to be for a long time... I don't know how long." he said, and she nodded, wringing her hands into the ties of her apron as he continued.

“It'll be dangerous, but they've taught me well, I held my own against a Knight of the Thorn! The Thorn!" he said, pride and disbelief in his voice as he looked down at his blade-scarred, calloused hands.

“I want this. It feels important, will you pray for me, mother?" he asked and she smiled, breaking down and laying her face on his armored chest.

“God, of course my baby. I'll pray every night until you come home."

“And don't forget about Lucian, he doesn't eat enough still." he added, causing her to laugh through her tears.

“I'll send him a basket of meat pies every tenday." she promised. Lucian's parents had not survived the arcane plague that'd ravaged their town, and the Mueller family had all but adopted the boy when they both met in their novitiate after the Radiant Order had brought the survivors here for treatment.

“And don't let Dad work himself to death, you know he will," he added, and she nodded.

“I knew this day was coming, I made him hire four more hands this season, we've done well and can afford it, you know how hard it is for him on that leg still," she said, and he nodded. Father's leg had been crushed beneath a fallen millstone early in his life, the Hospitallers had worked a literal miracle in healing it and saving his life, but the damage was extensive and he walked with a permanent limp and the aid of a cane since, much like many in Fairharbour — Bart's family story was one of hardships, scars and hurts made whole by faith and community. Bart looked outside to the sun rising faster and faster towards midday.

“I have to go mother, it's a long ride still," he said, knowing he had to cut this short or his resolve would waver and he'd stay til dark. She nodded, and looked around, then bustled back to the kitchens for a moment, returning with a package of waxed parchment.

“Sweetrolls, your favorites with the preserves in the middle," she said, smiling through renewed tears. “Just... don't eat them all at once and get sick out on the road, ok?" he couldn't help but laugh.

“That only happened once!" she joined him in their laughter as he took the package and knelt down, hugging the tiny woman around the middle, she wept openly now, kissing his forehead and laying it against her bosoms.

“My baby boy, so strong..."

He left after that, their goodbyes lost in tears and sniffling but the message was clear, he wiped his eyes as he swung into the saddle and turned his horse towards the horizon once more, his mother's face watching him from the window, eyes full of fear, pride and determined joy.

~ ~ ~

The road out of town was far from lonely, Bart gathered a small entourage of small children and animals following his horse as he went out, peppering him with questions and laughter - Knight-Brothers moving through the town wasn't so unusual, but give a young boy or girl a chance to talk to a real knight in armor and they rarely turned it down. Yet and still, his cadre dissolved as he crossed into the wheat fields and turned towards the old stone mill that he knew as home, the area bustling with a handful of doughty men in shirtsleeves, grousing and laughing as they passed about bags of grain to be milled or shipped, he tipped his head to several he knew, workers who'd been with his father for years, they all smiled and nodded back to him as he came to a halt, sliding off his horse and handing his reins to one of them with a gracious smile.

“Where's father?" he asked, and one leathery workman with a sack of meal over one shoulder jerked his thumb back.

“Main room, he's fiddling with the millstone track again," he grumbled, shaking his head and moving past. Bart snorted, that was his father — ever the perfectionist.

He slipped into the millhouse, the cool stone smelling of goosefat tallow and ground wheat, the air thick with the dusty castoff of the eternal grind, inside the millstone rolled its massive weight in a slow circle, crushing grain under it as it was fed by workmen from sacks, and in one corner, leaning over a heavy ironshod cane with shoulders as wide as a handcart and a shorn pate slick with sweat was his father, Adelbart Mueller. His face was a network of crags and valleys and he could be the spitting image of him, Bart had taken his mother's eyes and hair, but after his father in face and build entirely. The man's sandy hair and dirty dishwater blonde mustache ruffled as he looked up, gray eyes stern and hard, lips quirking around a corncob pipe into a tight smile.

“it's running cockeyed again." he said as Bart walked around to stand next to him.

“Again? Even after I came down here with the brothers and righted it?" he asked, the stooped man nodded, spitting to the side as he leaned in close and looked again. Bart peered closely and indeed could see where his father indicated: the millstone's outermost edge was lifted and not making complete contact with the gutter.

“Yup. Looks like its the axles again. Real damp this spring, looks like the pegs warped in all the moist." he said, gnawing irritably on the end of his pipe before turning away, drawing himself up straight — he was almost a head shorter than his son but just as broad, built like a burl of particularly stubborn wood in the general shape of a man. He put his signature flat cap back on as he looked his boy up and down.

“So it's time, is it?" he grunted at the younger man.

“Yes sir."

“You have everything you need?" he asked, leaning forward and raising a thick eyebrow.

“Saddlebags are packed for a tenday at least, and I'll hit Bellway before then unless I fall off the face of the world." The older man nodded, folding both hands on his gnarled cane head.

“You look good." he continued, looking his son over with an eye like one would a prized horse. “Strong. Right." he nodded as if his affirmation made it true, and in a way for Bart — it did.

“Balgus' work," he said, and his father nodded with a grin.

“Aye. Good steel, you wear it well," he said, and turned, hobbling along with surprising speed for his injury. Bart stepped aside to let him pass, his bad leg visibly braced in a small frame of wood and steel. The older man reached a worktable and began pulling open drawers with a grumble, muttering under his breath: “Now it's here somewhere..." There was a din of banging and rifling before he grunted again in affirmation and pulled a small parcel from the back of a cubby, blowing dust from it.

“I kept this for you since you were a babe," he said, turning back to his son. “My father's, and his father's before him, ye and ye as it goes." he said and handed the package to his son, it was small, easily fitting in his hand, he furrowed his brow as he opened it up... it was a small book.

“What's this?"

“Us." the old man said simply, shrugging his shoulders.

The tome was perhaps the size of a particularly generous snuffbox, beaten and battered, it clearly had been bound and rebound several times. He shot his father a curious look, but the old man just shrugged again and gestured to its pages, Bart gamely opened the small covers.

“Here is testament that I, Adriatias Mueller, did live and in doing so these are my deeds, I crossed the Northsea in times of war..." Bart looked up sharply.

“This is from my-"

“Great, Great, Great Grandfather Adriatias 'The Brazen Bull' Mueller. Fought in the first crusades a hundred years ago. There's more." he said, pointing again. Bart leafed through the pages, all men and some women of his family, all who had gone out to do good in the world, even the small things.

I am Adelbart Mueller, and I am a grain-keeper, father and husband read the last entries, they were all short-form notes of life, their accomplishments, a living record of his family's exploits.

“Father..." Bart began again, and his father smiled.

“You might need some extra pages once you're done." The pride in his father's voice said everything.

“I have to go for a while, father," Bart said, closing the tiny book and gingerly wrapping it back in its oilcloth cover, he tucked it into his surcoat — close to his heart.

“I know. You have things to do." his father answered, resting both hands on his cane, his bent frame straight as it could be. “Important things. I've always known, ever since you broke that nose as a lad, I knew you'd leave. Your heart's too big for our little mill." the old man's voice cracked a moment at the end and he swallowed visibly, steadying himself. Bart idly rubbed his thumb across his crooked nose — aye again, a story behind it worth telling... but he had other things on his mind still.

“I need to. I can't explain why," he said, dispensing with any sort of dissemblance or reservations. “My pilgrimage of course, but it's more than that." he started to say, groping for the words.

“You feel called to action." his father said quietly, his voice low with emotion.

“Yes." Bart's own voice was quiet.

“You never could leave an unfair fight be. Lots of those in the world."

“People are stronger than they think, father."

“They just need someone to show them it." the old miller finished for him, startling Bart with how dead-on it was, even for his father's usual blunt insight, his mouth gaped as if to ask how, but he just tapped the bulge on his surcoat, causing Bart to pull the tome back out hurriedly.

“Page 42". Bart leafed to that page, on it was a strict, blocky script:

I was Braddock Mueller. I did not fight in the crusade. I did not fight for the Radiant Order. I did not fight for God, the White Lady or the King or Crown. I fought for Brycewood. People are stronger than they think. They just need someone to show them.

“Brycewood is a small town to the southeast, nothing special. Woodcutting. But there's a headstone there for Braddock. He picked up his axe in defense of his home, fought bandits, and inspired the townsfolk to save themselves. He's not a hero, he's just a man who did what needed to be done." Adelbart said, more words than Bart had possibly ever heard his father say in one breath.

“it's in your bones boy. You don't need to make me proud, I already am. I know who you are. You're the same as them."

Bart had no answer to that, and Adelbart did not either, he simply extended an arm and they met in silence in a crushing hug, the only sound the slow rumble of the millstone as it spun.

They separated with a nod, Bart wiping fresh tears from his eyes. His father grasped his shoulder and straightened a pauldron with a firm shake. The two stood there a moment, both smiling through glimmering eyes.

Then, with just a nod he turned and left. His father watched from the door as he mounted his horse and spurred it forward with purpose.

~ ~ ~

The Kingsroad was the main highway of the Northsea nations, a massive highway paved with cobblestones as a joint effort between the Five Kings of Northsea to benefit trade and travel, it ran the entire length of the Confederation lands, marking the primary overlapping border of each nation, and it led straight to The Northern Sidhewood — a magical wood where the Elder Races of the Unseelie had retreated from the growth of Man, in accordance with their Oath of Fealty to the Lady.

Bart knew all of this, as he peered down at his map one night on the Kingsroad. Off the road in one of many well-worn travel stops along its long length, the map was superfluous really. No way he could get lost and he feared little on these paths. He'd walked this road with his father a hundred times at least, and moreover, the road was patrolled by Confederation Guardsmen, albeit infrequently. Banditry wasn't wholly unknown on the roads but generally only the boldest or most desperate of brigands risked contending with the Fifth Halberdiers even by chance. He stirred the coals of his fire, swinging his small kettle over it to warm up his trail rations: a bit of water from his skin, some salted pork he'd chopped roughly with his dirk, and then crumbled hardtack as a thickener made a fairly filling 'hobo stew'. Adding in a bit of salt and some savory herbs he'd gathered, he stirred it and sat back with the map again, planning his route and sipping at a tin cup.

“Ah, what a smell." came a voice suddenly, startling Bart as he looked up — hand already on his axe, propped up and gleaming bare nearby him — he hadn't heard anyone approach, which was a damn fine trick surrounded by dry brush and a paved road not 10 paces away.

“Whoa, easy neighbor." the voice said again, raspy... feminine. Out of the shadows, his eyes adjusted to see two figures wrapped in heavy traveling cloaks, one was small and female — the speaker - the other was taller, broader, built as Bowen had been. He could hear the soft jingle of mail as the taller figure moved.

“Fair evening to you, neighbors." Bart returned warily; “What brings you to my campfire?"

“Pray, be peaceful neighbor." the hooded girl said, holding up her hands; “My pappy and I simply smelled the fire and thought to warm ourselves with some pleasant conversation on this chilly eve." she said, her voice had an odd quality to it, almost like she was trying not to laugh. It sat... poorly with him. However, his honor demanded he treat with her fairly.

“There's room here for two more, mind the sparks," he said, settling back down — but not lowering his guard. The pair settled on the other side of the fire, the larger figure dragging a fallen log to perch on as the fire flickered off them. They weren't the first travelers Bart had seen in his tenday or so on the road, nor the first who'd shared his fire, however...

“There's food to spare if you are hungry, neighbor," he said, reaching forward to ostensibly stir the soup again, but also to peer closer at his two guests. The smaller girl was wearing what looked like traveling leathers, her hands were gloved and he could only see bare flesh on her face. The older man's face was completely obscured but the way he sat - the stiffness of his chest and shoulders - told Bart directly he was wearing armor beneath his cloak. As the pair settled closer - Bart's horse shied nervously. His eyes tracked to it without turning his head, wariness settling in to stay.

“Ah, I thank you but I fear my pappy and I have delicate palates, despite the lovely scents," she said and the older figure nodded, pushing back his hood. Bart's eyebrows went up.

He was a stark man, his hair was rich and full but a dull gray hue cropped messily close to his skull - the crisp hairline framing his face alongside a heavy, beetling brow. His cheekbones were so sharp he could have cut the salt-pork with them. His lantern jaw was severe and deeply lined - showing the craggy, uneven cleft of his chin and sleek outlines of jawbone through leathery skin — skin that itself was pockmarked and scarred by weather, age, and war. An aquiline nose so intense it could aptly be described as 'hooked' drew his eyes up from a slightly too-full mouth to his eyes, intense, deep-set eyes the color of icy winter skies that wore the thick brow ridge like an armored visor, he smiled at Bart, his teeth large and wide, filling his equally too-full mouth.

“Ah, a soldier I see," he said, his voice amused and friendly, a rasping tenor as he cautiously opened his cloak, revealing his armor and a sword hilt sitting at his side, both were battered, utilitarian designs enameled dark hues he couldn't make out by firelight, but otherwise unremarkable aside from being clearly well-used.

“I am something of a soldier myself," he said conversationally.

“And the little one?" Bart asked, looking at the girl adjacent the pale man grinned again, leaning forward, arms resting on his thighs, fingers steepled in between as he turned his head to her.

“Ah, my sister's child. Poor thing's an orphan, I care for her," he said, the girl pulling back her hood to look at Bart with wide, inquisitive dark eyes. She couldn't be more than perhaps seven summers past maidenhood, still had the blush of girlhood about her holding on like a late frost... which was an apt descriptor.

The girl was cold to look at, her skin the color of milk, her lips unrouged and pale, cut with scars and nicks, her entire face around her mouth dotted with old abrasions and slices, despite how full her bow-like mouth was, her features almost doll-like, if a touch sallow and sunken — the man noticed and turned his gaze back.

“Bandits you understand, burned her house down, abused her a touch. She's better now." he said with a nod and a thoughtful frown that stretched his entire face exaggeratedly. The girl smiled.

“Pappy takes good care of me, I see so many places and meet so many new people, shame we never get to spend much time with them." she said in an ethereal voice, drawing a cackling laugh from 'Pappy'.

“Ah the life of a sellsword, am I right?" he said, grinning again and clapping her familiarly on the thigh. “Never able to stay in one place more than a season, always new faces, new places, yeah?"

“I can't say, neighbor. I am in the service of God." Bart said in a neutral tone, stirring his soup and opening his traveling cloak to reveal the Eye-and-Horn sigil of the Radiant Order on his surcoat — he had not yet removed his armor to rest, it gleamed dully under the firelight.

The change in the man's face was instantaneous, all emotion drained out of him like wax boiling away from a candle flame.

“What order is that." he asked, his voice a dull croak. The girl's eyes were wider now. Staring. Intense.

“The Radiant Order of Our Lady in White," Bart answered crisply, tasting his still too-hot meal with a wince, looking from under his brow at the man, eyes never leaving him. Mustache bristling as they stared, the unfriendliness of the looks as the two men locked gazes only barely contained, blue-on-gray eyes twitching subtly as they sought to know one another through that gaze. Bart tapped the spoon and broke the silence.

“I am on my first Pilgrimage to meet the Lady, I am of course — charged with aiding the needy and smiting wickedness on my way there," he said, drawing the pause out as he drew a tureen from his mess kit and began to fill it with the soup.

“You wouldn't happen to know of any wickedness or needy folks, would you?" he asked pointedly. The question hung in the air for a split second, and then as if a lever had been thrown somewhere in the man's head, his face was alight with warmth again.

“Ah, no fair pilgrim I have found little employ on the road thus far, spring is ever flush with mercenaries plying their trade after all," he said, seeming much more relaxed all of the sudden, his entire bearing sinking further back onto the log, loosening up, even his intense eyes softened, lidding slightly as he watched the man serve himself.

“Do you have a name, Pilgrim? I am also heading that way, perchance we'll meet again along the road," he asked in a much more relaxed, languid drawl.

“Bartholomus Mueller," he answered succinctly, taking a mouthful of his soup and chewing it idly... the motion itself drew the man's eye, his tongue parting his lips and running idly over his canines.

“Pork is quite tasty, isn't it Bartholomus," he said, seemingly in a trance, eyes on the spoon and its savory payload between bites. Bart paused, but the man continued, his young charge's eyes also fixated, intensely.

“Such a mild, savory flavor... how it takes the tastes of how it lived, flavored by experiences and hardships, wild boar tastes different than domesticated, its stronger.... almost pungent." he continued, his teeth setting as he softly sucked air between them.

“Much like people, we are at our best when we're... well seasoned."

The big knight stared over his spoon at the visitor, slowly lowering it back to the tureen, his face was neutral, but the bristle of his mustache over his lip belied the tense set of his jaw;

“Are you sure you aren't hungry, neighbor?" he asked almost dismissively, holding up the steaming tin of broth and meat, “You are quite literally, drooling."

The man blinked and slowly wiped his chin with a single thumb, the gesture firm and deliberate, eyes never leaving Bart, until again like a sudden change in the winds, he smiled in a gregarious manner as before.

“Oh no, excuse my behavior." his voice was an apologetic purr; “I gave up pork... religious obligations, you understand." he said, drawing a slow nod from Bart as he settled back, continuing his meal as the stranger talked; “I merely had a moment of weakness at the scent of it, you seasoned it well for a simple Knight-Brother on the road."

Bart's eyebrow went up as he lifted his cup to his lips, washing the mouthful of soup down and covering his expression as he sized the man up again; they were nearly of a size with each other, though Bart clearly outweighed him by a stone or two he bet even money that the leathery visitor was quicker than he was — but he'd also overplayed his hand, Bart hadn't mentioned his title, and nobody outside of the Order called him 'Knight-Brother'.

“You didn't say where you hailed from neighbor, nor your destination."

The stranger's brow knitted together in consternation, his lips pursed as he observed the other man, tilting his head back slightly;

“Oh, plenty of places. Najula originally, a small town in the Reikstand. Little place, lots of pigs scurrying about, thus my... understanding of them." he said, seeming genial again. “Son of a swineherd and a shepherd, by the time I was a young man I had so much of livestock if I saw another herd of cattle or sheep again I'd likely have killed everyone around me," he said, chuckling even as he delivered the last line with such casual tone that it even made the little girl to his side break her staring contest with the simmering soup.

Bart simply nodded and returned to his meal, his body language easing a bit as he regarded it - gently picking a tough bit of rosemary out of the bowl and flicking it to the side. His casual demeanor seemed to ruffle the man slightly, the set of the stranger's jaw tightening. The tension in the air peaked, the only sound for a long, pregnant pause was the crackle of the fire, and the rattle of tin on tin as Bart ate, his exterior cool and collected, almost careless.

“So," the knight began, swallowing and tapping his spoon clean and setting it aside. “Is there aught I can do for you neighbor? I have little supplies, and I fear I snore terribly loud when I sleep. Even wakes the horse at times." he said in a deadpan, his eyes opening, staring hard as agates at the other man through his own heavy brow, his tone dangerously polite. “Perhaps I can have your name? So that I might ask after you further on my journey." he added as the stranger seemed to grope for an answer to the previous question; “I would hate to find you had come to a bad end because none knew to ask of your welfare."

The stranger's gaze hardened, eyes widened as his lips parted in a silent 'ah' as if acknowledging a touch in a sparring match.

“Parias, Parias Bahn." he said, dipping his head with an exaggerated flourish; “And my little charge here is Ishtar," he said, the little girl waving at him shyly, smiling without showing her teeth, before pulling at the taller man's cloak again.

“Pappy, I'm hungry," she said in a low whine, and that seemed to grab Parias' attention, eyes flicking to Bart a moment and the soup pot, and patting her on the leg again.

“I know, I know little one but we can't very well overlook our vows can we?" he said and clapped both hands on his thighs, rising from the log and cutting off Bart's response with a deep, rough clearing of his throat.

“Thank you for the sharing of your fire, neighbor. Our destination isn't too far ahead, and I find the night holds few terrors for a man with good steel at his side, eh?" he said, cackling softly as he patted his sword in its scabbard. “Come Ishtar, if you're a good girl we'll even get you a treat, something fresh and succulent," he said, some combination of the words — and the way the young woman's face twisted into an almost obscene parody of glee — twisted a knot in Bart's stomach. The two turned from the fire, though Parias paused, thoughtful.

“Careful of the road, Neighbor. Good steel wards away bandits, but if you don't know your path... you can find yourself lost very easily." he said and gave a faint grin and raised his hand in a casual, motionless wave before turning, pulling his cowl back up as his armor clanked as they filed out.

“A good evening to you as well... neighbor," Bart said to the empty air as they left, sipping at his water slowly. Watching them vanish into the darkness.

Sleep would not come for Bart that night, his mind haunted by the emptiness in Parias' eyes.

~ ~ ~

The Kingsroad was rarely lonely for long, and the unsettling evening before was rapidly replaced by warmer thoughts as Bart overtook a trade caravan of textile merchants by midday as they both made their way through the small hamlet of Bellway. Jovial folks of exotic stature and pleasant, cinnamon-hued skin that showed them as natives to the southern peninsula and its glorious alabaster spires and brass domed palaces. Their caravan had an exotic flavor to its very air, the scent of alien spices and remedies from faraway lands following it like a heady miasma. The master of the caravan was a short, athletic man of prime youthful years named Nazir - built like a bullwhip and very open with smiles and laughter, features that near-constantly painted his almost depressingly handsome face.

“Ah, it is good to meet friends on the road, is it not, my glittering giant?" Nazir crowed as they rode together, his warm baritone rolling out from beneath his exotically manicured facial hair: an oiled mustache and chin-beard that were so well-kept that on any other face, they'd be gauche and overdone. Yet the dark-complected man carried himself with such a natural grace and dare he say — swagger — that such ostentatious affectations only seemed appropriate. Bart could only smile, laughing as the man's warmth seemed to even pull the chill out of the brisk spring wind.

“It's becoming one of my favorite parts of traveling, friend Nazir." he agreed, folding his hands over his saddlebow. The pair made a ridiculous contrast, Nazir's own horse a white palfrey that trotted gaily next to Bart's massive dun-colored warhorse — and the two men were similarly at odds, with Bart towering over Nazir's spare, well-tended frame in both height and bulk. The exotic man nodded enthusiastically.

“I find you northerners so very enjoyably quaint! Tell me more about yourself, I would have stories!" he chided him pleasantly, and for once the usually quiet knight had no problem talking about himself and his goals, sharing his journey thus far, and his times at the Abbey to Nazir's rapt attention and studious enjoyment.

“So you are spellswords then? Wonderful! We have those as well, though our Akali are not as... regimented as your order, we make pacts with the Learned One and her children - Nagai and the like. its quite profitable, and also sometimes enjoyable as well." he said, wiggling his thick eyebrows over his kohl-lined eyes. “You've never lived until you've had an evening with an Al-Rezan apothecary my friend, the things they can do with their hands after years of anatomical study..." Bart colored from chin to brow at that mention, his mustache bristling as he squeezed his lips shut — which sent his boisterous friend into new bouts of laughter. Bart found his fatigue from his sleepless night melting away in the presence of the caravan.

Nazir's trade was many things, spices, silks, textiles of all sorts, and of course — stories. He was a trader of sorts, a dabbler in many trades but master of no specific skill. A bard or some regional equivalent in a language that Bart struggled with speaking. The rest of his caravan to hear him tell were all magnificent performers and perfect examples of his nation's wealth - and also his immediate family. His sister Naima and her husband Rashid provided additional help and muscle, Naima a slight thing even smaller than Nazir though only slightly - barely waist-high to Bart's frame. Rashid and he, however, were of a size to one another in both height and bulk - the burly southerner built like a fortress with a massive oiled beard and arms like tree trunks. His attire was different, almost uniformly a deep, vibrant blue color with polished silver cuffs and jewelry, save a bright cornflower yellow sash. Topped by a metal-studded turban of the same cloth which bore a silver clasp of a trident-like device that on closer view, was a three-headed serpent. He was armored in a simple breastplate over a mail hauberk and said that he was one of the Akali Nazir mentioned earlier. They all hit it off immediately, Nazir's infectious courtesy apparently a family or cultural trait, as they almost fell over themselves being kind to the lone Knight.

“An axe, mn?" came the rumbling bass of Rashid from his opposite side, having ridden up to check the road, Rashid was clearly their primary sentry and protector, and on his saddle rode a heavy-bladed sword of exotic make with a thick, gently curving blade that looked like someone had overfed a carving knife and then declared it king of cutlery. “Curious choice. Are you any good?" he asked bluntly, his basso voice gregarious and interested. Bart shrugged humbly and patted the axe head from its place alongside his saddle.

“I manage, friend Rashid. I am young yet," he said with friendly humility, which drew a toothy grin from the burly man, exposing a glittering golden replacement to one of his front teeth.

“Ah, honesty and humility. Traits I rarely see these days," he said, raising his voice in Nazir's direction across Bart's saddle, getting a snort of derision from the smaller southern man who raised a hand to point a finger.

“I am very honest and perfectly humble! It is simply a fact that I am wonderful, and so is everyone I deign to know," he stated as if it were immutable fact, written in stone and cast in iron.

“From his lips to someone's ears, I think God stopped listening when we were boys." Rashid rumbled into his beard for Bart's ear's only, drawing a lopsided grin from the knight as he rode along, Rashid shooting him a conspiratorial wink as he did.

“Pray, be us lucky and we'll reach Lachheim without either of us having to test our skills." he mused, scanning the horizon again before nodding and pulling his horse's reins gently, falling back towards the rear of the short caravan. Bart found himself liking Rashid as well, he reminded him of the Master-of-Arms, Bennett. Nazir filled the silence immediately with a recital of yet another story, which was perfectly fine with Bart, as his tale and their pace ate up the hours on the road in between.

Lachheim was a massive trade hub set at the first border conflict of the Northsea Federation's lands, uniting the two kingdoms of Reikstand to the east and Darrowmere to the west. It marked the furthest north Bart himself had ever traveled, so he knew the way well enough — the route they were on he had taken but a scant few times as a boy with his father, some two or three days away depending on pace. There they had sold grain and goods before his father's accident had limited his travel and instead required he hire hands to ferry his goods to market.

“Lachheim is a lovely place, quaint, only the first stop of many though!" Nazir bubbled as they went, passing a skin to Bart which smelled strongly of fruit and milk. He sniffed it a few times and took a drink, and found it cool and refreshing despite its thickness, a sweet fruity beverage that slaked his thirst and lubricated his dry throat. Bart couldn't really understand calling the massive, walled city of Lachheim 'quaint' — but Nazir was far more traveled than he, perhaps it was that compared to the splendors of Al-Reza.

“Are you going far then?" Bart asked, handing the skin back to the man who drank deeply himself, Nazir nodded vigorously.

“Oh yes, many stops on this journey. We will trade our spices here for grains, which we will then take further to trade for smoked meats and many other things. It's all very orderly, Naima has rolls of parchments with our planned trades. She's got quite a head for figures, I merely do the talking!"

“And Rashid keeps all of you safe," Bart added, glancing back as the brawny southerner looped around the handful of carts following them, manned by more gaily colored hands leading horses, Nazir nodded intensely, eyes turning serious.

“Our people are often considered lucrative targets for raiders, even back home. The deserts of the southern middlelands are rife with desperate men." he said, his bubbly voice serious for the first time, it took Bart off guard how dire he sounded, his eyes distant as he considered his home. He shrugged it off though, a smile spread across his face again as he turned back to Bart, his mouth open to say something before his eyes focused in the distance, attention pulled to the far hedgerow they had begun passing around the bend in the road. Bart felt immediately alert at the pause — and the moment of quiet caught his own attention, eyes flicking around. The birds had gone silent.

“Say, do you see that?" Nazir asked in the silence, pointing behind the big knight, Bart turned in his saddle to the side of the road; “That glimmer there, is that a hunting trap perhaps?" he asked as Bart's eyes widened in alarm as he focused on the object his companion pointed out in the far-off hedge. A glint of metal, waving in the breeze, a familiar and lethal shape peeking from between the hedgerows. The silence suddenly made sense, Bart's guts clenching with a million training drills screaming at his mind as he recognized it for what it was.

“No, that's a broadhead!" he snapped and threw himself sideways, no thought put into it. The burly knight wrapped his massive body around the southerner's torso as the unmistakable twang of a bowstring sang through the air — Nazir's fateful remembrance turning prophetic.

The arrow had been meant for Nazir, and its broad, flat head smashed and skittered with a shower of sparks off Bart's armored back and pauldron, drawing a long gash through the leather coverlet of his brigandine armor. Master Balgus' craft was without peer and the steel of his girding laughed off the crude iron arrow tip as Bart clapped his visor down, curling around the unarmored man like a protective bulwark. Two more arrows skittered off his armor with dull impacts he could feel through the plates like hammer blows — he hadn't time to think — only act, but a moment's thought in retrospect had him thanking God that they had not been bodkins.

“Ambush!" he roared, his voice a foghorn in the quiet spring air. Rashid's blade leaped to his hand in a flash, his own strange ring-like armor and squared-off cuirass glittering in the sun as he dove over Naima, barking orders in their musical tongue at the workmen, who dove beneath the carts and wagons — one screaming as an arrow sliced into his shoulder, toppling him from his seat, another going down with a similar cry.

Bart did not pause, he simply acted: grabbing Nazir by the front of his elaborate robes, he lifted with strength even he wasn't aware he had in the moment. His heart pounding a staccato against his breastbone as he hefted the smaller man from his saddle and wheeled his own horse, driving his heels into the war-bred beast as the dandy's palfrey shied and broke into a panicked canter down the road — its gaily colored rider dangling from the end of Bart's armored fist. Wasting no time Bart made for the rest of the caravan, the Knight's heavily armored body still between Nazir's wild-eyed, dangling form and the lethal fusillade as he galloped to the wagon Naima had taken shelter behind — several more stinging arrows daring to test Balgus' steel and dragging curses from Bart's lips. Pulling his reins sharply, Bart roughly deposited the dandy trader there with a terse nod at Naima and spurred his horse again with a harsh bark at the animal.

The attack came soon after. Dirty, grisly-looking men in mismatched armor and carrying weapons more rust than steel boiled out of the hedgerow, easily two dozen or more strong — too many for Bart's racing mind to easily count - and the big knight-brother cursed his lack of skill with a sword. Drawing his axe he knew he would only be able to disperse them with his horse, fighting from atop it with the lengthy weapon would be awkward against such numbers — Were it a short-hafted footman's axe or even just a damned arming sword he could have routed them in repeat charges. Instead, he set his teeth, inexperience warring with fear and his training in his heart — but then another of the wounded workers screamed — Naima's voice caught his ears, babbling something to Rashid in their native language and a steely resolve gripped his guts. Dipping the axe below his saddle, his grip on the haft low, he rose partially in his stirrups and bellowed at the surging throng of men.

“IN NOMINE DEUS!" the tongue of the White God — of his servitors on Earth and Heaven — rolled unbidden from his lips as he drove his heels into the horse's side. The dun beast gamely plowed forward — its own seasoned instincts and eagerness mirroring its master as it surged like a juggernaut, carrying its rider forward.

The sound it made as the armored mass crashed into the soldiers was beyond simple reckoning, a din of screaming meat and shattering bone beneath the brassy cry of rent armor — the horse itself did more damage than Bart — even as he rose in his stirrups and began to swing his axe in great, fluid strokes. His chops and hacking were not as much lethal blows as a raw, bludgeoning force that battered armored and shield-bearing men from their feet. His furious charge refocused the dead-eyed brigands on his armored frame, the bright colors of his order whipping about him as he came to the end of his charge. One hand tearing his cloak from his back and casting it aside as he swung partially from the saddle, spurring the armored beast to another charge as he almost casually stepped from the saddle partway through — having to briefly jog to arrest his own momentum. He set himself. trusting the animal's training to drive it true, and true did it run — flattening another handful of men beneath it as it ran the length of the caravan before slowing to a canter and snorting. It seemed to pause, before almost spitefully running down one more man and stomping him beneath its iron-shod hooves with a gruesome crunch of bone.

It was then Bart on foot, standing between the caravan and the disorganized raiders, there must have been a dozen on their feet, others stunned or rolling, wounded and dazed making up half again that number. Only then did he truly see the men fighting him, gaunt faces, hollow and hungry, and the smell of rot and disease rose to his nostrils as they rasped unholy battle cries from poxy throats. Something... ugly seized in his guts, a furious black hatred swelling in his heart as he faced down these diseased brigands. He had but a moment before they were on him, the knight shifting his axe into a high vertical guard and stepping to meet them at a measured pace.

The first blow landed with a devastating crunch, a man rushing in clutching an arming sword and round shield, catching Bart's blow on the wooden bulwark, but failing to appreciably slow his zealous might. The axe's master-crafted blade crunched through the ratty shield, arm, and then bounced off the man's helmet — the blow so sound that the raider crumpled like a squashed bug. Bart nearly stumbled in shock at that, he was strong yes, but he felt the man fold beneath him like rotten meat, unnaturally so — his shield still hung on the knight's axe as he stepped to meet the next enemy. No more time to think, the decimated shield shattered into a splintering mess of shrapnel as he swung the weapon in a brutal horizontal cut, stepping into the blow like a woodcutter and driving it into two raiders huddled bodies, bowling them to the side and freeing the killing edge of his blade.

“LAVA QUOD EST SORDIUM!" he roared anew, and unbidden came the celestial tongue once more, somewhere distant from the battle his mind mused that it would have been easier as a lad if the Holy Tongue had come to him so fluently in class as it did here. Just as quickly though the combat joined again, three men remained standing but another half-score struggling for their feet, wounded and shaken on the ground. An ugly, reedy brute ran at him, menacing him with a boar spear, demanding his attention. His grip on the haft shortened and he raised the weapon in a high guard once more, deftly batting the man's thrust to one side and snapping his hand forward, grasping the haft of the polearm and jerking it forwards — pulling the man with it off balance and vulnerable. His heavy, hobnailed boot drove forward into the man's face, crushing his jaw, nose, and cheekbones under the unyielding weight of Bart's fully-armored form, driving down into a stomp that met the ground with a gruesome snap, the brigand going suddenly, morbidly still.

Spear still in hand, he heard a cry from behind him; Rashid was holding his own against two of the men. More lightly-armored than Bart, he was also much more seasoned and cut through them deftly with an exotic, flourishing style that lopped limbs off and heads as easily as a gardener might trim a rosebush. However, to his side beyond his reach, one of the workmen was being menaced by a man who'd survived the initial charge. Unthinking, no time to consider his actions — Bart reversed the grip on the spear he'd wrested from the man, twisting at the hips, and with a roar of effort, he hurled the polearm overhand like an out-sized javelin, his armor squealing in protest as the limits of its flexibility were hit, hard. The spear arched in a wobbling spin, and drove into the mattock-wielding brigand like a thunderbolt — pitching him backward into the hedgerow like a broken doll, pierced through to the crosspiece of the hunting spear. The workman popped up with wild eyes and a look of fear and relief on his face — and then clenched his teeth, eyes at Bart's back.

A purely instinctual reaction to that minor movement saved Bart's life, almost smelling the filthy robber more than hearing the clatter of the man's loose mail behind him. He ducked his head and tucked his shoulders, and the war-pick that would have stove in his head, helmet or no instead glanced a painful clang off the rear of his gorget, causing Bart to stagger slightly. The attacker harried him more, forcing Bart to shift away as the beak-like tip of the hammer notched dents in his armor and bruises through it, hunching against the pecking, painful blows — no time to defend, he simply had to move.

The bandit over-committed on the final swing, a murderous gap-toothed grin on his face as he thought to finish a retreating foe, hefting his weapon and driving down hard at Bart's seemingly exposed back a final time, a cowardly frenzy gripping the filthy rogue — and instead swinging at empty air as Bart's long legs carried him clear of the chop — opening his guard wide.

Anger, hatred even, surged unnaturally savage through Bart's mind at the sheer glee in the man's eyes, his teeth set and his lip curled. Immediately the big knight wheeled, shifting his stance fluidly, and lashed his arm out in a vicious backhand that connected solidly with the man's over-extended weapon — slapping it out wide and squaring him up on the smaller, off-balance foe. On even footing he followed that swing up with another, this a right straight that blew through the smaller, wiry bandit's open guard straight through to his face. The brutal smash crushed his nose beneath the mitten gauntlet's unyielding knuckles as Bart drove his shoulder behind the blow, the man staggering away with a cry, his head whipping backward painfully. Bart wasted no time, regaining his stance he swung with aplomb - cutting the man down with a swift, chopping stroke of his axe — splitting the raider's head in twain with a hideously meaty thunk.

He froze there, a moment in combat slowed to a crawl as he watched the life leave the man's eyes... the lull stunned him as Bart grasped for the first time that he'd killed a man just now. That furious rage left him like water draining from a sieve. His hands shook around the haft of his axe as the man's weak flailing at the wooden grip faded almost instantaneously, the dead man staring up through splattered brains and flecks of bone at an unforgiving sky — his skull cleaved down to the bridge of his nose, opened up like a split melon of gore and gray matter. He'd killed a man, just like that. A cold regret gushed through his insides, bile filled his mouth and weakness dared to steal his legs from under him as clarity threatened to rob him of his righteous fury.

“FRIEND BART, BE ON YOUR GUARD!" came a clarion call from his rear, snapping him out of the shock as the stunned but otherwise mostly-unharmed raiders gathered themselves — notably among them the man whose arm Bart had crushed — another nine men in mixed arms and armor beyond that. Resolutely, he sucked in a breath that left him in a sob as he set his shoulders for yet more battle. Shaking the man's dead body from his blade, he turned his head slightly — Rashid was beside him now, his cruel, curved sword streaked with blood and a stout, round shield affixed to his left arm. The heavy wrapping of his bright, blue turban framed his severe face as he nodded at his brother-in-arms. His steady, understanding gaze offered Bart strength, he straightened his spine and took his axe in hand.

The two giants together were an unstoppable force, the ten men were reduced down to eight in two strokes, Bart's massive reach cracking open defenses for Rashid to dart in with a speed that belied his size, cutting, and stabbing like a dancer with his wicked blade. Eight became six — Rashid using his shield to literally bulwark Bart's two-handed assault, interposing it between the big man and harrying stabs and chops. Six became three, Bart lopping another man's head from his body with tears edging his eyes, Rashid disemboweling two more with snapping strokes. Three became one in a brutal rush, the blue and white flashes of cloth and surcoat both spattering with dark, fetid blood as they drove forward. One became nothing, the final man screaming as Bart's axe drove into his neck at an angle between his misshapen pauldrons and dented helmet, practically bisecting him before hanging in his stained gambeson — guts steaming in the cool spring air, the strangling brigand frothing up life's blood and thick gore as he crumpled in a heap.

The remaining handful of men struggled to their feet, streaming blood and tears they fled, Bart snarling in renewed fury and disdain, making to give chase — but Rashid's meaty paw grasped his arm and he shook his head.

“They are beaten, let them run. They will not try again this day." the seasoned warrior said bleakly, but with absolute certainty. Bart's chest heaved with effort, his muscles screamed and his lungs burned... and the strange black-blooded fury left him. Tears were streaming down his face beneath his visor, and he staggered back, looking down at the blood, gore and viscera that splattered his armor and hands - Then once more at the man who he'd cleaved down the pate. Bile rose in his throat anew, and he swallowed heavily. Raising his visor, he inverted his axe bit-down before the dead brigand — sinking to one knee before the corpse. Drawing his holy symbol from within the neck of his surcoat, he began to fervently utter prayers in the tongue of angels, tears openly pouring down his mustached face as he did.

“Your first kill?" Rashid asked after a long moment of silence, the prayers ended. He stood a respectful distance from the young Knight, wiping the blood from his weapon with a cloth. Bart could only nod, the welter of emotions within him blocking his throat. The big Southerner's face grew soft.

“Remember that feeling, never forget it. Killing must by needs become easier for men like us, but that is a weight you must carry." He said in a soft rumble, touching Bart's shoulder, the Knight heaved another sob, covering his face with a gauntlet-clad hand. Rashid stood near him, silent but present as he wept, for the dead man.

For his lost innocence.

~ ~ ~

The gaily-dressed man's eyes were closed, his face peaceful as they laid his still form into the bed of one of the carts, another man weeping openly and clutching at his sleeve, Fahad and Salim, he learned were the two men's names. Brothers in service to Naima by contract, Fahad had caught a broadhead in the heart during the initial salvo, pushing his brother out of the way. He was the only mortal wound the caravan had suffered, the others were non-threatening, Naima's hands were also skilled in medicine and had treated many of them, dosing them with healing unguents that closed the smaller wounds much like his Order's magic. Rashid held Naima as Nazir said words in that lyrical language over his body, wrapping him head to toe in a colorful mummy of silks. It wasn't much of a service, on the side of a road, surrounded by the dead brigands. Bart stood apart, still splattered in gore, his face swollen and tear-streaked as he looked on, watching Salim wail over his brother's corpse. The first innocent he couldn't save, he swallowed a lump in his throat.

“Friend Bart." It was Nazir, so focused on things was the younger man he hadn't noticed his approach, he sniffed loudly, meeting the man's gaze.

“You... you have done me a service I can never truly repay." the colorful man said, his tone muted as he spread his hands, Bart seemed a bit taken aback, he was a pragmatic young man, he knew that he'd helped save more lives than he'd lost — but Fahad's cold body still sat like a stone weighing on his heart. Nazir stepped between him and the body, his golden eyes intense like tiny embers.

“You are a hero today friend, Fahad would tell you himself. You are cut from the same cloth," he said, reaching up and touching the gashed dent in his armor where Bart had thrown himself in front of the arrow, Bart grimaced at that.

“Is it so brave that I risked nothing, I knew my steel would guard me." he croaked, his voice a mess. He did not cry often. It showed. Then, without warning. Pain stung his face. His cheek swelled as a red welt stood up on it, and he blinked away new tears.

Nazir stood there, shaking his wrist, the open-handed slap he'd given the man clearly smarting the dandy's soft wrist, but the smaller man's face was hard as stone as he grasped Bart by the gorget, hauling him down to his face.

“It matters not if you were naked as sin or wearing The First Paladin's own blessed plate you damnable fool. You did not even think. You saved my life and the lives of my kin and friends. This day we are brothers until the sky burns and the sun cools as an ember in the cradle of stars." he hissed with a fearsome passion that threatened to ignite him as surely as any flame might have, the dark-skinned man grasped Bart's neck and leaned in, kissing him hard on either cheek in turn.

“God put you here my brother. Put you here on this day and on this hour to deliver us from the doom waiting. He is perfect, you are not. Fahad sits by his right hand now, telling the Highest of High of his champion." Nazir's voice throbbed with conviction, enough that for a moment Bart felt pure, unadulterated shame as his own faith felt sallow in comparison.

“Thank you, friend Nazir," Bart said after a moment, feeling much as he did after confessing sins. He felt clean again in a strange way. “I... doubted, a moment."

“We all doubt, Brother," Nazir said, releasing Bart's gorget and reaching to his hand, pulling a thick signet ring from it. He took Bart's hand and closed it around it.

“The Houses of Al-Reza welcome you as a member. This ring proves my oath of blood. I have seen the color of your soul my brother, and I welcome it to my heart." he said and then looked down at himself, his colorful silks and linens were now slicked with gore from Bart's armor, and a look of abject horror washed across his face for a moment before he laid a hand over his face and laughed. Bart couldn't help but join him after a fashion. Salim came over a moment later, his tear-streaked face haunted, Nazir melted back into the carts, making a show of changing his robes.

“I... I wanted to thank you, Ser." the young man said, he was younger than Bart even, barely beyond his novice years himself, his brown eyes liquid and large as he met Bart's.

“My brother told me stories of the great Paladins of this land, he idolized your kind. I am glad to know his stories were true," he said, looking back at the carnage, then up at Bart again.

“He saved me. He was always saving me." he mused in a hollow voice, turning away from Bart and back to the cart.

“Thank you, for saving the others," he said, smiling as he wiped fresh tears, stumbling away to weep again in solitude. Bart raised a hand, too stunned to respond, to process it all. A welter of emotions raged in him - anger, self-loathing, fury demanding he do better, be better... and then pride. Joy even, a fierce sense of accomplishment - the strength of his mettle put to the proof. The big man grappled with it a moment before he was roughly shoved.

“Off. Now." it was a woman's voice, Naima. She had her hands on her hips, raising one to gesture at his armor.

“Off with it. I saw you take those hits. Armor is fancy and good, but you are made of flesh still. Let me see it, I have tended everyone else." she said, her face set hard but her eyes were full to the brim with worry and sadness.

“I would not turn her down, Brother mine." came Rashid's bassy voice as he joined the pair, wiping his bloody hands on a rag. “She has the very steel you wear for spirit, and will not be swayed. Better to be done with it and keep your earlobes," he said, getting a stern look from her he answered with a belly laugh, clapping Bart on the shoulder as he went by. Rashid seemed most unaffected by all of this, it made sense to Bart well enough, the way he moved and carried himself - he was a veteran. Death was a familiar companion.

Bart followed Naima to the covered cart she and Rashid shared, sitting on the end of it after unbuckling his brigandine armor and peeling out of the gambeson beneath it. He said a silent thank you again to Forgemaster Balgus for his expertise, getting into and out of the armor by himself was no more difficult than a particularly stiff coat. He winced as he lifted his shoulders to peel off the underlayer, revealing a series of wicked purple bruises where the arrows and harrying blows from the melee had struck him. Naima took him in with clinical detachment, her hands smoothing over his muscles, feeling around the bruises for broken bones — which hurt, a lot.

“Don't be a child." Naima scolded him as he winced as she dug her fingers into the bruise on his back. Bart gave her a flat look as she turned away to reach for her poultices again.

“Your prodding hurts more than actually being shot." he barked at her in a low tone, and she paused, looking at him alarmed, and then seemed to soften visibly, a smile on her lips.

“Good, you still have bite to you. I feared that the first brush with death had robbed you of your courage," she said, her voice softer... and her touch as well. She opened a pot of unguent and smeared it across his wounds, it immediately tingled and grew warm - he recognized the familiar thrum of healing energies, which drew his eyes to the pot.

“Magic?" he asked curiously, touching the wound a little as she moved on to daub it on other places. She nodded.

“Of a sort. You Paladins call down the Highest of High himself, we borrow his agent's essence and bind it into elixirs, poultices, tinctures, and the like," she said as she finished up, looking in his eyes back and forth, nodding to herself and stepping away.

“That's amazing," he said, looking at his body as he watched the bruises fade visibly, it wasn't as instant a cure as the laying on of hands in his order, but to have it in a jar on a shelf? Brilliant.

“Rezarian Alchemy," she said with a tired sort of pride as he wiggled back into his armor and clothing, she looked at him with an appraising eye. “Thank you, for saving my brother," she said after a long moment, blowing out a breath she'd been holding.

“Everyone is thanking me, I am not comfortable with it," he said, feeling oddly more... free, to speak his mind near the terse woman. She snorted.

“Yes, I heard my brother's gushing. He is completely serious by the way, you are as much family to us as if you'd married. He will see to it or die in the doing." she said, shaking her head. “He is impulsive, passionate, overreaching, and completely prone to frippery of all sorts," she said, thumping the cabinet with the medicines closed, and letting out an exasperated sigh.

“... and he's always absolutely correct," she said, her tone openly rueful and yet full of love. She turned to Bart again as he swung his armor up onto his shoulders.

“My brother can see the heart of a man in moments, it's a gift he has brought great wealth and happiness to many with."

“I cannot say if I agree with your brother's view of me just yet," he said, sighing as he leaned his arm on the cart, blood still smearing his armor's surface even as it hung open, pressing his forehead against the cool metal of his vambrace. “My head is a jumble, I can feel my inexperience like lead weights. I also feel... excited, proud of myself?" he said, shaking his head.

“I shouldn't feel pride for having killed, should I?"

She shrugged, folding her arms. “You killed for a purpose, the weight of that sin is between you and God is it not?" Bart nodded and gave his shoulders a shrug.

“it is... it is real now, I suppose. I've trained my whole life for this purpose, made a weapon of my hands and body for the work He laid before us. I guess... I just never thought as to why, and now it feels... strange. It was easy. Too easy."

“Of course it was. Taking a life is simple, just like that." she snapped her fingers before his nose. “You knew that," she said tersely, there was no way she could know of his training... but he supposed one martial culture was like another, Rashid in the distance was dragging the dead brigands off the road. Yes, she was likely very familiar with that kind of thing.

“I did." he admitted dumbly. “it has just been made real now. I am... I am processing how I felt during it." he said, looking at his hand.

“The words of the angels left my lips, and it was like my blood was fire. I could feel no limit to my strength. I felt invincible." he said, shivering at the remembered rush of... power, no other word for it.

“I believe I liked it. That worries me."

She snorted at him, and in quite an unladylike fashion - hawked and spit by the side of the wagon wheel as she busied herself with the remaining cleanup.

“You cried like a babe who'd been bitten by an enthusiastic puppy!" she admonished him. “Absolutely blubbered and wept, you cried ugly and honest," she said, and each word hit Bart like a sledgehammer of rueful shame, an embarrassed smile spreading over his lips as he looked away.

“You don't... don't have to rub it in like that," he murmured, and she gave him a shove.

“I do. You wept like a suckling babe. A man who enjoys killing does not pour tears and snot from his face over the body of a dead man."

The candor of her words struck him harder than the blows he'd weathered in the battle, the tiny woman stood before him like a giant. He clearly saw the beauty that truly had drawn Rashid in — her appearance was lovely yes - jet black hair and skin the color of exotic spices, eyes so brilliantly golden hazel that they unnerved him to look in, but her spirit — her soul towered over him. He stood, poleaxed by how she had cut him to the quick a moment, resisting the instinctual desire to simply say 'Yes Ma'am' and obey.

“Think on it." she instructed, closing up the doors of the cart; “But do so on your own time, my husband requires your help — men like you think best with your hands busy. Shoo." she said, pushing him bodily away, firmly dismissing his presence as she went back to the other workmen and began firing off a staccato of orders as they went about rounding up the spooked packhorses.

He found Rashid by the road, arraying the various men in a small clearing in a row, one of the workmen stacking freshly-chopped kindling for a pyre, the blue-clad warrior waved him over to one he was busy putting in order.

“Look at this, friend Bart." he rumbled in a low voice, the big knight walked over and was immediately glad he had yet to have lunch as the sight and smell of the corpse assaulted him, reeling back slightly and blinking away tears that welled in his eyes.

“Bracing, is it not?"

“It'll linger." Bart agreed, kneeling on the other side of the corpse from Rashid, avoiding the dead man's face with his gaze — the shock still too fresh, making it oddly easier to take in the gore. The body was one of those Rashid had felled in the final crush, its gut laid open in a horizontal slice just below the bellybutton, he shuddered at the memory of Rashid laying him open as such and then kicking him backward so everything just... fell out of him. He steadied himself, this was the reality of his world — he needs must adapt.

“What am I looking at?" he asked in a terse tone, eager to be done with it.

“This." the older man said, a long poniard of sorts in his hand, he turned over a mutilated organ, meeting Bart's uncomprehending gaze with a silent 'ah' of understanding; “It is the stomach, it opened when I gutted him. The contents are concerning," he said, pushing around in the viscera clinically, the sight making Bart wince.

However, what the big man lifted free on the end of the knife made him go cold. A single piece of desiccated meat, at first merely disgusting, but his eyes followed the shape and he turned his mouth down in a grimace.

“I may be sick." he said hoarsely. Perched on the end of the blade was naught, but a severed and gnawed human finger.

“Indeed, friend Bart. There's more but I'll spare you. I asked god's forgiveness and checked a few others." he said and waved at other similarly gutted corpses. “Bellies full of flesh and bone, yet they look like they are still starving." he shook his head, wiping his knife on the dead man's cloak and grasping one wrist, gesturing for Bart to get the other. They dragged him to the pile.

“What dark urge could drive them to such things?" Bart asked as they worked, lining the men up and laying wood about them, clearing brush from around the site so the fire would not spread to the surrounding woods. “There is a bounty to be had, even the hunting here is good. I've seen spoor of game large and small, let alone the charity of the Order."

“You are correct, it seems wrong. It smells of dark sorcery to me." the southerner agreed, laying the last of the dozen or so dead men to rest. Naima had come along afterward, sprinkling some kind of aspergillum-like device over the bodies, and she set about saying what Bart could only imagine is a prayer in their flowing tongue. Rashid struck flint and steel as she spoke, and on cue from the woman, they lit the pyre, consigning the dead men to flames and final judgment.

“I will take you up on that offer," Bart said to Nazir as the flames crackled, the dandy merchant had changed into a new set of traveling silks, these a cheery blue and cornflower yellow. He perked up, his khol-lined eyes attentive.

“I'll ride with you, at least until Lachheim. The roads may not be as safe as we'd like." Nazir nodded at that, smiling in spite of their circumstances.

“It is a good thing I think. We will take time to have Fahad's remains returned home when we get there, not cremated here in the wilds with these... beasts wearing the faces of men." Nazir said, looking up at Bart. “Salim asked that we have The Radiant Order bless his remains, Fahad apparently held you and yours in high regard."

“So he said," Bart said solemnly, looking hard into the flames. The men's flesh crisped and burned, and as he watched he felt the heat washing over him, searing away his own doubts and troubles. The fire hardened his resolve like clay put to the kiln.

“There are stories." Rashid said from his left suddenly, Bart's gaze didn't shift from the fire, but his head tilted to listen; “A beast that preys upon desperate men, near-death it offers them might, power, and vitality, they need but only consume the flesh of man." he said, spitting to the side in a superstitious manner.

“Such men who take this cursed bargain find that all other food tastes as ash, water never quenches, nothing sates nor nourishes them until madness takes them and they feast upon other men, and even then — their hunger is never quelled, it grows the more they eat until they themselves become as the monster who gave them the choice," he added grimly, hand on his sword's hilt at his side, the fire gleaming off his metal-woven turban.

“A beast of hunger, mindless hunger. They care not for anything but who which they may devour and induct into their obscene feast."

Bart considered this with the flames, the pyre collapsing into a sunken nest of embers to wholly consume the dead within, purifying them in its primordial heat.

“These stories, what do they call this monster?" he asked.

“There is no name in my tongue for it, we do not give it the notice of naming it." Rashid answered; “But those of your land call it Wendigo."

“Wendigo." Bart mused, the name was familiar, but he couldn't place where... if only Lucian was here, his mind was a steel trap for their book learning. He shook his head, filing the name away with the rest of the knowledge he'd gathered here, he had expected this journey to be a simple thing. Travel, sample some cuisine, see the world, and present himself to the Lady at the end... but now?

The world felt much more complex than it had in the Abbey. Nothing out here was nearly so simple. Rashid turned, clapping him on the shoulder as he walked past.

“I will go find my brother-in-law's horse, it is a good mare so she shouldn't have gone far. Pray, watch over them again until I return and we can leave this place." he looked up at the sky and squinted. “We should make Lachheim by nightfall, and we can sleep in a bed and have a meal with a table under it, yes?"

Bart nodded, his mind eagerly grasping onto the thought of happier things. Rashid paused a moment and tapped Bart's armor.

“Maybe take a moment to clean up while I am out, yes?" Bart looked down and yet again he'd forgotten, nose-blind to the smell, that he was still spattered in tacky blood and drying gore. The younger man blushed and nodded furiously.

“Good man."

~ ~ ~

Naima had a spare basin on hand, and it hadn't taken too long to wash himself clean of the mess of battle, sluicing cool water through his hair and washing his face in the small hand-mirror from his shaving kit, taking a moment to do that as well. Cold water was a less-than-pleasant way to shave, but he'd been doing it for years now, his first whiskers had come in at the tender age of fourteen summers and his mother had demanded he shave until the wispy down became a proper beard.

“A shame, you would look good with a full beard." came a woman's voice, Bart looked up briefly to see Naima standing over him, the rest of the caravan settled down on the carts, talking and distracting themselves from the losses — Salim sat between two of the other men, distant-eyed but seemingly content as they played some game involving a carved wooden board and small glass beads.

“Tried it once, gets snagged in the helmet straps," he said, scraping his razor across his broad chin one last time before splashing the cold water across his face, scrubbing furiously, washing the smell and taste of the battle from his senses.

“A shame all the same." she mused lyrically; “Here, allow me," she said and pushed in with a motherly firmness, taking a small tin from a pocket, she opened it and the smell of sandalwood hit his nose.

“What are you doing?" he asked and she grabbed his chin.

“Hold still. You northern barbarians always do wrong by your mustaches," she said, dipping her finger into the tin and producing a small ball of... wax? Rubbing it furiously between her fingers she smoothed it into his bristling, disheveled mustache and then gently drew it through with the comb from his own grooming kit.

“Ma'am, I feel remiss if I don— ow, don't state that this is unbearably awkward," he said, her face inches from his, she smirked and grabbed the edges of his mustache and twirled, twisting it into a neat, curling handle-bar shape at the ends.

“You are a knight, you should endeavor to look as heroic as possible. it's good for morale, yes?" she said and picked up his mirror, holding it before her face. He turned his head, the usual 'broom' shape his mustache occupied had been tamed into two neat curving sections... and he had to admit, he looked quite dashing like that. He sighed ruefully and pushed the mirror down, taking it from her.

“Do you ever tire of being right?" he asked her bluntly, and she gave an indelicate snort.

“Not even a bit. it's far too profitable" she said and patted his cheek in a patronizing manner, plopping the tin into his hand. “Two coppers."

“What?" he asked incredulously; “You're charging me?!"

“Sandalwood is a valuable oil, and beeswax is a prized export of our lands," she said proudly, holding out her hand. “I am ever in your debt, but my brother paid that back on behalf of our family already, so. Two coppers," she said and he looked down at her hand, then wordlessly he produced his purse and took two copper pennies from it, plunking them into her hand roughly.

“I thank you for your patronage, Ser Knight," she said with a grin, winking at him as she slipped away. He watched her go, marveling at how absolutely ruthless the woman was.

“Forget the Wendigo, she is the most dangerous thing here," he murmured to himself, looking down at the mirror and cursing quietly, he did look good. Dammit.

Just then, the clop of hooves came to his ears, he turned to see Rashid atop Nazir's white palfrey, moving in at a brisk canter, he grinned and patted the horse.

“I found her all the way down by the river, napping under a willow tree. What a prima donna." the big man mused, swinging down and handing the reins to the brightly-dressed dandy himself, who snorted and patted her snout.

“She is a cultured animal, you will be respectful of her temperament," he said, and Rashid rolled his eyes.

“Rider and mount as one," he said, walking off with a laugh, signaling the workman to mount up.

They set out at once then, pushing their horses to a mile-eating canter that made the carts bounce, but nobody complained at the rough ride, eager to be far away from the site of the battle.