The three days passed in a blur of jolting wheels and burning skies, time stretching and compressing like breath held too long.
Hallah remembered the morning of the second day with crystalline clarity—the way the light fell through the carriage window, the smell of the honey-cake Eira had pressed into her hands, the distant ache in her shoulders from where the kite shield's straps had bitten through her tabard. She remembered counting the bodies again, twelve or thirteen, the number slipping through her fingers like smoke through clenched fists. She remembered the tremors that came in waves, her hands shaking so badly she couldn't hold a waterskin without spilling.
Other moments were lost—whole hours swallowed by the rhythm of iron-shod wheels on cobblestone, the monotony of the Imperial Road unspooling before them like a promise that would not arrive. She slept without dreaming, or dreamed without remembering, her body trying to heal what the mind could not yet process.
Brant drove in silence, his massive frame hunched against the morning chill that never quite left the highlands. Eira sat beside him, her bow strung now, her eyes scanning the tree line with the perpetual vigilance of a woman who had learned that danger came fastest when you thought yourself safe. They spoke little, the three of them bound together by the weight of what had happened at Thornwick Cut, by the blood that still stained Hallah's boots no matter how many times she scrubbed them.
On the morning of the third day, the walls of Valeris rose before them.
They were three miles distant when Hallah first saw them, white stone catching the dawn light and throwing it back in blinding radiance. The Valerian marble had been quarried when the world was young, before the Silence, before the Rebirth, and it gleamed with a purity that made her eyes water. She could see the spires of the Crown Spire piercing the sky beyond the walls, the palace that had stood for nine thousand years, that had survived the fall of empires and the rise of gods.
And there, visible even from three miles distant, the Throne of Luminis—where the King sat, where the Paladins had once stood, where she would soon kneel or be broken.
"Gates ahead," Brant said, his voice rough from disuse.
The Imperial Road had widened as they approached the capital, expanding from a single thread to a broad ribbon that could accommodate two carriages abreast. They joined the flow of traffic—a river of commerce and ambition that carried them toward Valeris's maw. Merchants with laden wagons creaking under bolts of silk and barrels of wine, pilgrims in white robes with the six-colored sash of the faithful, nobles in enclosed coaches with gilded trim and curtains drawn against the common gaze.
The road divided into lanes: one flowing out from the city, one flowing in, separated by a median of flowering shrubs that smelled of jasmine and dust. Hallah leaned out from the carriage, her jade green eyes squinting against the morning glare. The line for the inbound gate stretched for half a mile, a patient serpent of carts and coaches waiting for inspection.
"Big line," she observed.
"We're expected," Eira said quietly. "The Academy knows we're coming. The King knows."
"Don't mean we get to skip the queue," Hallah muttered, but even as she spoke, she saw movement at the gatehouse. A captain in gold-trimmed armor broke from the shadows of the portcullis, his hand raised to shield his eyes as he peered at their carriage. He spoke to a subordinate, who ran toward them waving a white flag.
"Forge-master Brant Ironhand?" the captain called as they drew near. He was older than he'd appeared from a distance, his hair silver at the temples, his face lined with the patience of a man who had asked too many questions and received too few answers. His eyes flicked to Hallah, taking in her size, her sword, the tabard with its six colors that moved like living water in the breeze. "And the... Paladin?"
"Yeah," Hallah said, straightening her shoulders despite the tremor in her left hand. "That's me."
The captain's expression shifted—disbelief, then something like awe poorly hidden behind professional courtesy. He looked her up and down, from her pigtail braids to her boots, and she saw him calculating: four-foot-eight, maybe ninety pounds soaking wet, with hands that looked like they'd been smashed by hammers and put back together wrong. This was the miracle? This was the one in ten million?
"You're expected at the Academy, my... my lady," he said, the honorific sounding experimental on his tongue. "But not for two days yet."
"We'll announce ourselves to the Crown first," Brant said, his voice carrying the authority of iron and hammer. "The King should know his Paladin has arrived."
The captain hesitated, his eyes darting to the line of waiting merchants, the impatient nobles in their coaches. Then he nodded, stepping aside with a gesture that was half-bow, half-surrender. "Of course. The palace. Straight up the Processional, you can't miss it. The guards will know your sigil."
They passed through the gates into Valeris proper, and Hallah felt the city swallow them whole.
The palace was worse than she'd imagined.
Not the building itself—the Crown Spire was beautiful, ancient marble and soaring arches that spoke to nine thousand years of history. But the people. The courtiers in their silks and perfumes that couldn't quite mask the smell of fear and ambition. The guards with their perfect posture and judging eyes. The servants who moved like ghosts through corridors that seemed designed to confuse and intimidate.
A maid had been assigned to guide them—an older woman named Margarethe with graying hair pulled back in a severe bun and a habitual wet cough that spoke of decades spent in damp stone corridors. She moved with the economical weariness of someone who had served too many masters, her eyes fixed on the middle distance as she led them through antechambers that smelled of beeswax and old money, past paintings of dead kings with eyes that seemed to follow Hallah, past tapestries depicting battles she didn't recognize.
"The eastern wing houses the royal apartments," Margarethe droned, her voice a monotone of efficiency punctuated by another cough into her sleeve. "The Crown Prince's chambers are on the upper floor, the Second Prince's on the lower. The King resides in the central spire, accessible only by invitation."
Hallah's boots echoed too loudly on marble floors. She felt every inch the country bumpkin, the foreigner, the common-born pretender who had wandered into a world she didn't understand. Her calloused palms itched against her sword grip. She wanted to be anywhere but here—back in the forge where the worst thing that could happen was a burn, back on the road where enemies announced themselves with steel.
Then she heard it.
A voice—male, adult, cultured in the way of someone who had never been told no—raised in anger. "You worthless little shit! You think you can hide behind your books forever?"
Then a sound like meat hitting stone.
Hallah moved.
She was running before her father could grab her, before her mother could call her name, her short legs carrying her around the corner and into a scene that stopped her heart. Time seemed to slow, each second stretching into crystalline clarity as her mind catalogued details: the blue carpet, the white walls, the vase that had fallen and shattered, the two figures locked in violence.
The First Prince she knew him from descriptions, from the portrait in the Academy file, from the way he stood with the entitlement of a man who had never been hit—loomed over a smaller figure in blue robes. Crown Prince Aldric LXX, twenty-seven years old, classless, bitter, his face twisted with contempt and his foot drawn back to kick the boy on the ground.
The boy Lucan, ten years old, timid, the Second Prince—curled on the marble, blood on his lip, his glasses cracked and askew.
"Think you're special?" Aldric sneered. "Think your little Class S makes you better than me? You're nothing. You're the spare, the backup, the mistake that—"
Hallah didn't let him finish.
She crossed the distance in three bounds, her kite shield leading, and decked him.
Her fist—calloused, scarred, backed by five years of sledgehammer swings and the divine strength that marked her Paladin status—connected with Aldric's jaw with a crack that echoed off the vaulted ceiling. The Crown Prince's head snapped back, his eyes rolling white, and he crumpled to the marble like a sack of wet sand.
"Your Highness!"
The voice came from Hallah's right—a younger woman, pretty, terrified, wearing the gray dress of palace service with a silver pin that marked her as assigned to princely service. Althea. She had been standing near Lucan, Hallah realized, standing there while the Crown Prince assaulted his brother, her hands twisting the fabric of her skirt in a white-knuckled grip, her eyes darting toward the exits like a trapped animal calculating flight.
Hallah turned on her, rage burning away the fear and inadequacy that had dogged her since entering the palace.
"You," she snarled, pointing with a finger that shook not from fear but from fury. "You were supposed to be watching him!"
"I—I tried to—" Althea's voice broke, her eyes darting to the unconscious Aldric, to Lucan, to Hallah's bloody knuckles.
"Tried?" Hallah's voice rose, carrying the full weight of Bear's biker-bar authority in a four-foot-eight package. "Your duty is to protect your charge! One job! You had one fucking job, and you let that bastard kick him while you stood there like a fucking statue?"
Althea crumpled, weeping, her hands covering her face.
Hallah felt a flicker of something then—doubt, mercy, the question of whether she was being too harsh on a servant who probably feared for her job, her life, her family. The maid was young, barely older than Hallah herself, and the Crown Prince was a powerful man. What choice did she have? What could she have done?
Then she looked at Lucan, at the blood on his chin, at the way he flinched from raised hands even now, and the mercy died. The maid had made her choice. She had chosen safety over duty, comfort over courage. She had stood by while a child was beaten.
But even as the rage burned, Hallah felt the weight of it—the knowledge that Althea was broken, that she had been broken before, that the palace had a way of breaking people. She shoved the thought aside. There would be time for mercy later. Now, there was only the aftermath.
"Margarethe," Hallah said, turning to the older maid who had guided them, whose face had gone white with shock. "Run to the King. Tell him the Paladin has arrived, and she's just knocked his Crown Prince unconscious for assaulting his second son. Tell him I request immediate audience."
Margarethe's eyes went wide as dinner plates. "I—you—he's the Crown Prince, I can't just—"
"Run!"
She ran, her footsteps echoing down the corridor, and Hallah turned back to Althea.
"Get up," Hallah said, her voice softer but no less hard. "Go to the throne room. Wait for me there. If you've got any sense, you'll tell the truth when asked."
Althea nodded, scrambling to her feet and fleeing, her sobs fading down the corridor.
Brant arrived then, his face a mask of controlled horror. "Hallah, you can't just—"
"I just did," Hallah said. She knelt beside Lucan, her anger draining into something gentler as she looked at the boy. He was shaking, she saw, fine tremors that ran through his thin frame, and his eyes were wide behind the cracked lenses of his glasses.
"You okay?" Hallah asked, her voice rough-soft, the accent of Sovringard creeping in. "Can you move? Anything broken?"
"I—" Lucan's voice cracked. He touched his lip, came away with blood on his fingers, and stared at it like he couldn't understand where it had come from. "You hit him. You hit the Crown Prince."
"Yeah," Hallah said. "And I'd do it again. You got a handkerchief? You're bleeding on the nice floor."
He laughed—a wet, broken sound—and fumbled for a cloth. "Who are you?"
"Hallah," she said. "Your new Paladin. Apparently."
They had perhaps ten minutes before the guards arrived. Hallah spent them checking Lucan's injuries—split lip, bruised ribs, nothing broken—and ignoring her father's attempts to explain why assaulting royalty was generally considered poor etiquette.
"She had to," Lucan said suddenly, his voice small but firm. "Althea. She was afraid. He's—he's done this before. She tried to stop him once, and he had her... punished."
Hallah felt something cold in her chest. "Punished how?"
Lucan didn't answer, but his silence was eloquent.
She looked at the unconscious Aldric, at the purpled bruise already forming on his jaw, and she didn't feel sorry for him. But she felt something complicated about Althea, about the maid who had failed because she had been broken before, who had chosen survival over righteousness because survival was all she had left.
The guards came in force: twenty men in gold-trimmed armor, spears lowered, faces grim. Their captain was a tall man with a scar that ran from his left eye to his chin, and he looked from the unconscious Crown Prince to Hallah, to Lucan, with the expression of a man who had just stepped into a play without knowing his lines.
"The King summons you," he said carefully. "All of you. Immediately."
Aldric was stirring as they lifted him, groaning, his hand pressed to his jaw. His eyes found Hallah, and the hatred there was pure and uncomplicated, the look of a man who had never been denied and would not forgive.
"You're dead," he mumbled through swelling flesh, the words slurred. "Common-born trash. I'll have you—"
"Your Highness," the captain interrupted, his voice firm, "the King commands your presence as well. And your silence."
They half-carried Aldric, his legs unsteady, his eyes never leaving Hallah's face. She stared back, unflinching, her hand resting on Gold Rush's grip.
The throne room of Valeris was designed to intimidate, and it succeeded.
Hallah felt it the moment she crossed the threshold—the way the space swallowed sound, the way the light from the high windows fell in precise beams onto the white marble floor, the way the Throne of Luminis seemed to float at the far end, occupied by a man who wore nine thousand years of history like a cloak that was too heavy for any mortal shoulders.
King Aldric LXIX was old—eighty-seven, she knew from her studies—but he didn't look frail. He looked final, like a judgment that had already been rendered. His eyes, gray as winter storms, fixed on her as she approached, and she felt the weight of his attention like a physical pressure.
"Kneel," a herald whispered urgently. "At the sun-mark, there, before the steps."
Hallah found the spot—a disk of gold inlaid in the marble—and knelt. Brant and Eira knelt beside her, slightly behind. Lucan stood to her right, trembling. Aldric stood to her left, supported by guards, his jaw purpled with bruising.
"Rise," the King said. His voice was quiet but carried to every corner of the vast space. "And speak. What happened in the eastern gallery?"
Hallah rose. She felt the eyes of the court on her—nobles in their silks, guards at attention, the two maids huddled near a pillar, Margarethe gray-faced and Althea still weeping. She took a breath, let Bear's confidence fill her chest, and spoke in her normal voice—the voice of a Sovringard smith's daughter, rough edges and working-class vowels intact.
"Your Majesty," she said. "We was being shown to the guest quarters by Mistress Margarethe here. Heard shouting. Came around the corner and saw your Crown Prince standing over Prince Lucan, about to kick him while he was down. Lucan was bleeding. Mistress Althea, who was assigned to watch him, was standing there like a statue."
She jerked a thumb at Aldric.
"So I knocked him out. He needed knocking. Then I yelled at Mistress Althea, who let it happen, and I sent Mistress Margarethe to fetch you."
The silence was absolute.
The King's eyes moved to Aldric, then to Althea, then to Lucan. "Is this true?"
Lucan nodded, small and quick.
"And you," the King said to Althea, his voice dropping to a whisper that was somehow worse than shouting. "You stood by while your charge was assaulted?"
Althea fell to her knees, weeping.
"Guards," the King said. "Remove the Crown Prince to his chambers. He will attend no audiences for three days. And take Mistress Althea to the lower cells. She will receive what is given to those who betray their duty in service to their King."
Hallah watched them drag Aldric away, his eyes burning holes in her back. She watched the guards lift Althea, who didn't resist, who seemed almost relieved, and she felt that complicated thing in her chest again—the knowledge that justice was necessary, the doubt that mercy might have been better, the rage that protected her from regret.
"Paladin," the King said, and his voice had changed, become almost gentle. "You protected my son. My timid, brilliant son, who has known only fear in this palace. I thank you."
"He's just a kid," Hallah said. "Shouldn't be getting kicked by his own blood."
"No," the King agreed. "He should not." He paused, studying her. "You wish to make an oath."
"Yeah," Hallah said. "I want to swear to the Kingdom. Public. Before the nobility. Before... everyone. I want them to know. I want it to be real."
The King nodded slowly. "A messenger, then." He gestured, and a herald ran.
While they waited, the King asked questions. About her childhood in Sovringard, about her training, about the bandits at Thornwick Cut. Hallah answered honestly—her foul mouth slipping through occasionally, making Brant wince.
"What will happen to Mistress Althea?" she asked, the question escaping before she could stop it.
The King's expression went grim. "She will be judged. Betrayal of duty is not forgiven in Verdantis."
Hallah nodded, but the doubt remained, a stone in her gut.
The court began to arrive. Nobles in their finery, ministers with their ledgers, guards in perfect ranks. They filled the throne room, whispering, staring at the four-foot-eight girl with the sword and the tabard.
When the room was full, the King nodded. "You may proceed."
Hallah turned. She drew Gold Rush, the blade singing against the scabbard, and held it horizontally across her palms. She walked to Lucan and knelt before him.
"I, Hallah Sovringard," she said, her voice carrying to every corner, "do swear to you Lucan, my blade and my shield. I shall be your Paladin, your blade that cuts down your foes, foreign or domestic. I shall be your shield to defend you against all attacks that would bring you to harm. I shall be your guiding light should your path go astray, for I am your Paladin."
She held out the sword, offering it to him.
Prove it to me.
The voice filled her mind like light, like the sun itself speaking. Syltherion. The Weaver.
Speak them in the tongue of magic. Prove your words. I shall give you the words.
Hallah's mouth moved without her conscious thought, the syllables rising from somewhere deeper than memory.
"Egomoi ligier Lucan-ae fortfort! Ferfrappe hostennemi et protegéger amicami! Sancte impermand egomoi Paladin! Ferfrappe hostennemi brûlant frangbrise! Protegéger omnous contré morsmort! Luxmière ducere si terrater tordu! Car egomoi sancsaint Paladin aeternel!"
The LINGUA ARCANUM rang through the throne room like struck crystal, each phrase landing like a bell strike.
And the sun moved.
A single beam, impossibly precise, pierced the high windows and fell upon Hallah and Lucan alone. The rest of the court fell into shadow. The two of them stood illuminated in a column of golden light that seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere, that warmed without burning, that witnessed.
Lucan's small hand closed around the blade of Gold Rush, accepting the oath.
"I accept," he whispered.
The light faded slowly, reluctantly.
Hallah rose, sheathed her sword, and turned to face a court that stared at her with expressions ranging from awe to terror to hatred.
"Well," she said, her voice rough in the silence. "That's done