The morning light had the color of old steel. Frost clung to every surface—the fences, the straw dummies, even the edges of the wooden blades. Breath rose in small, defiant clouds as the four squires took their places in the yard.

  “Positions!” Maxwell barked, his voice cutting through the cold like a whip crack. “Pairs. Kay with Reece, Toby with Zak. And if I see a single lazy swing, I’ll make you run until spring.”

  Zak grinned, rolling his shoulders. “He’s bluffing. He won’t last that long.”

  “Try me,” Maxwell said without looking up.

  The grin vanished.

  The sound of wood striking wood filled the yard—hollow, rhythmic, like drums echoing in the mist. Toby’s arms burned after the first dozen exchanges. The gambeson under his cloak clung heavy with sweat, even in the cold.

  Zak’s stance was relaxed, easy. He fought like someone born to it—not graceful, but confident enough to make it look that way. Toby matched him through grit alone, forcing his muscles to remember the drills Maxwell had hammered into them for months.

  Feet planted. Weight balanced. Breathe on the strike.

  Crack. Crack. Crack.

  Toby was breathing hard, but it wasn’t from exhaustion—not yet. It was that strange joy again, the rhythm of effort. There was something honest in it, something clean. Sweat, ache, breath—the body telling the truth. The feeling tugged at a memory: afternoons behind the barn at Brindle Hollow, swinging a stick at fence posts and pretending the world could be mended by a good, hard hit. That had been flimsily done—childish, wild, nothing like this. Still, the joy rhymed.

  Toby realized the quarrel inside him. As the rhythm took hold, a brightness rose from his chest and Toby liked it—liked the burn, the balance, the way his feet answered orders. Then the other voice arrived, cold as a well—You’re not here for joy. You’re here to put elves in the ground. The honest pleasure of practice collided with the hard edge of vengeance. Part of him wanted to stay in the beat forever; part of him wanted to break the world that had burned his home. He made himself breathe, anchor the anger to the movement instead of the other way around.

  Zak stepped forward, feinted, and swung for Toby’s shoulder. Toby blocked, pivoted, felt the satisfying jolt of contact through his arms. His muscles screamed, but he grinned anyway.

  Maxwell’s voice came from behind them. “Better. You’re fighting, not flailing. Keep that up, farmer.”

  “Trying, master,” Toby panted.

  “Try less. Do more.”

  Across the yard, Kay and Reece circled. Kay’s movements were measured, crisp—textbook. Reece looked desperate but determined, every strike too strong, too wide. Kay deflected with the calm of a man swatting flies.

  Zak glanced over and called, “Careful, Reece—you’ll knock him into next winter and then we’ll have to listen to him complain about missing spring.”

  Kay, parrying, deadpanned, “I don’t complain. I file reports.”

  “On our heads,” Zak said.

  “Only yours,” Kay said, catching Zak’s grin without looking.

  Reece huffed. “I’d like to file a report about how my wrists hate me.”

  “That’s standard,” Toby said, beating Zak’s blade aside. “Wrists complain, legs swear, pride pretends it didn’t hear.”

  Zak flicked a cut toward Toby’s hip. “Speaking of pride—was that a real parry or did the wind save you?”

  “Real,” Toby said. “The wind’s on your team.”

  Reece, still circling Kay, added, “I’ll trade wrists for balance. I feel like a foal.”

  “Lift through the crown of your head,” Kay said. “Soft knees. Less shoulder, more hips.”

  “Less talking,” Maxwell called, “more doing.”

  They did—but banter kept leaking through the work like sunlight through shutters.

  Zak: “Festival pies were better than training.”

  Kay: “Your stomach’s the loudest thing in the yard.”

  Toby: “That’s because your sword isn’t.”

  Reece: “I could do with a pie.”

  Zak: “You could do with two.”

  Kay’s mouth twitched—the nearest he came to a smile during drills. “Focus.”

  Zak rolled his shoulders. “Fine. We can talk fathers instead. Mine says I was born with a sword in my hand.”

  “Explains the head shape,” Toby said.

  Kay’s tone cooled a degree. “Mine says a sword in the hand is a debt you pay forward.”

  Reece’s blade wobbled. “My father said—” He stopped, breath catching. The circle narrowed; sound thinned. “He said to keep my stance steady and my eyes open and—” The words snagged, a hook under the skin. “—and then he didn’t come back.”

  For a heartbeat, something flared in Reece. His body moved differently, faster. His next swing came so hard it cracked against Kay’s thigh with a thud that echoed off the walls.

  Kay stumbled back, eyes wide. “Saints—!”

  Reece froze. “I—I didn’t mean—”

  Maxwell was already there. “Enough.”

  Reece dropped his sword. Kay rubbed his leg, grimacing, but the thick leather pad and gambeson had spared him more than a bruise.

  “It’s fine,” Kay said, voice tight but steady. “Surprised me.”

  Zak whistled, impressed despite himself. “Reece the Wobbly becomes Reece the Hammer.”

  “Quiet,” Maxwell said, though not harshly. He looked between them. “Surprised you? Good. Surprise keeps you alive. Reece—you felt that, didn’t you?”

  Reece swallowed. “Felt… what?”

  “The surge. The focus. For a heartbeat, the world slowed down and you moved faster than you thought possible.”

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  Reece nodded, small and frightened and proud.

  Maxwell’s expression didn’t change, but his tone softened. “Then it’s time you learned what that means.”

  He turned to the others. “Toby, you come too. The rest of you—off-duty after lunch.”

  Zak perked up immediately. “Truly?”

  “For once,” Maxwell said. “Don’t make me regret it.”

  Kay gave Reece a long look, then nodded. “You hit well. Don’t apologize for it.”

  Reece’s lips twitched in a nervous smile. “Aye.”

  Maxwell clapped his hands once. “Drills done. Eat. Then you two—with me.”

  The sun had climbed high enough to melt the frost from the yard walls but not the chill from the air. Toby followed Maxwell across the courtyard toward the far edge of the training grounds. Reece trailed beside him, quiet, chewing his lip.

  “You all right?” Toby asked.

  Reece nodded. “I didn’t mean to hit him that hard. I just— when Zak started on fathers, and Kay answered, and—” He stopped, jaw tightening. “My father used to say the same things. About stance. About keeping my eyes up. And then—”

  Toby placed a hand on his shoulder. “You don’t have to explain.”

  Reece blew out a breath that steamed. “Feels like if I don’t, the words freeze in me.”

  “Then breathe,” Toby said. “We’ll thaw them later.”

  They reached a narrow trail that wound down behind the keep. The snow here was untouched, the world quiet except for the soft crunch of boots. The path led to a cluster of stones—tall, pear-shaped pillars rising from the earth like frozen giants. Their fronts were chipped, cracked, and marked with shallow grooves.

  Toby stopped, staring. “What are these?”

  “History,” Maxwell said simply. “And a test.”

  He walked to the nearest stone, running a hand over the scars carved into it. “Every knight who’s trained under this banner has left his mark here. Some small. Some deep. None easy.”

  Toby stepped closer. The cuts varied—shallow slashes, deep gouges, even one jagged chip where stone had shattered entirely. The surface felt cold enough to burn.

  “Physical Arts,” Maxwell said, turning to face them. “You’ve both brushed against it. Once by accident, once by anger. But you haven’t yet learned it.”

  Reece frowned. “Learned? How do you learn something that just… happens?”

  “By understanding what it is.” Maxwell rested his hand lightly against the stone. “The Art isn’t magic, not the external kind anyway—and not in the way the bards sing about. It’s control—of breath, of body, of emotion. It’s the moment between heartbeats when you stop reacting and start deciding.”

  He looked between them. “When fear sharpens you instead of breaking you. When anger listens instead of roars.”

  Toby thought of his duel with Ser Dylan—the heat in his chest, the rush that had filled his limbs. It had felt wild, not controlled. Power, yes, but not his.

  “Emotion brings it out,” Maxwell continued. “But mastery keeps it alive.”

  He gestured to the stones. “These are our reminders. Each mark was made by a man or woman who learned to command themselves. You’ll try to do the same.”

  Reece blinked. “With—?”

  “Your wooden swords,” Maxwell said.

  Toby laughed once, before realizing Maxwell wasn’t joking. “You want us to cut stone with wood?”

  “I want you to try,” Maxwell said, smiling faintly. “That’s different.”

  He stepped aside, pointing to a bare pillar. “Your turn.”

  Toby exchanged a look with Reece, who shrugged helplessly. Then Toby stepped forward. The pillar loomed above him, scarred and silent.

  He raised the practice blade, inhaled, exhaled, swung—and felt the jarring rebound up his arm as the wood smacked against unyielding stone. The sound was a dull, unimpressive thunk.

  Reece winced. “You chipped the sword.”

  “Better than my arm,” Toby muttered.

  Maxwell didn’t move. “Again.”

  Toby set his jaw and swung harder. Same result.

  Then again.

  And again.

  Sweat slicked his forehead despite the cold.

  Reece tried next. His strikes were faster but no more effective—only noise and splinters. After a dozen attempts, both were panting.

  “It’s impossible,” Reece said, throwing up his hands. “It’s stone!”

  Maxwell crouched near one of the marked pillars. His gloved hand brushed a groove almost an inch deep. “So were all of these.”

  Toby stared. “You mean— they…?”

  “Every knight you’ve walked beside. Ser Dylan’s mark is there. Ser Sid’s. Even mine.” He pointed to a smaller, clean cut halfway up another pillar. “That one took me two years to make.”

  Reece blinked. “Two years?”

  Maxwell’s eyes softened. “The first months, you’ll bruise your hands more than you’ll dent the rock. But one day—if you learn to breathe right, to feel right—it’ll happen.”

  He paused, then nodded toward a different pillar, one bearing a round indentation the size of a man’s fist. “That one,” he said quietly, “was Sire Ray’s.”

  Toby stepped closer. The mark wasn’t a slice—it was a crater, as if the stone had been struck by a hammer. The edges were cracked outward, frozen ripples of force.

  “He punched it,” Maxwell said. “When he was your age. Angry at himself for losing his temper in battle. Spent a night here alone. Left that behind.”

  Reece stared in silence. Toby swallowed hard. The idea of Sire Ray—composed, gracious Sire Ray—striking stone with that kind of power unsettled him. And yet, it made sense. Control that perfect had to come from somewhere deeper than calm—from mastering rage, not avoiding it.

  Maxwell stood straight again. “Power without control breaks things. Control without power breaks you. Learn both, and you can decide what stands and what falls.”

  He turned to Toby. “That’s what your anger needs to become.”

  Toby’s throat felt tight. “You think I can?”

  “I think you already have the fire. You just haven’t built the hearth around it yet.”

  Reece nodded slowly beside him. “And me?”

  Maxwell smiled faintly. “You already heard the question the world asks when it hurts you. You just haven’t learned how to answer without shouting.”

  The boy looked puzzled, but proud all the same. They tried again, though neither expected miracles. Each strike thudded, cracked, echoed through the clearing. The sound of effort itself became a rhythm of failure and learning.

  Toby’s arms trembled, his palms blistered. Reece’s shoulders shook with the strain. The stone did not yield. Not a chip. Not a dusting. Only the honest report of wood on rock and two boys turning breath into will.

  Maxwell let them work until their swings lost shape, then lifted a hand. “That’s enough for today.”

  Toby lowered his sword, chest heaving. “We didn’t mark it.”

  “Not today,” Maxwell said, nodding as if that were the correct answer to a different question. “Good effort. You listened more at the end than at the start. That’s progress.”

  Reece grimaced. “Feels like failure.”

  “Failure is the road you walk to reach skill,” Maxwell said. “You don’t leap it. You wear it down with steps. Think of a bout—the strike you don’t see the first time bruises you; the second time you flinch too late; the third time you recognize the tell, and you live because of it. The unseen strike is the best teacher you’ll ever have, if you let it teach.”

  Reece’s eyes steadied. “So this is… learning to see.”

  “And to choose,” Maxwell said. “Breath. Body. Will. Again tomorrow.”

  They turned to go. Toby glanced back once. The pillars stood quiet, shadows stretching long in the low sun. No mark of his yet—only the echo of effort and the promise of a line he would carve someday, when anger and discipline finally shook hands.

  He wondered what his would be—a clean groove, a chipped edge, or something punched deep like a heart’s answer—and what it would say about the boy who had once survived a burning village.

  ***

  As they disappeared into the courtyard, Maxwell lingered a moment longer. He looked at the stones, at the faint shimmer of frost clinging to the marks of generations. His gaze fell to Sire Ray’s fist-print, and he smiled, brief and private.

  He reached out, touched the surface. Beneath his fingers, the frost melted instantly.

  “Still angry, old friend?” he murmured to the stone. “Good. It keeps us warm.”

  Then he turned back toward the keep—his breath not misting in the cold—and followed the boys inside.