Checking the body over calmed down my beating heart. According to my alchemy textbooks, the hare was in the condensation stage, making it a noble and just threat considering my cultivation. I mused on the strange standard of academic texts labelling beasts using the terms brought to us by our realm-walking visitor.

  Wood and Bronze were both in the condensation stage. It was where glamour was still being collected, the body's reserve always in need of being topped up. At the core, however, the Hearth was well-formed and constant. At Wood, you had enough to regularly infuse yourself, but it tended to be uneven or in short bursts. After the second gift and reaching Bronze, you could reliably keep your whole body infused, making it the stage when most began refining their bodies. Even with the additional gift, there was still the risk of running out of glamour if over-exerted.

  Before that was the Stone or Body stage, where mortals and most beasts existed. They could occasionally use brief puffs of glamour but had yet to form a true Hearth.

  Bors, however, was Iron, or in the foundation stage. His glamour was distilled from the emanations of the Fae into a resource he held within, condensed into something that began stamping his ownership on the concept. The better you understood yourself and the gifts you drew upon, the greater your potential for control. Beasts at this stage were often intelligent, some even capable of speech.

  Above that were Steel, Mithril, and a level simply known as Fae. There were only rumours about that final stage. At Steel, a cultivator had to start work on their soul forge. At Mithril, the Forge was completed and lit. Cultivators or beasts could then create their own glamour, achieving feats beyond what seemed possible. In academic texts, these stages were referred to as Formation and Nascent Soul. Fae had no academic equivalent, I wondered why that was?

  My mind was wandering, which seemed strange considering the focus that’d just been coursing through me. Confused, I tried to focus, only to feel something sickly and cold passing across my lips.

  My mind snapped out of the breathing technique I'd slipped into by accident; the death glamour had drawn me into it as surely as a feast gets the mouth watering. Embarrassment wasn’t my only concern. With rigid self-control, I locked down my Hearth’s demands. Despite the thick glamour still hanging in the air, I stopped myself and focused on the other task I needed to complete.

  Death glamour should not be so casually consumed. All had heard the stories of death-gifted cultivators going mad from taking in strong glamour. Their souls warped by their meal's power. The more powerful the foe or the more human they were, the worse the effect.

  The hare was no Fae beast of legend—though that would have saved my ego some distress. Still it was far from mortal: a high-level condensation stage fae beast in academic terms, high bronze in normal parlance. With considerable effort, I cut it open. The body was tiny. It felt like a cruel joke that I’d barely worked for the doe but had been beaten bloody for something Bors could finish in a couple of bites.

  I didn’t want the flesh. Beast meat was usually terrible unless your gifts were complimentary. What I needed lay just below the heart—a walnut-sized beast core.

  At the river, I washed it off. Beast cores were key components in enchanting and alchemical brews, but processing was necessary to eliminate impurities, the fragments of soul stuff that clogged pathways. In their raw form, they were essentially poison.

  Ignoring that, I popped it into my mouth and chewed like it was the nut it resembled. The tainted glamour it released surged through me, and I immediately began moving it around my body. I needed the impurities. After my first death, I had simply known. With the same certainty as knowing breathing was good, I understood the impurities allowed my resurrections.

  Processing the core took half an hour. I could feel the boost to my cultivation but also the soot-like residue narrowing my pathways. It was a start. I wasn’t yet near the level required to shrug off death, but this was progress.

  The restrictions it placed on my Cultivation weren’t substantial. I’d struggled for each sip of glamour for so long that I’d forgotten what it felt like to drink freely. I wasn’t eager to return to that state. I needed to reach the threshold for resurrection—not block my growth entirely.

  The day was drawing on, and I still needed to get back. I buried the rabbit nearby. Monster parts beyond the core had value, but I lacked the energy to figure out which ones to keep. Returning with the whole carcass was not an option. If Bors asked about the core, I didn’t want to admit I’d chomped it like a boiled sweet.

  I let a burst of smoke glamour clean my clothes. My lute had been a blade for mere moments and was now slung over my shoulder, soon joined by the doe.

  I arrived back at camp as the sun dipped low, feeling a natural exhaustion. My wounds were raw, and bruises were forming. I must’ve looked a sight because Bors ran over. I was touched—until his first action was to grab the doe from my back. The Knight Errant buzzed with excitement at the sight of the meat, helping me to the fire while gushing about my luck with the doe.

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  I stretched and focused on circulating the glamour in my Hearth around my body, speeding my healing.

  “I thought you’d kark it for sure. Looks like you almost did. Got into a battle with a bastard of a ballad, or fell foul of a malicious melody?” Bors grinned.

  “A barb you’ve polished for some time, I take it?”

  “Only most of the afternoon. I was pondering how poorly that battle of barbs would go for me.” Bors, with practiced ease, began to skin and quarter the doe.

  “Perhaps you should stick to slinging swords while I win with wit. Would you believe a hare did this to me?” His face fell.

  “Ah, fuck!”

  “What?”

  “I said it was safe, but I totally forgot about the Gale Hare. It never lets me near it, and it can’t threaten me. Those things are vicious. I saw one take a squire’s head clean off at Caerbannog. I could’ve sent you to your death ‘cause I was hungry!” Bors slumped, his titan-like presence shrinking.

  “Well, that’s a balm for my bruised ego if not my actual bruises. I felt a right fool after the fight—beaten raw by something I could pick up by its ears.”

  “You killed it? I thought you’d just escaped.”

  “Let’s say I’m stubborn. That hare met someone just as unreasonable.”

  Bors continued to gape at me, his earlier excitement replaced by shock and guilt. “I am sorry, Taliesin. Truly. This is why I’m stuck on this bridge—I do things without thinking.”

  “Like picking fights with Orders?” I prompted, trying to lighten the mood.

  “No, they pick fights with me. I just don’t think about the consequences of saying yes. I should be the bigger man, according to Arty.” He sighed, his massive frame hunching as he chopped at the meat. He seemed to be taking his frustration out on the doe rather than himself now.

  “I don’t see how you could fail at that,” I quipped. Bors chuckled but remained subdued.

  “I collected some herbs, roots, and tubers by the river,” I offered. “Shall we make a stew?”

  He nodded, heading to fetch water from the river with a pail. He returned and took my foraged bounty, setting about cooking with a focus that made me suspect he wanted to make amends. I let him take charge of the meal; his earlier disaster notwithstanding, I was still confident he’d do a better job than I would.

  Silence fell over the camp as I sat back and stretched, basking in the company. I hadn’t realised how much I’d missed simply sitting by a fire with another person who wasn’t scheming against me. While I circulated glamour through my Hearth to ease my aches and bruises, I felt a deep-seated relief being in Bors’ presence. He exuded a rough honesty, unpolished but genuine.

  This was, depressingly, one of the few times in my life someone seemed to care about me for my sake alone. Not my supposed value, my bloodline, or what use I could be to them. That thought twisted something inside me, and my fingers absent-mindedly plucked a soft tune on the lute.

  Smoke glamour danced at my touch, swirling into half-formed faces. The first was Maeve, quickly shifting into the Lady of the Lake, and then, unbidden, my mother’s face emerged. That sight made my hand falter, and the glamour dissipated.

  “You alright there, Taliesin?” Bors asked, ladling stew into bowls. He handed me one, its aroma rich and comforting despite the crude ingredients.

  “Sorry. I got lost in memory,” I said, shaking off the emotions that threatened to surface.

  “No worries. Your control is impressive, better than mine for certain.” A scowl crossed his face, and I could tell he was still angry with himself.

  “Bors, I’m not angry with you,” I said, deciding to put his guilt to rest.

  “Why not? I could’ve got you killed, all because I can’t stop to think about others for even a minute!” He stared at his bowl, his knuckles white where they gripped it.

  “This stew is really good,” I said, trying to distract him. “It doesn’t deserve the evil eye.”

  “You must accept some apology! There’s something I must do to make things right. You have to be angry.” His words, almost a command, opened wounds I thought I’d patched over. My emotions surged before I could stop them.

  “Bors, I’ll be honest with you, as I sense you’ve been honest with me. Until recently, I was as near to property as makes no difference. The chattel of some truly vile people.” My voice rose as I spoke, the anger and pain spilling out unchecked. “I spent every day trying not to have my light snuffed out by their whims. Surviving constant scrutiny where one wrong step could see me turned into spare parts. I was not about to die to some jumped-up rabbit.”

  Bors’ expression tightened, but he said nothing, letting me continue.

  “What’s nice is that I am free. I’m eating this stew, which has no business being as good as it is, and I have your company—a fine company at that. I could’ve stumbled across an Order prick who’d mock me or duel me for sport. Instead, I am here. I am alive. I am free. You do not get to decide if I’m angry!”

  Silence fell between us. I realised I’d stood at some point, my fists clenched. Flopping back into my seat, I grabbed my stew bowl and began eating, suddenly self-conscious.

  “Well,” Bors said, a grin spreading across his face, “that sounded pretty angry.”

  I couldn’t help it. I laughed—a deep, cathartic laugh that burst out of me. Bors joined in, and for a moment, the weight on both of our shoulders lifted.

  “And here’s me complaining about a bridge,” he said when we’d both calmed down. “How do you even get caught up in stuff like that?”

  “Let’s just say that when you mentioned being against divine cultivators, I knew we’d get along.”

  “Scum, the lot of them. It’s why the Orders drive me mad. They should be riding out to slaughter the divine cultists, not holding tourneys with them. I just wish I had some of your smarts. There’s a limit to how much sense you can beat into a bunch of knights.”

  “And if I had your strength, I’d have escaped long ago.” I smiled at the memory of my escape. “Though I will say, I lined up some revenge on my way out. Made them bleed for what they did to me.”

  “You might not be angry, but I’m still angry at myself over the hare thing,” Bors said. “Sounds like you’re set to wander for a bit. I’ve got a spare tent and some gear. You could join me here while you work out what you want to do next. I’ll keep you safe till you’re ready to move on.”

  “Totally nothing to do with wanting some company on this lonely bit of masonry?”

  “I am informed that a Knight Errant should have some mystique, so I refuse to answer that question.”

  “Another pearl of wisdom from your mate, Arty?”

  “Nah, that one’s from Percy. She’s all about reputation and stories of renown. You’d get along—you’ve both got the wits for it. They’ll all be back in a month or so, so my offer stands till then.”

  “I’d like to meet these knights who stand against the divine cultivators,” I said. “We could trade tips.”