We reached Emma's manor just as dusk started to bleed across the sky. Forest gave way to lighter woods scattered among pastoral fields and green hills, much of it dotted with small hamlets surrounded by apple orchards and vineyards.

An idyllic country, on the surface. If it weren't for the dark thing haunting it, I'd have felt calmed by this place. It was like the famines and wars that'd frequented the realms in recent years hadn't touched it, making it a window into some gentler time. We were near the Fences, and though the misting mountains were darkened by the setting sun they added to the picturesque scenery.

It wasn't all apple trees and tamed woods, though. There were graveyards here and there, all of them fenced or walled in to keep the ghosts penned until one of the shepherds of the dead meandered through to claim them. I could tell it'd been a long time since a shepherd had been this way, because shades watched me from behind weathered grave stones, from the tall grass or the shadow of trees, their faces sullen and pale in the dying light.

They sensed the fire in me, and longed for it. Their eyes were hollow and hungry in the growing gloom.

No matter how pretty a country, there are always ghosts. Always graves. Always rot. I couldn't forget that. It'd get worse after dark. At least I could sleep inside tonight.

Emma, either not seeing the dead or not caring, seemed lost in thought as we walked. She'd been quiet since our encounter with the revenant. Occasionally she'd glance at me, some question reaching her lips and dying there before it could be spoken.

I didn't press her. We'd have time to talk soon enough. I sensed the confrontation in the woods had shaken her, more than she let on.

Her manor wasn't nearly as ostentatious as I'd expected, from her regal manners and the rarity of her magic carriage. Set on a hill overlooking an old, overgrown stretch of field surrounded by woods, placed well away from the few hamlets scattered across the nearer country, the structure looked old and tired. A knight's manor, of the kind a landed man-at-arms would dwell in when not serving their lord. I could see untended ivy creeping up the walls and rust on the iron gates. The moat had gone dry. Several windows had wooden shutters rather than glass, and the gardens needed care.

The other dwellings we'd passed had looked well tended, mostly comfortable cottages and white houses with fresh paint. I'd seen herds of animals, livestock chimera of some local variety, and they'd looked well fed.

Which made this place's neglect more stark. Rather than looking relieved to be home, Emma stared at the melancholy building with dull, resigned eyes, telling me she didn't miss what I'd noticed.

A stone-laid path led up the hill to the manor's front door. I noted a figure waiting for us atop the front steps. A tall woman in her thirties, with hands nervously clasped in front of her. She lifted those hands as we approached, as though in prayer. She was dressed as a servant in a simple green dress and cream yellow shawl.

The woman stepped down from the porch as Emma ran her eyes across the house dispassionately. "Welcome home, my lady. I am glad to see you returned safe."

Her voice held a tired edge, making it huskier than I imagined it would otherwise be. The stranger curtsied low. She had a narrow face, with a long nose and green eyes, her brown hair secure in a braid wrapped about her neck like a choker — a westerner fashion.

Her eyes flicked to me briefly, but she otherwise kept them downcast. When she took in the battered state of us, her eyes widened. "What happened, my lady!? Are you alright?"

"Vanya." Emma addressed the maidservant without answering the question. "This is Master Alken, my guest. He is going to be staying with us for a time. I trust you'll see him made comfortable?"

Vanya's eyes widened further as she took in my armaments, though I saw some doubt creep into her expression at the use of Master, a vaguer title more commonly used for professionals of a dubious sort. Or just ordinary craftsmen, which I obviously was not.

Armed individuals who are not knights are more often something worse, so I didn't blame her for being worried. The woman still curtsied to me respectfully. Emma started to move past her, but something about Vanya's hesitant demeanor made the young aristo pause. She lifted an impatient eyebrow at the maid.

"It's Lord Brenner," Vanya said, her voice hushed and nervous. Again she wrung her hands. "He's inside. His son is with him, along with two others. One of those I do not know. I think he's a soldier of some kind, a new arrival, and the other is Preoster Eskander.

Only then did I note the stable set near the manor house. There were riding chimera reined outside of it. Three of them were some kind of deer-like creature — kynedeer, a common animal in the west and south — and one looked like something halfway between a shaggy dog and a lion.

The way Emma's face transformed was telling. Her eyes narrowed, her jaw clenched, and her posture went stiff. "I see," she said in a tight voice. "Then I must not keep his lordship waiting."

Vanya still looked nervous. "Would you… perhaps like to clean up first, lady? At least have your injuries tended to."

"Must not keep our guests in suspense." Emma spoke through her teeth. "Besides, he's likely already seen us approach. I'm not going to pretty myself up before entering my own home."

She made that last statement pointedly, and Vanya winced. The young noble turned to me, and I saw her make an effort to compose herself. "It seems like I must introduce you to my benefactor. If you would follow me?"

I nodded. "There trouble?"

Emma opened her mouth, and I saw the deflection coming. She paused, and her tartness faded. "It's nothing that need concern you," she said. "He isn't aware of my relationship with Lady Nath. I will introduce you as a mercenary hired to guard me. You will be from…" She thought for a moment. "Kingsmeet. You will be Alken the Red, a sellsword who lost his liege during the wars. Does that suit you?"

I shrugged. "It serves." It was also mostly true, which would keep me from having to lie too much. Lying hurt.

I followed the young noblewoman into the manor with the maid hovering at our backs. Qoth had vanished somewhere before we'd gotten close to the manor. Inside, things seemed more put together than the exterior — still old, but clean and comfortable. We passed into a foyer dominated by hunting trophies.

Emma visibly steeled herself with a deep breath, then led me into a spacious sitting room. There were shelves with books, candelabras in abstract designs, and cushioned seats. The same House mark Emma wore on her ring and sword hung on the wall over the fireplace, affixed to a decorative shield of the same kind most nobles would hang in their main hall or throne room.

Inside the room stood four men. They turned to us as we entered.

"And there she is!"

The most well dressed of the four, a man with a ruddy brown beard and receding hair, had been staring at the shield above the fireplace. I couldn't be sure, but he seemed to have a sour expression before he turned and saw us. His voice was jovial, but the flash in his eyes and unmoderated volume in his voice seemed too aggressive for welcome.

"It is good to see you safely returned," he said. "We had feared the worst… and it seems we were right to!" His eyes took in Emma's appearance, with her damaged clothes, mussed hair, and assortment of scrapes and bruises from our ungentle landing earlier in the day. She'd made an effort to clean herself up, but there wasn't much to be done without a wardrobe and bath.

I studied the man, who I took to be Lord Brenner Hunting. He was big, almost bearish, dressed in a rich doublet done all in deep browns and reds, the upper sleeves padded with gem-studded nets. Rich garb for the ruler of a rural fief. I knew his son immediately, a man with similar height, color, and brawniness in similar if more functional garb, lacking only the age and beard.

Emma bowed in the knightly fashion rather than curtsying. I saw the lord's jaw tighten at that.

"There is no need to fear, my lord." Emma's expression remained pleasant, with eyes sparkling with a confidence the hands clasped behind her back told the lie to, though only I could see how tightly they were clenched. "As you can see, I am returned safely."

"Safely?" The lord showed his teeth. It wasn't quite a smile. "Your appearance would attest otherwise."

Emma's jaw tightened stubbornly. They matched glares a moment, and Brenner looked away first. I couldn't be sure, but it was as though he couldn't meet the girl's eyes too long.

He covered it by facing me. "I see you did not return alone. Perhaps introductions are in order?"

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Emma glanced at me. "My lords, this is Ser Alken the Red. He is a specialist I hired, and—"

"A mercenary?" Brenner's voice filled the room like a thunderclap, his face darkening with the onset of anger. "You brought a vagabond sellsword into my lands without my leave?"

The man closest to him — a tall, militant type with hair shorn nearly to his scalp and an angular face — watched me curiously. He looked to be in his forties. He wore exquisite armor, fashioned of dark steel and inscribed with faint lettering along its contours. A dark gray cloak covered the ensemble, making him look like a particularly martial crow. I took this to be the "soldier" the maidservant had mentioned, but he was definitely a knight and I recognized the etchings on his armor as holy scripture.

A Church knight, dedicated to one of the holy orders. I couldn't tell which.

"I told you this would happen." This came from the fourth man in the room, a clergyman in the golden-brown robes of a preoster. He stepped forward in a dramatic rustle of wool. He was of average height, thin and hungry looking with haunted eyes shadowed by lack of sleep. With a slight stoop, the golden torc hung around his neck looked like a weight.

I saw it," he spat as he glared at Emma like she were the very image of sin. "I told you, my lord, and perhaps now you will heed me. Near the lake south of Orcswell, this witch spoke with a dark apparition there, a fiend right out of the smoldering Pits."

He swallowed, the bob in his throat vanishing a moment as he clutched his auremark. He'd wrapped the holy emblem's chain around his wrists like manacles rather than wearing it on his neck. "An elf maid she seemed, sat upon a monstrous steed pierced by many blades, with black wounds for eyes and hair like spindle-woven shadow about her pale dress. Fair she was, and terrible to behold!"

He'd started to breathe heavier during his speech, and clutched his auremark even tighter. The gray knight lifted an eyebrow at the priest.

Brenner seemed not to notice the preoster's strange demeanor. He lifted his chin at the girl, waiting for her explanation.

Emma's own anger showed its teeth in the sudden sharpness in her tone, like clear glass beginning to crack. "I know nothing about any apparitions, but I am the scion of my own House and allowed a guard of my own choosing."

"I could have offered you a guard," Brenner said pointedly. "I have offered it. My son has volunteered for the role more than once."

He gestured to the young man standing apart from the other three, a distance I sensed to be deliberate. Though he shared his father's brawny build and thick brown hair, he had a boyish face that made him look younger than I believed he truly was. I guessed him to be twenty, perhaps a bit younger and not much older than Emma.

He also didn't have the same attitude as his father or the preoster, and very much seemed like he didn't want to be there. He didn't meet anyone's eye, and coughed when his father brought attention to him.

Emma didn't quite sneer, but it was in her eyes. "Forgive me lord, but I have reason to doubt your household's ability to protect me. You have failed before."

Brenner's expression darkened further. "What happened to your parents was a tragedy, and best not discussed here in front of… strangers."

He glanced at me.

"This is my home," Emma hissed. "It is my privilege to speak as I will."

"Indeed?" Lord Brenner asked crisply. "And the privilege to steal from me? Is that also owed to you, little shrike?"

Emma seemed taken aback. "Steal from you?"

"Surely you don't believe we didn't notice the Night Coach missing from my grounds the very same morning you took it?"

The glass of Emma's calm shattered. Her face went pale with rage and she took a step forward, balling her fists. "That carriage belongs to my family," she snarled. "My parents brought it from Castle Liutgarde. It is a heirloom of my House!"

Eskander turned his nose up at the girl. "And likely as full of devilry as everything else from that accursed place. And where is the vile contraption?" He looked at Brenner. "I told you it would be better to have it burned, my lord."

Emma glared at the priest, and for a moment I wondered if the man would suddenly combust. She was a witch, though I wouldn't confirm that to these men. "You need not concern yourself with that, good preoster. It crashed in the forest when the Burnt Rider attacked us. I barely escaped with my life, and did so only thanks to my new guard."

She indicated me. That was the second time she'd lied to these people.

But Brenner completely disregarded me and her statement about the revenant. His face went pale. "Destroyed? You lost it!? Foolish, irresponsible girl! Do you have any idea how valuable that coach was? It was priceless!"

"And mine," Emma repeated. I saw something like satisfaction in her face, though the loss was as much hers as the lord's.

"Insolent brat!" Brenner took a step forward, looming large as he lifted a hand. He stood much taller and heavier than the girl. Fear flickered across her face.

I stepped forward, putting myself between them. The knight reached for his sword, a warning in his eyes, and the preoster started to shout.

Brenner's son stopped the situation from escalating. He'd been quiet up to that point, lurking in the background with a watchful expression. He stepped forward, placing a hand on the older man's arm. He gripped tight, and Lord Brenner halted.

Stronger than he looks, I thought. Brenner didn't look at the boy, his angry eyes fixed on me. We were of a height, and he was more broad which gave him weight on me. If it came to a fight, I wasn't sure I could take the knight, him, and his son in these close quarters without magic.

Something about the gray knight made me think he probably had Art too. Most Church knights were basically martial clerics, and trained to wield aura.

"Please father." The young man spoke softly. He had a calm voice, and a calm face, a quiet hill to his father's thundercloud.

Lord Brenner tore his eyes off me to glare at his son. Emma stood her ground, her demeanor proud, though I noted her hands shook. The armored knight kept his eyes on me, and I on him. He seemed very calm.

No, not calm. Amused. I decided I didn't like that one.

The lord mastered himself, though by the way he jerked his arm from his son's hand I didn't think it a total submission. He studied Emma a moment, snorted derisively, then turned to me in an obvious dismissal of the girl.

"I apologize for that unpleasantness," he said to me, adjusting his sleeves before placing a hand over his chest and tucking the other behind his back. "It has been a stressful past three days. We thought the young lady lost to us, fallen afoul of some evil. She is like a daughter to me, and I admit to a father's wrath in the wake of relief."

A shadow of anger passed over Emma's face, uglier than anything she'd expressed before.

"I am Brenner Hunting," the nobleman continued, not noticing or not minding the lady's ire. "Lord of this fief under the grace of the Duke of Idhir. Lady Emma introduced you as a ser. May I ask what land you hail from?"

I folded my arms. My weapon remained stowed beneath my cloak — had the man attacked the girl, I'd have gone for my knife. "You said it yourself, lord." I inclined my head, keeping my tone on the border of respectful. "I'm a vagabond."

Eskander scowled. "A sellsword, then?"

"Not quite." While I had no particularly harsh feelings towards priests, this man was starting to annoy me. He came on far too hard with the suspicious zealot persona, which made me suspect it to be forced.

In a moment of inspiration I added, "Alken of the Fane." Not exactly a lie. Oria's Fane was as close to a home as I had these days.

Lord Brenner's bushy eyebrows went up. "Glorysworn, is it? Well, at least the girl didn't just take some hired thug off the street. I understand it is the habit of your calling not to reveal the name of your House until your errantry is done."

He appraised me for a moment, in much the same way merchants appraised goods they were considering buying. "And how much did Lady Emma tell you of matters here?" Brenner asked, glancing at the girl. "About what exactly she needs protection from?"

"I've encountered it already, so I understand the gravity of the situation." I let that sink in, since he didn't seem as bothered as I felt he should about the fact she'd been attacked that day already. "She told me there's a curse afflicting this land. A specter of death besieging your people. She sought a champion to face it, and found me."

"Yes, well… that is true enough. Have you faced such before?" He looked me up and down. "Are you some great monster hunter?"

"He can wield Art," Emma blurted. "I saw it myself." She saw my sidelong glare and turned her nose up. So she remembers what I did when the Rider attacked us in the woods.

Brenner's eyebrows rose further. "A magus, are you? Then you and Ser Kross have aught in common, I think."

He gestured to the man with the short-cropped hair. "He is a knight-exorcist of the Priory." When he noted Emma's surprised look, he chuckled. "That's right, young lady, I have not been as lax as you claim. While you were off finding some gallant — no offense to you, Ser Alken — I was seeking the aid of real professionals! This won't be the first thing of darkness Ser Kross has banished."

He looked to me then. "Of course, if our glorysworn friend wants to tag along and try his own skill in aid of this hunt, then that is well. I would hate for his time to have been wasted."

He said the last pointedly. I could almost hear Emma grinding her teeth.

Brenner studied me a moment longer, then turned his eyes to the Carreon. "For now, we have all had a trying past few days. I am certain you will need rest after your… escapades. I would like you to join me at Orcswell tomorrow. I'm guesting with the mayor. We will discuss this matter more."

Emma bowed her head, managing to make the gesture look defiant. "As you will, my lord."

Without a second glance, Brenner looked to the priest and the Church knight and nodded. He swept out of the room, the preoster shooting dagger eyes at both me and Emma all the while. He kept looking like he wanted to say something to the girl, but changed his mind and hurried after the nobleman.

Ser Kross watched me with that half-smile on his face the whole time. When he drew near, his shadow passed over me. I went very still.

The lord's son, whose name I hadn't caught, paused near Emma. "I'm sorry about that," he said. Again, I noted how quiet and light his voice was, mismatched to his frame. He seemed like a shadow of his father, his presence a whisper echoing the older man's shout. "We were all worried sick about you. We'd thought the Burnt Rider had finally…"

He shrugged his brawny shoulders, shuffling. "You know."

Emma's expression softened somewhat, though it didn't lose all its sourness. "It's fine, Hendry. I'm fine." She waggled her fingers after the departed men as though casting a spell, her imperious inflections returning. "Go. Wouldn't want to keep his lordship waiting."

The boy, Hendry, nodded to me as he departed.

"Bastard," Emma snapped once they'd gone. "Waiting for me in my own parlor like I'm some errant child to be reprimanded. My parents paid him for this villa. It is my home."

I kept my peace. Emma seemed to notice me still standing there and made a visible effort to calm herself. She lifted her narrow chin and made an odd gesture, sweeping her hand out to one side. "I shall have Vanya give you a tour of my court. I need to bathe."

I nodded gravely. "As you will, my lady."

My attention, however, wandered after the departed group. When Ser Kross had passed me I'd felt a wash of power from him, brief yet potent. His aura had smelled of incense and rang like a gentle choir in my ears.

Not an ordinary knight or fighter-cleric. That man was a paladin, just like me.

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