Adrian Silvercrest's Arc

Chapter 1 of 23

Adrian Silvercrest knelt in the wet grass at the forest's edge and pulled the black rose from the dirt. A blue jewel glowed at its heart. His reflection bent inside the stone, and he saw himself older, seated at a long banquet table beside a woman he did not know, both of them staring at nothing. His own face in the vision looked hollowed out. He dropped the rose. His hand shook. He was twenty-four and betrothed to a stranger. In one month he would sign the contract his father had drafted. He had ridden out this morning to clear his head, and the legend had found him instead: the bloom that showed a man his future. His future was a quiet, well-dressed grief. A fox stepped from the ferns. It wore a green robe stitched with runes, and it watched him like it had been waiting. "You've seen enough," it said. "Follow." Adrian followed. He left his horse. He left the crest-stamped saddle. He walked behind the fox for hours until the pines opened onto a village of thatched roofs and smoking chimneys. A blacksmith's shop stood at the near end, doors open, anvil ringing. Adrian stopped a woman carrying a basket of turnips. "Pardon me, madam. Might you direct me to an establishment that serves a midday meal?" She stared. Then she curtsied, deep and wobbling, and hurried off calling for her husband. A second woman, closer to his age, set down a bundle of kindling and crossed the road toward him. Brown hair, green eyes, plain dress. She stopped an arm's length away and looked him up and down like a horse she was pricing. "You just cost yourself a lunch," she said. "'Madam.' 'Establishment.' You bow when you thank people. You hold your shoulders like someone's about to pin a medal on you." She glanced at his boots. "And those cost more than my father's forge." "You know who I am." "Everyone in this square knows who you are. Give it another minute and the constable rides for the palace." She picked up her kindling. "Elara Meadows. Come inside before someone kneels." He followed her into a low cottage. She shut the door and leaned against it. "Why help me?" he asked. "Because you look like a man who ran from something, not toward something." She studied him. "What are you doing here, Your Highness?" "I want someone to love me," he said. "Not the title. Me. I saw what my life becomes if I marry the woman they chose. I won't." She was quiet a long moment. Then she nodded once. "Then the prince has to die in this room," she said. "Sit down. First lesson: stop saying pardon. Nobody here says pardon." Adrian sat on a stool that wobbled under him. He set his hands on his knees the wrong way. Elara laughed, and he found he did not mind it.