Edgar Valens stepped off the stone path and into the wet grass. The blades curled black beneath his boots. He did not slow. Centuries of this had taught him patience, and patience had taught him hate. Somewhere ahead, across the marsh, lived the elder who had cursed his blood. Edgar meant to find him. He stopped to rest against a low grey boulder. The stone wept a pale green sap, thick and slow. Edgar scraped a handful onto his fingers and drank. It tasted like cold cider. It was the only thing his body would keep down. Bread rotted in his mouth. Water from any stream turned bitter the moment he touched it. When he stood, he looked back. Two footprints stared up from the grass, sunken and brown, ringed by dead blades that still hissed as they curled. Beyond them, a tall dark spire rose above the trees, its stone towers leaning as if the forest itself had pulled away. Birds did not cross above it. Roots fled its foundations. Edgar wiped the sap from his lips. He turned toward the spire and walked. The ground died behind him, one slow step at a time.