The last of the farm houses that edged Tradesholm thinned behind me, familiar stone walls shrinking into the distance, and then the world simply… became gold. The Breadbasket Plains were not named for poetry. They were named because someone practical once looked at a hundred leagues of grain and said, “Well. That feeds us.”

  Wheat rolled in slow golden waves. Barley stood thick and stubborn. Rye and oats broke the fields into shifting patterns of green and bronze. The soil here was dark… darker than anywhere near Tradesholm. Even I could feel the faint hum underfoot. And that was saying something!

  Everything planted here grew heavy. Full.

  The Albaric throne did not trust nobles with this land. No grand estates were allowed. No keeps with banners snapping over fields of grain. Instead, the Plains were stitched together with homesteads, modest barnyards, small townhalls where some lord’s steward collected taxes, and squat guardhouses watching the roads.

  Too much grain in one noble’s hands would make the king nervous. Too little control would make everyone hungry. The Breadbasket Plains was why Solivane never starved. It was also why Drakvar had wanted it for as long as anyone remembered.

  Across the western sea, the Drakari ruled harsher ground. Their fields did not swell like this. Their wars came in waves, sometimes loud, sometimes quiet, but never gone. They tested the Gilded Steppes to the north often enough. Villages there still bore scorch marks older than I was.

  But no Drakari raiding party had come this far south in years. Which was why I didn’t understand Mother’s worry.

  The road was open. The sky clear. Guardhouses visible if one squinted.

  The only threat I had imagined that morning was dying of boredom. I regretted that thought by midmorning.

  The old man’s wagon rattled toward Riverton, and I had foolishly accepted his offer to ride. It would cut days from my journey. It was also full of parrots. Bright green, yellow, and red birds lined the cages stacked along the wagon bed. They preened. They stared. They looked innocent. They were not.

  “LEFT-FOOTED MIDGET!” one screamed.

  “DULL BRAINED FOOL!” another added helpfully.

  “SMELLS LIKE YOUR MOTHER FARTED YOU OUT!”

  I stared at them. The old man beamed at me as if I should applaud. “Aren’t they lovely?” he lisped. “Thmartet birdth on the plainth.”

  One of them puffed up. “BALDING WHORESON!”

  The old man laughed so hard the wagon rocked. “That one’th my favorite.” I began reconsidering my life choices.

  He talked. Constantly. Stories spilled from him like grain from a split sack to cousins, crops, neighbors, taxes, weather patterns, something about a runaway goat and a disgruntled steward. His lisp swallowed half the words, and the rest tangled together before reaching my ears.

  “And then I thaid to him, barley can’t jutht– well, you know– the thoil–”

  I did not know. I nodded anyway.

  A parrot leaned forward and fixed one bright eye on me. “HALF-HEARD HALFWIT!”

  I stiffened. The old man didn’t notice. “They pick up the funnietht thingth,” he said proudly.

  By midday, my head throbbed.

  By afternoon, I was certain the birds were taking turns to ensure maximum damage.

  By evening, I had made my decision.

  The Plains were open. The road stretched straight for leagues. Guardhouses stood like stubborn dots along the horizon. Walking would be quieter. Possibly safer for my poor sanity. Definitely less insulting. I waited until we stopped by a shallow stream for the horses before clearing my throat. “Sir… I’ve just remembered something.”

  He turned to me. “Yeth?”

  “My aunt,” I said, inventing quickly. “North. In the homesteads.”

  “North?” He squinted at the endless fields. “North of what?”

  “The wheat,” I said weakly.

  A parrot tilted its head. “LIAR.” I glared at it.

  The old man nodded slowly. “Family’th important.”

  Relief washed through me. “You’ve already helped me enough.”

  “Well then! Thafe travelth! Mind the wind!”

  “I’VE SEEN BIGGER TITS!” one parrot shrieked.

  I jumped down before they could escalate. The wagon rattled away in a riot of feathers and insults. Silence returned like mercy. The Plains stretched endlessly ahead. I adjusted my pack and turned west.

  Albaris lay beyond the horizon. Thirty days had seemed excessive when I counted them at home. Out here, the road was simply a line to follow. One step. Then another.

  I’ve been on the road for two days now.

  The wheat was taller than I expected. High enough that when the wind passed through, it moved in long, rippling sheets. If someone were kneeling within it, I might not see them unless they moved against the grain.

  I told myself that was a foolish thought.

  The guardhouse I had passed an hour earlier still sat in plain view behind me, sturdy and reassuring. The road stretched clean and straight ahead. Nothing but farmland.

  Still… The back of my neck prickled.

  I slowed without meaning to. The hum beneath my boots was steady. The wind pressed the wheat low and lifted it again.

  There! A disturbance. Not the broad ripple of wind but something narrower. A line where stalks shifted a breath too late. As if something had passed through and stilled.

  I stopped walking. The fields answered with silence. Perhaps a fox or a farmer cutting through his own land. Perhaps my imagination, overfed on Father’s warnings and Mother’s worry.

  I adjusted my pack deliberately and resumed walking. I did not look back. If someone wished to watch me, they would see only the back of a girl minding her road. Let them wonder if I had noticed.

  The sun was high above my head by the time I chose a place to rest. A shallow ditch ran alongside the road where runoff had carved a narrow crease in the earth. Not ideal, but it offered slight cover from the wind and from casual view.

  I had nearly convinced myself the feeling earlier had been foolishness. Until I knelt to put the pack down and saw the print.

  It was half-smudged in the dirt near the ditch’s edge. Not a farmer’s boot. Too narrow. Not a guard’s standard tread. And not bare.

  I crouched closer. The heel cut was shallow. The front curved slightly inward, as though made for moving quietly.

  It faced the road and straightened slowly. No Drakari raiding party had come this far south in years. That was what everyone said.

  I pressed my lips together.

  I smudged the print with my boot until it was nothing but disturbed dirt. Then I moved my resting place twenty paces farther from the road. Just in case.

  The first townhall rose from the fields like a stubborn afterthought.

  It wasn’t grand. None of them were allowed to be. A two-story stone structure with a red-tiled roof, a narrow watchtower built more for visibility than defense, and a small courtyard fenced in with timber. The banner of a noble House whose name I do not know… hung limp above the entrance. Wealth measured in acres, not influence.

  A handful of guards lingered outside, spears grounded, expressions bored. Which, I supposed, was the point. If the Breadbasket looked calm, it remained calm.

  I approached openly.

  One of the guards straightened when he saw me. He was older than I expected, perhaps nearing forty, with a sun-darkened face and a scar that pulled slightly at one corner of his mouth.

  “Road’s clear behind you?” he asked.

  “Clear,” I said. Then hesitated. “Mostly.”

  His eyes sharpened slightly at that. “Mostly,” he repeated.

  I shifted my pack higher on my shoulder. “I thought I saw movement in the fields earlier. Could’ve been nothing.”

  He studied me a moment longer than comfort required. “Foxes,” he said first.

  “Of course.”

  “Farmhands cutting across their parcels.”

  “Yes.”

  A pause. Then he lowered his voice. “We’ve had sign.” The word was small. Measured.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Sign of what?” I asked.

  “Boot prints that don’t belong. Grain cut in narrow lines, not harvested. A sheep missing from a north homestead. No blood. No body.”

  My stomach tightened slightly. “Drakari?”

  He exhaled through his nose. “Not in force. If it’s them, it’s scouts. Testing.”

  The wind shifted. Wheat bent low around us. “They’ve never come this far south,” I said, hearing how young that sounded even to myself.

  “They’ve never needed to,” he replied. “The Steppes have always kept them busy.”

  “And now?”

  He glanced toward the horizon, where the fields stretched unbroken. “Now the Steppes are quiet.”

  That unsettled me more than if he had said the opposite. Quiet meant planning. “Are you increasing patrols?” I asked.

  He huffed a dry laugh. “With what men? Half our number rotated north last month.”

  “To the Steppes?”

  He didn’t answer directly. “Word is Drakvar’s coastline had a lean winter,” he said instead. “Lean winters make hungry neighbors.”

  I swallowed.

  “How far west are you headed?” he asked.

  “Albaris.”

  His brows lifted faintly. “On foot?”

  “Yes.”

  He considered me, then nodded once. “Stay on the road. Don’t camp near tall grain. And if you think you’re being watched…” He paused.

  “Yes?” I prompted.

  “Assume you are.”

  That was not comforting advice. He straightened and stepped back, the conversation over in the way soldiers ended things. I thanked him and crossed the courtyard toward the well to refill my waterskin.

  That was when I noticed it. A boy, maybe twelve, perched on the low stone wall near the stable. Barefoot. Sun-browned. Watching me far too intently for idle curiosity. “Traveler?” he called.

  “Yes.”

  “You walk alone?”

  “Yes.”

  He tilted his head slightly. “You shouldn’t.”

  I almost smiled. “I’ve been told.”

  He slid down from the wall and approached slowly, as if wary of spooking me. “My da says they don’t ride horses when they scout,” he said in a near whisper. “Horses leave tracks.”

  My pulse quickened. “Who doesn’t?” I asked.

  He leaned closer. “They crawl,” he said matter-of-factly. “In the grain.”

  A chill ran down my spine. Before I could respond, a woman called sharply from the stable door. The boy flinched and darted away, vanishing behind the building.

  I lingered longer than necessary in the courtyard after the boy vanished. The well rope creaked as I wound it. The guards resumed their lazy stances. Nothing looked wrong.

  If Drakari scouts were scouting… Shouldn’t they be more alert? Was the scarred guard simply paranoid?

  I had two choices.

  I could test it.

  Step off the road suddenly. Double back. Cut through a patch of lower grain and see if anyone corrected course. If someone was following, they would have to reveal themselves eventually.

  Or–

  I could stay. Wait for another wagon heading west. Travel with company. Safety in numbers.

  “Thinking of waiting?” the scarred guard asked quietly, as if he had read my posture when I returned to him.

  “Considering,” I admitted.

  He scratched at his grizzled jaw. “You’d be waiting a while.”

  “How long?”

  “The farmers just started harvesting and it won’t be done in a few days. No grain caravans moving.” He nodded vaguely westward. “The ore wagons from Albaris haven’t even begun their rotation to Tradesholm. And they won’t until next season.”

  Next season.

  I did the math quickly.

  Next season was two months away. And if I waited for a proper caravan, I might lose ten days. Perhaps more. Ten days were a tenth of my journey. Ten days was distance I could have covered. And what would that make me? A would-be knight who hid behind merchants because of a smudged footprint and a child’s imagination?

  I exhaled slowly. “If something is following me,” I said carefully, “wouldn’t it be wiser to know now?”

  The guard’s mouth lifted faintly. “Wisdom and bravery don’t always share a bed.”

  “I’ll stay on the road,” I said.

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  I adjusted my pack straps. “I don’t intend to lose days waiting.”

  He looked at me for a long moment. Measuring. “You’re young,” he said at last.

  “I’m aware.”

  His gaze dropped briefly to Tarin’s gift at my hip. “Stay near the watch posts at night when you can. And if you hear something move that shouldn’t…”

  “Yes?”

  “Don’t chase it.”

  That was almost enough to make me reconsider. Almost. I walked until dusk painted the fields in dull bronze and shadow.

  This time I chose my resting place carefully. A shallow depression near a low stone boundary wall between two parcels. The stones would break the wind and give my back something solid. No tall grain close enough to brush against me unseen.

  The sky stretched clear overhead. Stars pricked through as the light faded. I ate in silence. The Plains sounded different at night. Less wind. More small movements. Insects. The faint rustle of dry stalks settling.

  I told myself it was ordinary. I lay back with my cloak wrapped tight and closed my eyes. Sometime after full dark, I woke. Not with a start but with slowly growing awareness. There was no obvious threat. But there was a pause in the natural sound of the fields.

  The insects had stopped.

  I did not move except to allow my breathing to deepen. Feigning sleep. The hum beneath the earth felt unchanged.

  Then… A shift. Something moving through grain at a slow measured pace before it stopped.

  I counted silently. One breath. Two. Three.

  The movement resumed parallel to the road. Parallel to me.

  My pulse pounded hard enough I feared it would give me away. If it were a fox, it would dart. Zigzag. Hunt. This did not zigzag.

  I resisted the urge to sit up. The guard’s voice echoed in my memory. ‘Don’t chase it.’

  The movement continued for several long moments. Then it faded. Not away from me. Not toward me. Just… gone. The insects slowly resumed their chorus. The wind stirred again.

  I remained still long after the natural sounds returned, staring at the dark outline of stone above me.

  When dawn finally bled across the horizon, I rose stiffly and silently packed my things. I walked to the edge of the grain where I thought the disturbance had passed. The stalks were bent. Pressed low in a straight line for perhaps twenty paces before disappearing.

  I stood there for a long moment. Then I straightened. If something wished to follow me, it would have to keep up. I turned west again and continued walking.

  I had already put distance between myself and the stone boundary when I heard footsteps behind me. Light, unhurried, and steady enough to belong to someone who wasn’t hiding. I turned, hand near my hilt and ready to draw my blade when I saw her.

  A girl.

  Solivari.

  Dark hair tied back with a strip of faded blue cloth. Traveling coat dusted pale from the road. No visible insignia. No foreign armor. Just a pack, and the easy posture of someone who had walked long distances before.

  Relief came so fast it embarrassed me.

  “You’re heading west?” she called.

  “Yes.”

  “Good. I was hoping I wasn’t the only sane one on this stretch.” Her voice was normal. Warm, even. She jogged a few steps to close the distance between us. Up close, I realized she was about my age. And taller. Of course she was taller. She looked at me curiously. “You out with family?”

  “I’m sixteen,” I said immediately.

  Her eyebrows rose. “Truly?”

  I scowled because, of course, I would be mistaken for a child with my height. “Yes.”

  She blinked once, then smiled. “I stand corrected.”

  I adjusted my pack. “You heading to Albaris?”

  “That obvious?”

  “You’re walking the road that leads there.”

  She laughed softly. It felt genuine. “Name’s Drenna,” she said, offering her forearm in greeting instead of a hand.

  I clasped it. Her grip was firm. “Soryn.”

  “Well, Soryn,” she said, falling into step beside me, “looks like we’ll be walking together whether we meant to or not.” Drenna walked easily and conversation came in loose strands.

  She was from the southern reaches, she said. Her family farmed lentils and rye. She’d decided she wanted something more than harvest cycles. “Something sharper,” she’d said, glancing at my sword.

  I couldn’t help smiling at that.

  We talked about the Academy in vague, hopeful terms. About what Albaris might be like. About whether the Capital truly looked as white and endless as the stories claimed. She told a story about getting chased by a goose as a child. I told her about falling into a mine shaft at thirteen and being trapped until my father hauled me out by the collar.

  We laughed. It felt… easy.

  By midafternoon, the sun pressed heavy against the fields. We stopped near a low stone irrigation marker to drink. I crouched, loosening my pack straps to reach for my waterskin.

  Drenna stood a few paces behind me. I could hear her adjusting something. Leather shifting, buckle sliding. “Do you ever get tired of the quiet?” she asked.

  I smiled faintly. “I was just thinking how peaceful it is.”

  “It is,” she agreed.

  Something changed in the air. I felt it before I understood it. I turned—

  Steel screamed toward my throat. I dropped flat. Her blade sliced through the space where my neck had been and struck the stone marker with a ringing crack. For half a heartbeat, my mind refused to accept what I was seeing.

  Drenna stood there, knife already turning for a second strike. Her expression had emptied of warmth completely.

  “What—?!” I choked, scrambling backward.

  She advanced calmly. “Oh good,” she said lightly. “You’re not completely slow.” The words hit harder than the attack.

  “You– why–?”

  “I was deciding,” she said, circling me. “Whether you were worth the effort.”

  I drew my blade with shaking fingers. Her stance shifted smoothly. Practiced. Controlled.

  “You seemed harmless at first,” she continued conversationally. “Too small. I don’t bother with children.”

  “I told you I’m sixteen!”

  “Yes.” Her gaze sharpened. “You did.” She lunged. Our blades collided.

  The force of it shocked me. She was stronger than she looked. It was not just muscle strength, but Resonance pressing behind the strike. The air around her felt dense, like pressure before a storm.

  She drove forward. Even with the advantage of a sword longer than her knife, I barely held. She was nothing like Tarin when we practiced. Tarin with her measured and slow strikes so I would see the blade coming. She was nothing like Father who moved with deliberate force. Drenna moved as if some unseen force was guiding her blade… unerringly finding my weaknesses in spite of my training. I could barely keep up.

  “You could’ve left me alone,” I gasped.

  “I could have.” She twisted her blade and forced mine down an inch. “But you’re going to the Academy, aren’t you?” I didn’t answer. Her smile returned, thinner now. “That means you’re carrying something useful.”

  She struck again. Faster. I stumbled. “I don’t need your life,” she added almost kindly. “Just your coin. Your steel. Your boots, maybe.”

  “You walked with me all day,” I said, fury breaking through shock.

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  She tilted her head. “I wanted to see how you moved.” Her blade crashed into mine again. My arms screamed. “And I don’t like killing children,” she added. “But now that I know you’re not one…”

  She surged. My heel caught uneven ground. I fell hard. Her knife hovered inches from my throat. The fields rustled from a sudden violent wind.

  “I was almost disappointed,” she murmured. “You laughed so easily.” Rage burned through my fear.

  I shoved upward with everything I had… Steel, body, Resonance.

  It wasn’t enough. It was never enough!

  She pressed down. Then a shout tore across the plains.

  “Ho! You there!”

  Hoofbeats thundered from the western road. Drenna’s eyes flicked up. A rider crested the rise at speed… Plain clothes, but unmistakably a guard by posture and seat.

  Drenna stepped back instantly. The slyness… gone. She glanced down at me with cold grey eyes. “Another time,” she said softly. Then she ran. The wheat swallowed her within seconds.

  The horseman reached me moments later, reining hard. “You hurt?” he demanded, already scanning the fields.

  “No,” I managed, pushing to my feet.

  He exhaled sharply. “Bandits. Been seeing more lately.”

  I blinked, caught off guard. “Bandits? Back at the townhall, the guard didn’t say anything about bandits.”

  The man gave a short, humorless chuckle. “I’m not here to tell anyone stories, kid. I was delivering a warning to the guard posts. A family west of here… they didn’t make it. Bandits hit their farmstead just last week. Bodies left in the wheat. Farmers are on edge now. They won’t welcome strangers easily, especially a lone girl passing through.”

  My stomach tightened. I pictured Drenna’s playful smile, the way she had waited, the knife hovering just long enough to make me hesitate. How foolish I had been to trust her, to think I could handle everything alone.

  I swallowed. “I… I understand,” I admitted quietly. “I’ll be careful.”

  He gave a curt nod. “Good. You keep your wits about you. Breadbasket is wide, yes, but the teeth in it are sharper than most travelers expect.”

  “She was Solivari,” I said before I could stop myself.

  He gave me a grim look. “Aye. Some of them are.” His gaze swept the endless grain as if making sure the bandit who nearly murdered me was truly gone. “War and other things squeeze people. Fields don’t always feed everyone.”

  I dusted myself off and went to retrieve my pack. Shame burned hotter than the sun over Breadbasket. All those years of training… The sword song, survival, shadowing, Resonance exercises.. And what good had it done me? A single girl had bested me without warning, and I hadn’t even landed a proper strike.

  The man studied me for a moment before asking, “Are you on your way to Riverton?”

  “Albaris.” I sheathed my sword. “I’m to enter the Academy to become a knight.”

  His eyebrows shot up in surprise. “But you’re–”

  “I’m older than I look!” I interrupted hotly.

  He held a palm out in a placating gesture. “I apologize. Look, it is not safe on the road alone right now. I’ll escort you to the nearest post before I go on my way.”

  I let the horseman trot alongside me for a moment, gathering my composure.

  “Tell me,” I said cautiously, “what did you mean? You said the fields don’t always feed everyone. That doesn’t make sense. It’s Breadbasket. Every farm here is full. How could anyone starve?”

  The guard, a man whose sun-darkened face was half-hidden beneath a wide-brimmed hat, gave a slow exhale. His reins tapped lightly on the horse’s flanks. “I didn’t say everyone starves. I said fields don’t always feed everyone enough.”

  I frowned. “What do you mean?”

  His lips twitched into a sneer. Not at me, but somewhere in the distance. “Southwest across the sea. A new land was discovered. Bigger than Solivari, richer than any kingdom you know. Jewels like the sun fallen to earth. Technology that let even the dullest attuned ones harness borrowed Resonance… Sigils, they call it.”

  My eyes widened. Across the sea? Sigils? Borrowed Resonance? How is that possible? In spite of myself, I felt my hope grow. Maybe this was the answer to my curse.

  “They want grain,” he continued. “Gold doesn’t interest them. Too much of it already. Grain, timber… anything we grow in abundance. They’ll trade jewels, technology, knowledge for it. The trade is generous for them… expensive for us. Commonfolk barely see a fair ration these days. Prices have spiked. You think the Breadbasket feeds all, but much of it is already promised elsewhere.”

  My fingers tightened on my pack straps. So this is what he meant… The abundance I’d taken for granted isn’t enough.

  “And?” I asked, trying to hide my nervous excitement behind a veil of curiosity. “What does that have to do with the bandits?”

  He grunted. “Nothing directly. People are restless when they can’t eat, when fields are rationed while others take the best. Some turn desperate. Some turn cruel. Some simply test the weak. Solivari or not, the plains will take their due from anyone who wanders too carelessly.”

  I tried to calm my racing thoughts. “And the southwest land? This… sigil stuff. It’s real?”

  “Real enough,” he said, glancing at me sideways. “But dangerous. Too much power too quickly makes fools of men. And women. You’ll learn that soon enough when you reach the Capital.”

  I exhaled slowly. My pride still smarted, but a spark lit beneath it. Knowledge. Opportunity. A reason to endure. To become strong enough not to be humiliated again.

  If Drenna had to be the first lesson that the world beyond Tradesholm wouldn’t wait for preparation or training, then so be it. I had no choice but to move forward.