Run: 2026-02-16-01KHK9KW3CVHCKB4XPNF4VM81Z

<nc-section data-title="Version 1: A Knight's Welcome" data-color="red"> The clatter of hooves softened to a muffled beat as Thunder and I slipped beneath the low eave of the stables. Lanterns swung from iron hooks, washing straw and saddle-leather in honeyed light; the air was warm with the steam of beasts and the yeasty scent of hay. A handful of grooms glanced up, then made a path as a man in a sun-faded surcoat stepped forward, his step unhurried, his eyes keen as a hawk's. "Frederick?" he asked. His voice held the burr of old campaigns and winter mornings. He was not so tall as I had imagined a knight to be, yet something in the square set of his shoulders, the honest weight of his gaze, filled the space around him. Silver threaded his dark beard. A nicked vambrace rode his forearm like an old friend. "Sir Roland," I said, swinging down from the saddle. I kept a steady hand on Thunder’s rein, and the stallion flicked an ear, calm under the stranger’s study. Sir Roland clasped my forearm, a grip firm without the need to prove itself. "Welcome to the castle, lad. Thunder is a good name for a horse that carries weather in his chest." His smile ghosted, there and gone. "You’ll find no softer storms inside these walls." He looked to the grooms. "See the stallion rubbed down and watered, no oats till he cools." To me, he added, "First lesson: we tend the beast before the blade. Come—walk with me. I’ll show you where your cot waits, and in the morning, we’ll start with steel." He turned, and the lamplight caught the faint lattice of scars along his jaw—quiet lines that spoke of choices made and the prices paid. I fell in beside him, the familiar rumble of Thunder’s breath behind us like a drumbeat to a new life beginning. </nc-section> <nc-section data-title="Version 2: First Lessons" data-color="green"> The yard by the stables was a spool of twilight, unwinding into torchlight and hoof-scrape. I drew Thunder to a halt, and before I could swing down, a man with a weathered face and a cloak the color of rain stepped up and caught the bridle with a sure hand. "Easy there," he said, eyes flicking over me, the horse, the road-dust on my boots. "Sir Roland, if titles must be thrown about. You’re Frederick." "Yes, ser." I dismounted. My knee wobbled once, betraying the long ride, and his mouth twitched—amusement or approval, I couldn’t say. "Good you came before night proper," he said. "Horses and boys both sour when put up wet." He tipped his head at Thunder. "Unbuckle that girth yourself. No squire rides farther into manhood by letting another tend his tack." A stableboy had already stepped forward, pitchfork in hand; Sir Roland lifted two fingers, and the boy faded back with a nod. I set to work, palms smarting where the reins had rubbed. Sir Roland watched, not hovering, not helping—only noticing everything. "You were taught to keep your blade hand free even when worn to the bone," he remarked when I shifted the saddle. "Whoever taught you that, thank them. Here we keep to two truths: a blade to truth, and a heart to mercy. The first keeps you standing. The second keeps you worth standing." By the time Thunder’s blanket was smoothed and his nose buried in sweet hay, the aches in my shoulders felt less like burdens and more like beginning. Sir Roland thumbed toward a squat door across the yard, lamplight pooling at its sill. "Cots in there. Keep your kit close. Third bell at dawn, practice yard. Bring a will and a wooden sword. You’ll need both. Welcome to your work, Frederick." </nc-section> <nc-section data-title="Version 3: Ember Omen" data-color="blue"> Dusk took the yard in slow sips, blue deepening to indigo. Swallows stitched the last light above the stable roof, and somewhere a raven clicked its beak, a small iron sound. I reined Thunder in by the hitching rail, his breath ribboning white in the cooling air. Before the grooms could come, a man in a battered surcoat stepped from the shadow of a post, his boots as silent as an old thought. "Frederick," he said, the name not asked but known. "I am Sir Roland." He had a soldier’s stillness, the kind that made the world quieten to meet it. A faint, puckered mark lay along his temple—no blade’s straight kiss, but the curve of some old burn. His gaze went to Thunder first, to the dark strength in his shoulders, and only then to me. Between us drifted the scents of leather and clover and a thread of smoke that could not belong to any torch. "Welcome to our walls," he went on, and took my forearm in a grip warm as the hearth. "You’ve ridden far. See to your mount. A man’s measure shows in how he ends a journey as much as how he starts one." I slid the saddle free. For a breath, when my palm brushed Thunder’s withers, a heat quickened under my skin—like the memory of a flame. I blinked, and it was gone. Sir Roland’s eyes narrowed, not unkindly, as if he had heard a note I had not meant to play. "There’s weather turning in the north," he said softly, his voice pitched for me alone. "Old songs stirring under newer stone. You came on such a wind." He straightened, and the moment passed. To the grooms: "Water and walk him. No grain yet." To me: "Your cot is there, beyond the arch. Dawn finds us in the yard. Steel first, then oaths later. We shape boys to men and men to shields." As I led Thunder to his stall, the raven hopped once along the rail and watched, head canted. In its dark eye I saw my own reflection: road-tired, wide awake, and—Heaven help me—hungry for whatever ember had chosen this night to glow. </nc-section>