Before the title, before the armor—before he became "Sir Cladus of the Guard"—there was just a name whispered by candlelight.
"This mission is to be untraceable," said the Lord Commander. "You are to observe. Nothing more."
"Observe what?"
"The duchess's daughter. Elara."
---
The palace in winter had always been crueler than the borderlands.
Too many warm fires behind closed doors. Too many whispers that burned colder than snow.
Cladus remembered the first time he saw her—truly saw her—not as a name in a report, but as a girl standing in front of a mirror, fixing a hairpin with the precision of a soldier reloading a pistol.
Not vanity. Discipline.
"She's more dangerous than she seems," said a voice beside him in the hall. A fellow knight. Arrogant.
"All roses are," Cladus replied without looking.
---
Later that year, a carriage was ambushed outside the estate.
It wasn't Elara's—but she rode in the one behind it. And Cladus, uninvited, intercepted the attackers before they reached her wheels.
"You weren't supposed to act," the Lord Commander scolded after.
"I don't take pride in watching girls die," Cladus had answered, then left the room before he could regret it.
He wasn't punished.
But three weeks later, he was officially appointed Elara's personal guard.
By Auren himself.
"She needs someone loyal," the prince had said. "You seem...dispassionate enough to be effective."
Cladus had bowed, but said nothing.
He didn't tell them that he'd already been watching for a year.
---
Back in the present—
The candlelight flickered as Cladus sharpened his blade outside Elara's chambers.
He still remembered the sound of her voice that night she'd said:
"I'm not trying to be better. I'm trying to win."
A dangerous woman.
And yet—he stayed.
Why?
Even he hadn't answered that.
Not yet.
---
And as he wrapped the leather around the blade hilt, a single sealed letter fell from the inside of his old travel pack—creased, unsigned, forgotten.
He didn't remember placing it there.
But the symbol etched in wax—
A falcon's claw around a rose.
"That house fell a decade ago," he murmured, brow furrowing.
And yet…
Why did the wax smell like fresh ink?