They were learning to kill.
I slowed near Turtanu’s tent as two more men stumbled into the ring—shields lifted, practice swords tearing vicious arcs through the air. Each clash cracked like bone splitting, wood against wood, sharp enough to rattle the teeth. Dust spiraled up with every lunge, grinding against my tongue, stinging my eyes. Sweat poured off their bodies, dark stains soaking linen, the stink of salt and iron thick in the heat.
Their movements were jagged, ugly, stripped of any grace—no polished stances. No noble elegance forged in royal halls.
Only survival.
This was not a place of bloodlines.
This was something harsher.
Crueler.
Here, men weren’t born.
They were broken.
And then they were made.
We reined our horses in at the edge of the encampment. Dust and heat rolled off the sand like a curse. Lazarus swung down first; I followed, sandals striking the packed earth. The smell hit at once—sweat, smoke, blood, and iron, heavy enough to choke. We stepped forward into the crush of bodies, into the noise of war being rehearsed.
Here—sweat crusted into dust and the sun judged without mercy.
The air burned my lungs. Around me, fists struck flesh, spears hammered earth, bows groaned overhead. Men’s eyes followed me as I stood in the heat, each stare pressed against me, hot and unwanted.
I wasn’t ready.
Gods, I would never be ready.
My chest clenched like a trapped animal. My bones felt hollow. I wasn’t a soldier. I was the son of one. The shadow of a warlord’s house. Raised in halls where silence injured more than steel, where every meal was swallowed under threat. My father’s voice still rang in me—low, merciless—Stand straighter. Strike harder. Don’t shame me.Every order was meant to maim.
My bruises had been hidden beneath linen. My wounds had never bled where servants could see. But they had bled. Always. His hand had been quicker than mine, his judgment heavier than iron, his punishments masked as training.
Pain hadn’t made me strong.
It had only taught me to suffer quietly.
To swallow faster.
To bleed inward where no one could look.
“Salvatore Lorian.”
The name split the yard like a spearhead striking stone. Turtanu’s voice rolled out from beneath his canopy. Men shifted around us, sandals scraping dirt, wagers falling silent.
He stepped forward. His bronze corselet was dulled by years of war, its edges greened with tarnish. A heavy leather belt circled his waist, a dagger sheathed at his hip. His arms were bare, thick with corded muscle, crisscrossed with scars that looked carved, not healed. His face was a ruin of battles survived—a lip split crooked, a nose long ago broken and left bent, one eye narrowed to a squint from some forgotten wound. His hair was close-cropped, streaked with gray, his skin darkened by years beneath the sun. He moved like a stone that had learned to walk.
“Son of Lord Lorian,” Turtanu continued.
“I knew your father, boy. Knew him when we were both no older than you and that little scrap beside you.” His eyes flicked to Lazarus, dismissing him with a glance before fixing back on me. “We were boys, hungry for battle, eager to bleed. And your father?—”
He spat in the dirt, not with disgust, but as if to seal the truth.
“Your father was a fucking lion. He devoured war at dawn, spat blood, and never broke. He and I forged our names into the earth with bronze and fire. Men followed him because they knew he would never fall. He was more than a soldier—he was a storm, and I was proud to stand at his side.”
Turtanu’s lips curled, and his eyes cut into me.
“And your brother, Julian… he fought as if the gods themselves poured fire into his veins. He lasted years in this encampment. Years. His name will continue to be sung drunk by the fires because he earned it. He died with honor. A lion’s son.”
