Simon Clervaux. They had called him the Ironhand once, though not for cruelty—for the steadiness of him. The way he could hold a fractured line together through sheer presence, the way younger soldiers found their footing simply by looking to where he stood. General Simon Clervaux of the King’s First Legion had earned that name quietly, over years, through a thousand small moments of doing right when no one would have blamed him otherwise.

He was the sort of commander who learned the names of the men who shod his horse. Who pulled night watch alongside the youngest recruits when morale grew thin. His fellow generals had found this faintly embarrassing. Simon had never minded. The men under his charge ate well, slept when they could, and followed him into ugliness without hesitation. That had always seemed to matter more.

He had expected to die a soldier’s death. Everyone who knew him had expected it. No one had expected the fever.

It came in late autumn—fast and vicious, the kind that swept through barracks like rumour. What should have broken in a fortnight stretched into six weeks, and somewhere in that long delirium the infection crept into his eyes. The surgeons used words he hadn’t fully understood. He’d listened carefully regardless, lying still in the Legion’s infirmary while the light bled slowly out of the world.

He did not make a fuss. That, too, was very like him.

What followed was a series of careful, apologetic meetings with officers who wouldn’t quite meet his eyes—or rather, met them too deliberately now. A modest pension that felt like an afterthought. Formal thanks in the language of men who wished to be finished with an awkward matter. He had no family to return to, having given those years to the Legion instead. The capital held nothing but familiar streets that no longer looked like anything. He stayed through winter out of stubbornness, then went north when the roads thawed.

The north suited him. Rougher at the edges, less interested in what a man had been. He’d arrived with a pack, a cane he’d carved, and the hard-won attentiveness of a man who’d learned to read the world without looking at it. He made himself useful—hauling grain for the miller, working the anvil for the blacksmith who found, to his surprise, that a blind striker who hit where he was told was worth more than a sighted apprentice who didn’t. Small work yet honest work.

The tavern was warm tonight, the fire built high against the early winter pressing at the shutters. Simon sat in the far corner, back to the wall—old instinct. He had learned the Millstone’s particular music by now: the complaint of the third floorboard near the bar, the rhythm of the dice game by the hearth, the way the barkeep’s voice carried differently when the room was full. Woodsmoke and tallow, the warm-sour smell of ale. He let the noise wash over him like weather and nursed his goblet—a bitter slow trail of heat down his throat.

He’d told Edric the tavern-keeper he was looking for work. Edric knew everyone’s business within three days of their arrival and considered it a civic duty. If there was work, Edric would know where it was.

Simon set his goblet down. The presence registered before he could explain how—not quite a sound, more an alteration in the texture of the room. A knight’s instincts did not retire gracefully. They simply went looking for new work. He reached for his goblet again, unhurried.

“I seem to feel a pair of eyes on me.” The words came wry, and the smile that followed was genuine. He tilted his head toward the presence. “There’s no need to be shy about it. Is there something I can do for you?“​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​