It was just after the solstice: three months since the dissolute Khan known as Onghwe had defeated the armies of Christendom at Legnica, just a few miles from here, and a bit more than one month since he had issued his challenge.

She shifted to her left, darting behind the trunk of an elder oak. She stroked the bark lightly as if to ask the oak for guidance, then passed her fingers over her eyes in an old Binder prayer. The mist was clearing already; she could wait. In these lands, a well-trained adept knew to be patient.

Snatches of a conversation came to her, a back-and-forth argument that sounded like it hadn’t started this morning, nor would it be finished anytime soon. Cnán recognized the cadences of Latin, which she had not heard in a while and had not spoken since childhood.

“—relax your vision. You know where the blade is. Stop looking at it—”

“—don’t close your eyes! You might as well throw down your sword altogether. Are you a dumb lamb?”

“—if you watch his blade, it is too late. You can’t see his eyes, so why are you—”

Less than a stone’s throw away, a young man, no more than twenty years of age and crowned with hair so blond it was almost white, was facing an older man—a bulky, battle-scarred redhead. Both were carrying great swords of war, and their repetitive exercises were being observed by a man dressed like a monk.

These men were likely knights of the Shield-Brethren—the ones she had been instructed to find. If there were anything to their reputation, they would have responded within days to the Khan’s unlikely invitation.