As I bend to untie my shoelaces, my companion leans against an oak tree, and our eyes meet. A light prickling pressure passes from him to me like a blessing: the exact opposite of what he offered the last time we were here together.

Sel doesn’t ask why we’re here. He doesn’t ask why I discard my sneakers. He doesn’t ask why I bundle my socks and stuff them into the mouth of each shoe. His gaze stays warm on my back as he watches me walk barefoot past him and deeper into the woods the way we’d come. Satisfied with the distance, I crouch in the dirt and look to the sky. I dig fingers into cool earth, and it sends whispers up into my arms. I push toes into the buried memories of bodies gone past, bodies running away, and bodies bearing through.

This is why I’m here. I need one wild horizon—one sharp moment that belongs only to me—before I return to battle.

No more Before. No more After. Only Now.

I surge forward, and the strength of armies sings through my muscles. Survive. Resist. Thrive. Each pound of my feet echoes in my joints like a blacksmith’s hammer, ringing loud into bones and ligament and sinew until the forest blurs past in a stream of moss greens and umber browns.

I sprint fast and faster.

And then I’m in the air, leaving the earth and trees far behind me.

RANK	BLOODLINE	SIGIL	COLOR	INHERITANCE	WEAPON(s)
1	King Arthur Pendragon	Dragon rampant	Gold	The King’s Wisdom and Strength	Longsword
2	Sir Lancelot
3	Sir Tristan	Three arrows sinister	Azure Blue	Marksmanship and speed	Bow and Arrow
4	Sir Lamorak	Griffon courant	Carmine Red	Preternatural strength (enduring)	Axe
5	Sir Kay
6
7	Sir Owain	Lion couchant	Tawny Yellow	Aether lion familiar	Quarterstaff
8
9
10
11	Sir Bors	Three-banded circle	Burnt Orange	Agility and Dexterity	Longsword
12	Sir Gawain	Two-headed Eagle	Emerald Green	Enhanced healer abilities; preternatural strength at midday and midnight	Dual Daggers
13

AUTHOR’S NOTE

In a lot of ways, Bree’s story is my story. When my own mother died, I learned that I had just become the third consecutive generation of daughters who lost their mothers at a young age. That we know of. This realization was sharp and quick and impossible—and the exact moment when Bree and Legendborn began to take shape.

Death is rife with odd ironies; growing up, I had, on occasion, seen my mother’s wound, but not understood its nature. It took losing her to recognize that wound as grief, and, of course, the event that helped me better understand her is the exact event that took her away. I wanted to compare notes, but that’s not how my story works. Instead, I wrote my own explanation.