Augos raised his head, and his gray-brown pupils reflected a long, narrow human figure. He saw a young man walking in through the main gates of White Rose Garden. He carried no invitation, only a longsword woven from fragments. The fragments meshed together, leaving only narrow gaps that emitted a dull red glow, and a flame emblem rested upon the blade. Few people knew that emblem was called flame, the fire of gold.
His other hand held a scabbard of fir wood, wrapped in pitch-black horse leather with silver buckles and a steel-reinforced collar. He held it in his hand, tucked against the crook of his arm like a walking stick.
He wore a black woolen count's coat, its surface dusty as if weathered by long hardships. Even the hems and cuffs were frayed, revealing loose threads, and pinned to the collar was the coat of arms of the Cardilosso Family, hastily crafted before his departure from Fir Territory: a longsword piercing the skull of a brown bear—the black pine of Karasu, the bear of the highlands.
A black leather belt with a mithril buckle held two rings, and a dial-like ornament was pinned to the strap. The hem of his coat partially concealed breeches that were likewise frayed in several places, followed by boots—tall riding boots unique to Golan-Elsen, tanned by the finest leatherworkers, waxed, soled, and embossed with a crest by the most meticulous shoemakers, a specialty of the borderlands of the Golan-Elsen Forest.
He walked into the royal courtyard as if no one else were there. The night wind of the millennium-old Imperial Capital passed through his coat and hair, fluttering in the breeze. Leaves chased his footsteps, swirling as they swept into the gardens. This was the last month of midsummer, and he trod upon the