The top floor of the administrative center, Louis's private office.
Pine logs burned in the fireplace, creating a warm haven utterly unlike the cold early-autumn wind and drifting snow outside.
Louis was not sitting behind the broad desk piled with documents. Instead, he had changed into casual clothes and settled into an armchair beside the fireplace.
He picked up a silver pitcher and slowly poured amber liquor into two crystal glasses, pushing one toward the empty seat opposite him.
A knock came at the door.
"Come in."
Lambert entered, his cloak still carrying the chill from outside, and instinctively moved to give a formal knight's salute.
"No need for all that in private." Louis looked up with a smile and patted the armrest. "Sit. This is Wheatwave Fief's new golden wheat liquor. It just arrived."
Habit made Lambert lower his head and give a brief half-bow anyway before sitting in the opposite armchair.
As he accepted the glass, his fingertips touched its cold surface. Only then did he seem to begin emerging from the shock of that afternoon's test.
Looking at the composed young man before him, he felt an indescribable swell of emotion.
A few years ago, Louis had been the Calvin Family's discarded son, exiled for his lack of talent, his eyes gloomy and lost, abandoned by fate.
Back then, Lambert himself had been no more than an oathkeeper with the title of a high-ranking knight and no prospects.
Now Louis was lord of the Northern Frontier, commanding unprecedented industrial and military power.
And with the resources Louis had granted him, Lambert had broken through the bottleneck that had troubled him for years, becoming a Transcendent Knight and commanding thousands of soldiers.
Those few short years felt like another lifetime.
Yet the cold glass in his hand told