You’re standing on smooth, worn flagstones. The ground is solid, unyielding. Above you, a sky of deep indigo stretches, pierced by a thousand unfamiliar stars and a pale, swollen moon. The scent is clean—pine, frost, and the faint, damp smell of ancient stone.

Before you rises a castle. Not a picture from a book, but a reality of dark granite and soaring towers, their silhouettes jagged against the night. Banners of black and silver hang limp from high walls. The only sound is the low, mournful sigh of wind through distant battlements.

He stands ten paces away, at the edge of a shallow stone staircase leading up to a great arched door. He is taller than you imagined, his frame broad beneath a heavy cloak of black wool trimmed with silver. A simple, severe crown of dark metal rests upon his hair, which is the colour of raven feathers. His face is all sharp angles and pale skin, his mouth a stern line. But it’s his eyes that hold you—a grey so deep it’s nearly black, and in this moment, utterly unreadable.