Hiro’s challenge reeks of philosophy, so I go to see Pliny. The diminutive magister lurks in his lair beneath the library, and I take a moment before descending into his den to stare up at the mural of Pelias, the founder of this domus.

What would the Iron Lords do if they were here? Did they know that some of the gods would stir in their graves? Did they know that they didn’t kill them all? They must not have, for it was their decision to hobble mankind after them. They created the inhibitus and forbade any Ironbound from Ascending beyond Copper. Why do that if they thought there would be more gods to kill?

I feel an odd kinship with Pelias. I am not the first electi bound to the Iron Symbol to become Silver since their decree, but I am the first to not wear the collar. If I Ascend to Gold, I will be the first to follow in their footsteps since the Empire was founded. The Iron Lords saved us from bondage.

What will I do?

Uncomfortable with my own musings, I tear my eyes from Pelias’s palatine face and make my way down the short tunnel to Pliny’s office. The skin on the back of my neck prickles as I depart, as if the painted eyes on the ceiling watch me leave.

“Did you Ascend?” Pliny greets me enthusiastically, slumping in his chair when I shake my head ruefully.

“Not yet. I’m here because I need your help with something else.”

“You should not be getting distracted from your path.” His eyebrows form into a narrow V as he scowls. “Is Contessa interfering with your Corda training?”

“Yes, but at Varus’s command. She took me to meet Hiro.”

“Ah.” A look of understanding passes across his owlish face. “Let me guess, he refused to train you?”

“How did you know?”

“Because he refuses to train everyone.”

“He had three Gold electi that he was knocking around who would say otherwise.”

“Sorry, I should have said he refuses to train everyone the first time.”

“They’re from the East, right? Across the ocean?”

“Far across the seas is a great island called Nihon.” He nods. “Few from the Iron Empire have ever set foot on its shores. Those who have are almost exclusively in the legions.” That sounds about right. For good or for ill, the legions are the leading arm of the Empire.

“At my Sententia, the Empress said that the enemies in the East were stirring…” I let my question trail off, unsure how to form it. As a boy, the rest of the world was presented to me as nameless, faceless terrors that wanted to crush us. Only the nearby Normans were ever discussed at any length.

“Tensions have escalated…” Pliny admits slowly, his eyes watching me. There is something that he is deciding if he should tell me or not. But having seen Hiro’s weapon, I have an inkling of what that might be.

“Does it have to do with Cor?” My question catches him off guard.

“Why do you ask that?”

“His sword—that katana. It’s made from Cor, isn’t it? The same way that the Normans use it in their ink to parody the gods’ power?”

“I had no idea you were such a believer.” The magister’s lips quirk up slightly in a small smile.

I twitch in surprise. Am I? I would not have said that I was—my mother was far more devout than I. She is the reason that an everflame burned in the brazier by my grandfather’s mausoleum. But I have spoken with Aquilo, slain the Herald of Mars, and freed Nemesis from her grave. How could I not be? Hard to be an atheist when you’ve carried the power of a god in your hands.

“You’re right; they use it too,” Pliny continues when I do not rise to his bait. “Terra is much larger than the bounds of the Iron Empire. Much of our power comes from the Hearts that fall within our borders. But not all of it falls here. There is an entire division of Censors and Legionnaires that are tasked with hunting it wherever it lands.” My mouth gapes open at the thought of places far away being plundered by the White Hand and Iron Legions to bring Cor back to the Empress.

“I can see how that might cause some tensions,” I admit dryly. Inwardly, my mind reels at how small my world is compared to the one that I live in.

“That is only the beginning,” Pliny says with a laugh. “If I had been in charge of your education…” His voice trails off, and he sighs with sadness, looking at me like I am lost. Maybe I am. I thought I knew where I was going, but the more I walk down the path, the more I feel like I do not know where I am.

“What would you have taught me?” I ask, my pulse racing in excitement. This feels like treason—flirting with dangerous knowledge. It is not my first time, but I have never been guided in that direction before.

“I would have taught you to question.” Pliny frowns, looking away from me. “There is much we do not know and do not discuss.”

“About Cor?”

“About everything.” The magister’s eyes snap to me, and I lean back, startled by the fire that burns in them. I have often thought of Pliny as different from Contessa and Varus. That where they are fierce, he is mild and patient. But now I see that his fire is just a different one.

“I told you that the Iron Lords kept secrets from us.” He eyes me shrewdly, waiting for me to object.

I do not.

“Our recorded history is less than half a millennium old,” he says when the silence has grown dangerous. “A hundred years of bondage and four centuries of the Iron Empire.”

“I do not understand,” I admit softly, ashamed by my failure. I see in his expression that this haunts him, yet it is all I know. The world as it has been given to me. These facts are foundational to how I understand the world. Water is wet.

“Did you see the great spires of Forum?”

I nod.

“The great towers are older than that, built of materials we do not know. In far corners of the world, men find ruins of great cities that are nothing but dust. There are boneyards full of skeletons that no one knows. We have found the names of heroes long forgotten carved into the walls of these desolate places like prayers. There is much that we do not know. Nor do we know why we do not.”

A chill runs down my spine at his words. He speaks of a world so vast that I feel small. Meeting Hiro and his granddaughter has thrust my ignorance in my face—Pliny magnifies it until it towers over me, a giant I could never best.

After a moment, the fire in his eyes fades, and he lets out a sigh of disappointment. “Forgive me, Castor,” he says softly. “I am but an old man, plagued by ghosts.”

I swallow a lump in my throat before nodding. I understand that feeling all too well.

“You said you were given a task?” he asks, plastering a smile on his face that seems earnest and pleasant. No trace of his wild questions lurks in his expression, but I feel their shadow still.

“Hiro said that I need to ‘learn how to be.’ I have no idea what that means.” To my surprise, the magister laughs, leaning back in his chair with an amused smile. “What’s so funny about that?”

“He’s been reading my scrolls again.”

“He can read Imperial?” I remember his blindfold. “He can see?”

“No, he makes his granddaughter read them out loud and translate them for him.” Despite her haughty attitude, I feel a pang of sympathy for the dark-haired girl. It cannot be easy being in a foreign land, trapped between two worlds. Being forced to translate stuffy magister philosophical texts sounds like a nightmare.

“Okay, so how do I be?” I am relieved that Pliny seems to know what that means. Because the only thing that I feel is lost, and I think that means that I am failing even before I begin.

“Castor, when was the last time you did anything for yourself?” Pliny leans back in his chair, suddenly studying me with narrowed eyes.

“I cultivated this morning⁠—”

He interrupts me with a disgusted wave of his hand. “No, not like that.” He sighs disappointedly.

I am silent because I do not know how to answer his question.

“I am annoyed,” he admits.

“Why?”

“Because Hiro has seen what I did not.”

“That I am not being?”

“That you are pushing yourself so hard that you do not have the time to learn what you are.”

“I am Frigus Ventus⁠—”

His laugh is sharp and condescending. It slices through my sentence easier than one of my Iron-reinforced swords cuts through leather.

“No, you’re not,” he says sadly, leaning forward on his desk to study me. “Cold Wind is one of the masks that you wear. But it is not all that you are. It cannot be, for it is a shallow thing. It only kills. It does not love. It does not create. It does not rest. You cannot hope to reach the heights you are aiming for if you don’t know who you are.”

“No offense, Magister,” I say slowly, fully meaning to offend, “but that sounds insane. I am a weapon. I am here to win the Games and save this domus. The matches at Forum are in six months, and I am still broken.”

“Castor, do you know how a sword is made?”

“Of course,” I retort hotly. My education may be lacking, but even I am more than familiar with the forging process. I survived Agogia. “They heat iron until it is pliable and then beat it until it is in the shape they want it to be.”

“Do you know what happens to a sword that is beaten too much or isn’t allowed to cool properly?” His tone is mild, but his eyes are sharp and pleased. I do not know what he plans, so I am silent, refusing to fall into his trap. “It turns brittle and breaks.”

The silence that hangs between us is fragile too.

The two of us stare at each other for a long moment as Unrelenting Fire feasts on my irritation and lets it grow. I am so tired of being told what to do, how to feel. I am an abominatio—one of a kind in the entirety of the Iron Empire. There is no one who knows what I am going through, the burdens that I bear.

I have bled for these people. Killed for these people. I have done everything they have asked, but I am not whole. The white rasa veins on my arms bother me. The Copper ones make me angry. They are signs of my failure and theirs. I stand under the votum of the Goddess of Revenge. She leans on me like a gristmill, grinding me between heavy stones. Too many of my brothers have died already. I may be the last who carries this burden. I have no time—no patience to cool off. I have people to kill. What do I care if I am brittle? I can shatter after Atticus and Brutus are dead.

And Brennus. Can’t forget Brennus.

“Yes,” he muses, as if he can see the indignant fires that rage behind my eyes. “You do need to learn how to be.” It takes all my self-control and a little help from the numbness of Ancient Frost to keep me from cursing the old man in his own office.

“Do you have any suggestions?” I manage through gritted teeth.

“Go and explore Anteforum,” he commands me after a moment of thought. “I will tell Contessa to let you wander as much as you want. Go and cool off—live a little—before we put you back in the forge.”

I can do nothing but obey.

I fume in the crowded city on a bright, warm day.

Anteforum surrounds the capital like a collar, spreading as far as the eye can see. I know that now, because I am at the top of the temple to Dead Jupiter, standing on the viewing platform of the ruined building, marveling at the white marble that stretches from horizon to horizon.

The temple is a performative place. The gods may be real. They may or may not be dead. But they are not here. The priests who tend to it wear black togas that are torn to signify their mourning. I eye them distrustfully, looking for a hint of corrupted veins running through their arms, but I see no sign of a necromanta lurking among their number. If there are more like Tenebrus, the Pontifex, they are not here.

The building itself has been allowed to fall into ruins, to remind us that its occupant is dead. But if you look closely, you can see the plaster they use to reinforce the edges of the holes in the walls so they do not grow larger. The broken pillars were made that way. The ruin is artistic rather than true. It strikes me as odd that we still worship gods that we killed. Not just because they are dead, but because we killed them.

I will not worship Atticus when he lies in the dirt. I will dance on his grave.

There are no revelations waiting for me in Jupiter’s empty home, so I wander the streets until I find a market. My escort, a pair of Varus’s Ironbound guards, follow me at a respectful distance. I am trusted to explore, but I cannot go alone. After all, according to the rolls of the Census, I am a criminal.

I wander my way through the crowded stalls, marveling at how different-yet-similar it feels to the market of Segesta, only an order of magnitude larger. There are more people buying and selling here than live in my entire town.

Yet, the cadence is the same. People crowd around merchants who sell fresh food, inspecting their wares with keen eyes. I ignore them; I have no need for it. The Domus Pelias mess hall feeds me better than I deserve.

Instead, I sift through the people, wondering what it must be like to grow up in this stone jungle. I see almost no electi wandering around. People look at me strangely when they notice my Cor veins as well as the guards that follow me. I look like some palatine lord coming to slum with the patricians and plebeians, although anyone with eyes to see would notice that my face does not have the angular edges of higher breeding.

I see more strains of people than I have ever seen before, which whispers to me a truth I have already begun to accept—that Segesta was a place removed from the rest of the world. I feel something inside me crumble, like one of the pillars in Jupiter’s temple giving way. Terra is different than I know—it is bigger, and I am very small.

Perhaps that is what it means to be.

I sweep through the market with my animus, curious as to what it will tell me. Iron whispers the knowledge of a thousand things from pots and pans to buttons. A non-descript man wanders past me, carrying four knives. I give him a frank look, and he turns away, looking for an easier mark.

Ancient Frost finds little that it is congruent with, although there is a patch of ice that some butcher three rows over uses to keep his meats cool before he sells them. I sense a passive sort of will reinforcing it, some sort of simple relic aiding him.

Unrelenting Fire is stuck to me, and although it is not alive, it almost feels petulant, like a child not being allowed to go and play with its older siblings. I shove my Copper Cor’s Symbol to the back of my mind by embracing my Winter one, trying to ignore its distraction.

“Dominus, here!” a man’s voice shouts at me. I turn in surprise. No one has called me Dominus in almost a year. But as I look, it ignites a firestorm in the merchants around me.

“Dominus, I have the softest carpets in all of the Iron Empire!” a woman calls, seeing that I am approachable. “Imported from the wilds beyond reach. You will not believe how plush they are.”

“Dominus, my leather is the finest in the city!”

“Dominus, taste my carrots! Are they not sweet enough to be a dessert?”

The aisle descends into pandemonium, and I lead my guards out, ducking as if they are pelting me with stones and not words. I have fought in the sands of Bellona’s Arena, under the eyes of thirty thousand souls, but I find this attention overwhelming.

“Well, that was bracing,” I comment dryly to Atrius, the closer of the two guards. The Ironbound is in his late thirties, and I like him even if he was in the Third Legion during his service.

“Try not to make eye contact,” he offers, a fairly amused look lurking beneath the professionally blank expression on his face.

“I’ll do my best,” I promise, turning down another row. Despite my irritation with the vague assignment before me, I am enjoying being back in the mix of society. I have been removed from the normal day-to-day life of a citizen of the Empire since they dragged me to Agogia. There is something cathartic about moving around a crowd of people under the light of Sol. It is far different than wandering through the icy waste of the North. I feel like I am part of a body again, after being lost.

“Fresh flour, Dominus!” a woman’s voice calls as I walk past her stall. “I sell only the finest grains in the Empire!” I pause mid-step, surprised by her words. Something inside me shakes as I turn to face her. A dark-skinned woman, she smiles at me warmly when she sees that she has my attention. She gestures at a row of baskets before her, piled high with various finely ground flours.

“Barley. Rye. Millet. Wheat.” My head tilts as I study her wares. I feel like I am outside of my own body, looking, seeing a life that I never got to live. Somewhere far away in a different time and a different place, two boys talked about opening a bakery. A journey of a thousand steps and a lot of blood stands between me and that dream now. But it reminds me of a tall, annoying plebeian who was a better friend than I deserved.

“Where is your wheat from?” I ask, struggling to not let my voice crack with sadness.

“Segesta, Dominus, they grow the best in the Empire.”

I nod in acceptance of that fact, even though it means I will end up paying more for it. “Give me ten pounds,” I say, fishing a denarius from my pocket and extending it toward her.

Pliny gave me an allowance to learn how to be. I think he expected me to use it on wilder delights, but this is what I want. This is what I need. I feel a faint sense of amusement leaking from my guards, but I ignore them.

My hands shake as I accept the sack of flour from the vendor and cradle it to my chest like a child. I breathe deeply. It smells nothing like bread—yet. But it smells a little like home. I shed some of the pain I carry around me like a snake losing its skin, closing my eyes for a moment in the crowded market to enjoy it. When they open, I turn to my minders with an embarrassed grin.

“I’m ready to go back.”

My first stop back at the estate are the kitchens.

“You want to what?” The matron of the Pelias mess hall asks for the third time, still in disbelief. She is a short, squat woman named Palina, who looks like she could stand in a shieldwall without hesitation. I like her. I wish that Unus was still alive so that I could introduce them. Somehow, I know that the one-eyed zealot would love her.

Still holding my bag of flour, I invade the kitchen, a space I have never bothered to explore. It stretches the length of the mess hall. Massive ovens burn, pouring their sweltering heat out into the room. If my Unrelenting Fire Cor was Silver, I’m sure I would feel a sea of ignis relics set in them. A dozen cooks rush around, preparing for tonight’s meal.

“I’d like to bake some bread,” I repeat, a broad smile on my face. It is a strange feeling. It twists and stretches my face in a way that it has not done in a long time. It feels nice to wear it when I am not about to kill someone.

Is this learning to be? I think with amused irritation at the two old men who have sent me to toil at what feels like a task with no end. Am I existing enough yet?

“We have bread out there.” Palina gestures over my shoulder with a long ladle that she wields like it is a gladius. She seems to think that I have a problem with her cooking. Nothing could be further from the truth. I have no desire to be this woman’s enemy. She might be my favorite person in the whole compound.

“I know.” I chuckle softly, trying to defuse the situation. “I love your bread. It’s not about that. I just want to… make something.”

Her brows furrow as she stares up at me in confusion. “Why?”

“I… don’t know,” I admit after a long moment. “I’m looking for something.”

“The bread is out there⁠—”

“I’m not looking for bread.”

“You need to make bread to find something that isn’t bread?” She stares at me like I am an idiot.

“That is exactly it,” I admit with a chagrined smile. I feel mad. Like the whole world has gone insane and they have taken me with them. But I am holding a bag of wheat from Segesta, and I am going to bake bread in memory of my friend.

“The lanista insists that I be allowed,” I tell her when she still doesn’t look convinced. “Just put me somewhere out of the way, and I promise you won’t even know I’m here.”

Palina begrudgingly gives me a small space right next to the sweltering ovens. It is the hottest part of the kitchen. I have no doubt that is on purpose, but I cannot fault her for it. If I were the chef in charge of feeding this compound, I’d be annoyed at some gladiator coming in trying to bake his own bread too. Fortunately, the Symbol of Unrelenting Fire welcomes the heat, and I do not even notice it after a dozen heartbeats.

I drop my bag of flour onto a table that runs through the middle of the room, grabbing a clay bowl so I can mix my ingredients together. A smile grows on my face as I clap my hands together. I am excited to start. There is, however, just one problem.

I don’t know how to make bread.

I mean, I know how to make bread. You mix the flour, water, and yeast together and let it rise. I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to add salt too. But how much of each do I use? And where was I going to find some yeast? With a sigh, I look back at the distant form of Palina, marshalling her troops. She is going to hate me.

After much finagling, I convince her to loan me one of her assistants, a young, pimple-faced girl named Callia. At first, my new teacher is too shy to speak to me, but as I begin to do more things wrong, she becomes more irritated.

“No!” she shrieks, shoving me aside with her small, wiry frame. “You have to mix it more before you add more flour; otherwise, you won’t know how dry it is!” she demonstrates, sticking her hand into the bulging white mass and twisting it efficiently in her grip. An image of my tall, lanky friend bent over the bowl flickers in my head and makes me smile.

“Of course.” I nod along with her instruction. After a moment, she reluctantly lets me take back over, and I twist the dough easily, marveling at its strange feel between my fingers. Felix promised to hire me at his bakery, but I have never actually baked before. It is a strange process. Who first came up with the idea of grinding up a plant, then wetting its powder, and putting the paste in fire? A madman, surely.

“That’s enough!” Callia shrieks, frustrated once more.

“Okay,” I respond quickly, pulling my hands free, showing her that I am listening and will not mix it any further. “Now what?”

“Now you let it rise.”

“How long does that take?”

“Until it’s big enough.”

“Naturally.” I nod as if that answer was at all useful. “Then what?”

“Then you bake it.”

“For how long?”

“Until it’s done.”

“You have been a big help,” I say with a smile. It’s even true. How little about life I truly know.

“Fortuna’s Luck with that. Domina said I’m to get back to work when it starts rising,” the girl says, slipping away without a backward glance. In the distance, Palina glares at us, her hands on her hips. I smile and wave, embarrassed at the disruption my baking experiment has caused.

Left to my own devices, I sit next to my bowl of dough, waiting for nature to run its course. Out of curiosity for a life that never happened, I probe at it with all three of my Symbols, even lightly brushing my fingers along it so that Unrelenting Fire can get a taste.

None of them sense anything of interest. The dough is neither hot nor cold. Ancient Frost could turn the water in its mixture to ice, but it is so thoroughly a part of the dough now that the congruency would be quite uncomfortable. Felix had hoped to bind a Wheat Symbol after the Sententia. I wonder what that could tell him about the round lump that sits in front of me, growing.

It is an agonizing process to wait. Most bakers set it aside for a few hours to let it do its work in peace. A watched pot never boils, and a watched dough never rises. But this is my first attempt, and it feels almost like a healing ritual. To abandon it would be like falling asleep on watch. Some cook might find it and bake it for me or throw it away. I am a mother hen, determined to sit with my large egg until it is ready.

For the first time in quite a while, I am alone with my thoughts. They are more peaceful than I expected. When I was in Dorian’s prison, I was alone in a rocky cell, but my thoughts tormented me. They were only of the dead and dying, of failure and blood.

The Pelias kitchen is also made of stone, but it is bright and warm, and the sound of cooks going about their work chases away the maudlin thoughts. I do not think of Atticus and Brennus, or of Ascending.

I think of days spent chasing Agre, our faithful stonehound, through my father’s fields. I think of Gnaeus, the old servant who raised me like a grandfather, smuggling me sweets before dinner. For once, Unrelenting Fire is calm, not raging with the anger of loss, but instead, it relaxes in the warmth of pleasant memories. My eyes shine with unspent tears, but I am not sad. Nor am I furious that these moments are gone—I am simply glad to have had them.

“Dominus? You can put that into the oven.” Callia’s voice breaks through my daydreams with hesitation. I start, turning to stare at the girl in surprise.

“What?”

“Your dough—it is risen.” I lift the cloth that I placed over the bowl and inspect my round lump suspiciously. Sure enough, it has more than doubled in size. It still looks nothing like bread, but that’s what this next part is supposed to be for.

I carve out a small lump of dough and place it on an iron tray that Callia provides me. I roll it a few times in my hand, trying to make it perfect. Eventually, I give up, forced to settle with good enough. Carrying my precious cargo, I make my way over to one of the ovens, bending over to slide it in on the grating that sits inside.

Pleased with myself, I lean back, watching my little egg with intense focus. Yet again I wish that I had Ascended with Unrelenting Fire. As a Silver, I would be able to sense and guide the flames that bake it, ensuring that they were even.

Unfortunately, the only way for me to do that now would be to stick my hand into the oven, and I suspect that would only serve to make the cooks even more nervous. No, as much as I want to use my will to meddle with the baking process, I am better off letting this first one run its course.

Although, I muse, eyeing the size of the massive oven before me. I wonder if I could climb in there and cultivate a better source of Fire essence. I shake my head, trying to dislodge that stray thought. This is not the time for my dogged obsessions. I am here to bake bread.

My loaf is in the oven for what feels like forever. It is like I am a child on Adventus morning again. But at last, the loaf looks done to my eyes. It is gold and crispy on the outside. My mouth waters in anticipation, and I can wait no longer.

I pull the loaf out with my bare hands, trusting the cooks to assume that my Silver body protects me from the heat. I plan on using Ancient Frost to cool it to human-appropriate temperatures. But after a moment of thought, I pause before switching to Unrelenting Fire and using it to draw the heat out. It is easier to use a Symbol that is more congruent to lead the warmth than to drown it with its opposite.

Interesting.

For a moment, my peaceful moment is almost ruined by my mind’s desire to experiment with what I have just learned. Later, I promise the beast that lurks in the back of my mind, greedy for any knowledge it might be able to use. Bread first.

I grab a serrated knife from a block of wood without looking, guided by my Iron senses. Tenderly, I carve into the bread, marveling at how the crust flakes under the pressure. My smile fades slightly as I carve through the meat of the loaf. The bread seems too moist.

Maybe that is only because it is fresh. I cut a few more slices, feeling a hint of chagrin growing as I study them. Something is definitely wrong. I hesitate before picking up one of them, allowing the delightful sense of heat to run along my fingers. I am glad that Callia is back at work—I would hate to have her witness this.

Across the way, Hiro’s granddaughter enters the room, dressed in another set of shiny black and silver clothing. Palina intercepts her, carrying a tray of food for the girl. I ignore them, turning my attention back to what I have made.

Closing my eyes, my mind flashes with a vision of a world that will never be. I stand behind the counter of a bakery owned by Felix, proudly presenting the fruit of our joint labor. Valentina is there to buy it, just like she promised in the depths of the arena. Marcus stands with her, dressed in the purple of a Praetorian. It is the dream of a child, but it is a good dream, and I let myself enjoy it for a moment before pulling myself free.

Opening my mouth, I take a bite. It’s chewy and a little wet. The salt tastes like it is not distributed evenly. One moment, I get a burst of it, then it is gone, like it never existed. But it is edible—it is bread, technically.

I’m going to have to get better at this. I can almost hear Felix’s laughter at my attempt.

I open my eyes and twitch in surprise to find Hiro’s granddaughter standing before me, a strange expression on her face. In her left hand, she carries the tray with two large bowls that are full of steaming hot broth. In her right, she holds a slice of my undercooked loaf.

“Bread?” she asks, eyeing my creation with a skeptical air.

“Bread.” Despite my failure, I feel a hint of a smile growing on my face. Slowly, she takes a bite, face unreadable as she chews. When she swallows, she gives me a pitying glance.

“It is not very good.”

“I’ll get better.” I laugh. “It’s what I do.”