The knight did not sit upon the meal chest; he collapsed against the dry masonry of the north wall as though the iron pins in his greaves had sheared away simultaneously.
His back hit the limestone with a dull, hollow clatter of plates, sliding down the rough stones until his haunches found the floor between two vinegar tubs. He rested his elbows on his armored knees, buried his face in his gauntleted palms, and let the steam rise between his fingers. The breath that escaped him was not a warrior’s challenge; it was the long, shuddering wheeze of an exhausted beast that had been dragged across fifty miles of broken gravel.
Jon stood by the trestle table, his arms folded across his leather apron, his ten white finger-rings resting against the rough wool of his sleeves.
“Three times,” Cael said into his gauntlets, his voice muffled by leather and steel. “Not once. Three times I have taken a knife to this breastbone before dawn.”
“The scars tell the count,” Jon said, keeping his tone even. “Two cuts across the muscle, one vertical gouge that chipped the cartilage where the second rib joins. You were cutting in the dark, without a looking glass, trying to hook the tip behind the gold rim.”
