The first hints of dawn stretched across the horizon, spilling pale gold over the quiet palace gardens.
Mist clung to the edges of the training grounds, curling around the bases of the marble statues that bore the likenesses of past kings and warriors.
The air was crisp, tinged with the scent of dew-soaked grass and the faint tang of metal from the racks of weapons laid out along the field.
In that silence, there moved a figure both graceful and lethal, a shadow threading through the mist with precision that spoke of years of rigorous discipline.
Princess Ariana of Ivanova Kingdom emerged from the trees at the edge of the courtyard, her hair—a blaze of fiery red—catching the first rays of sunlight and igniting into strands of molten gold and crimson.
She wore a tunic of soft leather over close-fitting trousers, boots laced to her knees, and a belt that held a short sword at her hip.
