While varieties of humankind might be infinite, Classes were not.

At least, that was how Old Gant said he had explained it to her parents. For most people, the paucity of life’s choices was barely a consideration: families specialised in a Class and each subsequent generation simply followed in the well-trodden footsteps of their parents and their parents’ parents before them. Of course, there were exceptions: every hamlet had dark tales of “bad seeds” who rejected beloved family traditions to run away to one of the towns or, Goddess forbid, the Capital, but those exceptions merely proved the rule. For the most part, year after year, Bakers bred Bakers, Stonemasons had little Stonemasons, and so on and so forth until the end of time.

“But that does not need to be the fate of your little girl,” Gant had reportedly told them. “For her, there are much greater opportunities out there.”

Daine did not know what had first drawn his attention to her. Perhaps some aggrieved neighbour had complained about the Orbans’ “wild child” traumatising their children. More likely, Daine thought in her gloomier moments — and she certainly had enough of those — her exhausted parents had reported her themselves. Too strong, too fast, too hungry, too destructive. Whatever the truth, Gallant Stonehand — who was, at that time, already well on the way to earning his “Old” honorific — had been summoned and had arrived, with great fanfare, to present the Orbans with the opportunity to sell him their fourth daughter.

Daine liked to think they would have agonised over that choice. Gant had never said either way, but it made it easier to stomach if she could imagine long, tearful nights of debate, followed by months (years, surely?) of painful recriminations once she was gone.

Not that it mattered.

Truth be told, almost fifty years later, she could not even remember what they looked like. Had they loved her? Presumably. There were far easier ways to deal with a troublesome child than hoping someone would come by and offer them hard coin for her. That she was alive to meet Old Gant spoke of . . . something, did it not it? She could have asked them herself, swung by to visit on one of her Tours. But what would have been the point? “Thank you, dearest parents, for selling me to the Kingdom’s cruellest, more brilliant Mentors. Yes, I learned many ways to kill people. No, I would not recommend it. Yes, I am that Darkhelm. No, I do not especially enjoy it. How is Grandma?” Somehow, she could not see the reunion progressing in such a storybook manner.

A few years back, she had been approached by someone, presumably from her part of the world. They’d recognised her surname and wanted to know if she “be an Orban of the Farming Orbans?” She had ridden on without pause, leaving him with a mouth filled with dust and a curse on his lips. But the question ate away at her in the long nights. Could she say she was truly an Orban any longer? Would she be good for anything on a farm more than pulling a plough?

The Orbans, for generations unending, had been Farmers. Good ones, too. That meant lots of Strength, lots of Constitution, and a fair bit of Dexterity. Even for those with that Class, as evidenced by the interest of her unwanted questioner, Orbans were highly regarded for their physicality. Their sons were welcome to come courting at any hearth, and their daughters were seen as excellent breeding stock to supplement a family line. In many ways, it was surprising that Daine had been the first in their bloodline to show the potential for Class Evolution. Most families had stories of children gathered by someone like Gallant Stonehand, having displayed preternatural talent. Nevertheless, she had been a local first, and Gant had needed to deliver what he witheringly called “the provincial talk” to her mother and father.

“One of my roles, appointed by the King himself, I am pleased to tell you, is to look out for children like your dearest Diane — sorry, Daine, is it? What a creative use of vowels! Never let tradition, good sense, or literacy stand in your way; that’s what I always say! — who have the opportunity to have their Class evolve. You will have heard that children with this potential demonstrate prodigious talent in their common Class from an exceedingly early age. This is, after all, how we find them. And you will know, of course, the rewards available for those who locate these children.”

He conspicuously stroked a full bag of coins to emphasise his words.

“Once identified, we have found that should these children collaborate with an appropriate Mentor — I dare flatter myself here by noting the King himself sponsors my school — there are almost no limits to the paths these children can walk. Now, the potential for this is not as rare as you may think. However, if we do not find these children before their fifth birthday, then their common Class will simply ‘lock in,’ as it were. At that stage, they will go on to lead normal, albeit rather more successful, lives. I am sure you will have a nephew or distant cousin who seems to be better at . . . sorry, I’m not especially familiar with Farming practices. But they will be better at it than anyone else. Perhaps they will develop a Skill to allow them to milk the bulls twice as fast as expected, for example.”

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

“And Daine could do this?”

“Certainly. At three years old, from what I’m told, she’s already as strong as your husband, as quick as a rabbit, sleeps less than two hours a day, and, I am sure, already eats three times as much as the rest of your family combined. Yes, I see in your faces you are well familiar with going without to ensure this voracious little terrier gets the opportunity to eat her fill.”

“Is there anything that can be done to stop it? To make her normal again?”

“My dear young thing, please do not cry. I am sure you cannot spare the moisture. This whole situation is entirely commonplace, I promise you. It’s nothing to worry about at all. Believe me, if you turn down my generous offer, you will, in no time, have a very accomplished . . . do you people do something with seeds? Yes? Well, she’ll do it very well indeed, and you will all be enormously proud. But, of course, you will also be quite a bit poorer due to the substantial drain of your meagre resource she will be. But let us look on the bright side; if your family manages to survive tending this cuckoo in your nest — and I have heard that some families can buck the trend and struggle through — then in ten, maybe fifteen years, she will be able to start repaying you. And what a Goddessend that will be, eh?”

Daine imagined the look on their faces as they tried to conceive of even another ten weeks with her in their house, consuming all around her like some malign, anthropomorphised locust, let alone ten years. She was sure that vision of a bleak future sealed the issue as much as Gant’s next words.

“However, should you decide you can bear to part with Diane — sorry, Daine. Are you absolutely settled on that? They adapt so quickly to new names at this age. Oh, so be it— she will have, and I mean this quite literally, the chance to transform the world. Not everyone can make this sacrifice, so our greatest heroes are rare. Should she survive the training, she will become someone of whom you will hear songs. You will see statues erected to her and be able to think, ‘That’s our little girl. How brave we were to give up her life of chicken-fondling to allow her to follow those dreams.‘ And, as I may have mentioned, the realm has the hard coin to pay for that chance.”

“What will happen to her? I mean, what will you do with her?”

“A sensible question to ask and one that does you credit, ma’am. You wouldn’t be doing your due diligence if you did not ask about me and my process, would you? I can tell you that some parents, well, they’re just grateful for the coin. I ride into town, offer them a solution to the single biggest problem in their lives, and they simply bite my hand off with gratitude; indeed, most try to pay me to take their little tyke away. But no. Here you are, half-starved, looking that gift horse in the mouth and asking to count its teeth. I take my hat off to you, ma’am. Quite the integrity you possess.”

Her mother had tried apologising then, worried the offer would be snatched away. But Gant would not hear of it. So instead, he told her of his training school. Of the methods that would help a Farmer’s child use her Orban foundations to increase her Attributes and to seek to develop a broader range of Skills. To try to build on what nature had provided with hard work, focus, and “to speak plain, ma’am, because we are all people of the world here, as much of the stick as the carrot.”

Daine hoped her parents had understood quite how much stick would be required. She doubted it.

“And she will become a hero?”

At that, Gant had leaned forward, light glinting off the silver ball that sat in place of his left eye, and spun his favourite tales: of Dreadnaughts and Blood Rangers, of Metamorphs and Lightweavers. And, of course, of the Knights of the Road.

Gallant never told the story the same way twice, and, as age and drink stripped away more and more of his personality, Daine had come to recognise how little of what he told all of them about their families and the circumstances in which they parted with their children was likely to have been true. She doubted he even remembered the visit to the Orban farm — he just told whatever version of the past suited at the time.

Some of her classmates had needed to hold on to the romantic view of the peasantry nobly sacrificing their children for the greater good. Darkhelm knew differently. She had heard the rumours of blood and fire in the night, of screaming mothers and slaughtered fathers. While she did not think Old Gant’s school had needed to resort to such an approach, he would have been peculiarly unique if he had never ordered it.

The realm needed its heroes, after all.

She did not feel especially heroic right now, covered in the blood of a Fire Mage who had neglected her reading on the magical resistances of Knights of the Road.

Cenwyn approached Daine with, she thought, the excessive caution of a man faced with a caged tiger. “To answer your question, there is every chance tonight will live long in the memory. Without seeking to be presumptuous, perhaps you would appreciate somewhere to clean up?”

She looked down at her clothes. She favoured dark colours for this reason, and while vanity had never been her problem, there was always an attraction in washing away the worst of the residue. She fixed Trellec’s men with an unwavering stare. “Is there any reason I should hesitate to change? Are more demonstrations required?”

“No, my Lady. We’ll be leaving you be now and making our way back to the Keep.” The spokesman paused and jutted his chin at the bodies. “May I arrange their collection?”

“Tell Trellec I expect their families to be compensated. He wasted their lives tonight. Take care he does not spend yours so lightly.”

“As you say, my Lady.” The men retrieved their unconscious fellows, and they all quickly departed. Daine turned back to the Tailor.

“Master Tailor. Cenwyn. A quiet place to clean up and, if I may presume, some new clothes would be very welcome. If you have anything to match the quality of the cloak, you will find that Orbans are not short of hard coin.”