Her hand drifted toward the hilt of her dagger without thinking. “No. No way. I gave you the oath. I willkillanyone who comes near you.”
“I believe you,” I said, meaning it. “But Remy’s already on it. The assassin’s dead.”
Her jaw tightened. “Remy killed him?”
I shook my head once. “No. Zander did. With Dark Fire. He left a hole in the man’s chest.”
Solei was quiet for a breath. “Efficient.”
We slipped through the back of a shuttered tavern, the warmth of spilled ale and burnt herbs clinging to the old wood. The bartender didn’t glance up. A nod was all it took.
Solei led me down a back stairwell hidden behind a tapestry. The passage beneath was cramped and reeked of damp earth, the torchlight barely cutting through the dark.
I followed without speaking.
Finally, after several turns and the scrape of metal on stone, we entered my father’s chamber.
And there, seated at a mahogany table with a decanter of wine and maps scattered before him, was Cyran.
My father.
He looked up slowly, eyes shadowed, and smiled like he’d been expecting me all along.
“My lost daughter,” he said smoothly. “Why have you arranged this meeting?”
Cyran leaned back in his chair, fingers steepled beneath his chin as I dropped the folded parchment onto the table between us. The Order’s thorn seal gleamed in the flickering lamplight, cracked open but unmistakable.
“We found this on the assassin that tried to kill me,” I said quietly.
His eyes flicked down to the seal, and for the first time since I’d entered the room, something flickered across his expression, just a flash of stillness. Not fear. Not guilt.
Surprise.
“I didn’t order your death,” he said at last, tone flat but tight beneath the calm. “Solei has warned me she’d be displeased.”
“She’d be more than displeased,” Solei muttered from where she stood behind me, arms crossed, her tone coiled with promise. “She’d slit your throat herself.”
Cyran gave her a slight look, amused, not insulted. “Besides,” he added, “I’m no longer involved in court politics. Not directly. I wouldn’t risk exposure by sending a killer after my own daughter.”
I stared at him. “Then what about the king?” I asked. “Do you have anything to do with his sickness? With whatever’s rotting him from the inside out?”
His expression hardened. “No. I’m not involved in the king’s decline. That game is beyond me, and I no longer care who wears the crown.”
Solei shifted, pushing off the wall. Her eyes were bright, even in the dim light. “It doesn’t matter whatyousay,” she told Cyran. “The assassin wasMalstom.I secretly messaged our people and started an investigating once Ashe told me about the attack. The bartender told me who the assassin was when we entered the tavern. Once Remy finds out that he works for us, he’ll assume it was you.”
Cyran stood so fast the chair scraped back with a loud screech.
“That’s impossible.”
“Who’s Malstom?” I asked, pulse spiking.
Cyran’s jaw flexed. “An Order assassin. One of our more talented recruits. He’s from Roweath originally. Highly trained.Precise. I brought him into the fold after Remy disappeared. After we stopped looking for him.”
I stared at him. “Then ifyoudidn’t send him… someone is setting you up.”
Silence followed.
A heavy, twisting silence that wrapped around all three of us.
