Varynth creates the misery of thousands simply to ensure they remain desperate enough to kiss his boots.
A profound, sickening disgust coils in my gut.
He is not ruling. He is festering. The traditions he protects are nothing more than cowardice masked by cruelty. Megan was right. The immaculate order of House Thosti is a slaughterhouse, and the man sitting upon the dais is the chief butcher.
"You are rotting inside, Varynth." The quiet statement carry the devastating weight of a broken oath.
Refusing to wait for his dismissal, I leave the Patriarch of my bloodline behind and walk toward the iron doors.
"If you leave this hall, you sever yourself from my protection, Zhetrin!" Desperation and rage fracture his tone. "I will strip the ledgers from your hands! I will see that human flayed alive in the central square!"
"Try." The doors seal shut before the quiet challenge can reach him.
Thick, oppressive air chokes the outer corridors of the palace. Striding down the shadowed, winding hallways toward the grand exit, my mind rapidly calculates the logistics of open warfare within my own house. Varynth will move quickly. He will attempt to freeze my assets and turn the Miou legions against my estate.
Rounding the corner toward the lower terrace, I pull my towering frame back into the deep shadows of a carved obsidian pillar.
Fifty yards down the dim corridor, my cousin Seredryl stands in an alcove near the courtyard gardens. Possessing elegant, severe features and midnight-blue hair woven with silver beads, the minor noble has spent a century lurking in my shadow, hungry for the power I control.
She is not alone.
An emissary wearing the stamped leather of the southern districts stands beside her, bearing the sigil of Lord Kryven.
Silencing my breathing, I lean closer to the cold stone.
"The Warlord’s estate is heavily warded." Seredryl's tense, frantic hiss barely disturbs the air. Her focus darts nervously over her shoulder, completely oblivious to my presence down the hall. "Tharion has doubled the interior guard. The surface-filth does not leave the eastern wing."
Withdrawing a velvet pouch from his coat, the emissary presses it into Seredryl’s hands. The dense clink of Khuzuth coin is unmistakable in the quiet.
"Lord Kryven does not care about the wards." The emissary's words clip with cold precision. "The Patriarch has given his blessing. House Thosti must be cleansed of this embarrassment. You have the rotation schedules for the estate guard. Find the crack, Seredryl. Deliver the human to the Dark Market, and Kryven will ensure you inherit the ledgers when Zhetrin falls."
Seredryl’s fingers tighten around the pouch. The greed burning in her eyes easily eclipses her fear.
"I will handle the interior watch. Tell Kryven to have the flesh-brokers waiting at the southern drainage grates tomorrow night."
Nodding once, the emissary slips backward into the dark gardens, vanishing into the Undercity.
Remaining completely still, I press my back against the obsidian pillar.
The bloodline is fractured. The treason is absolute. My own cousin is selling the coordinates of my estate to a rival lord, orchestrating the abduction of the only being in this rotting world I possess a desire to protect.
A dark, feral violence rises in my chest—a terrifying instinct detached from ledgers or politics. It is the raw, unhinged fury ofan apex predator realizing a lesser beast is hunting what belongs to him.
Stepping out of the shadows, my boots silent upon the stone, I pivot toward the exit. I will not strike Seredryl down in the hallway. Killing her now gives Varynth the justification to declare me a traitor to the bloodline and seize my estate before I can return. I would lose the war.
I must return to the stronghold. I must fortify the eastern wing. And I must ensure that when Seredryl’s traitors breach the walls, they find nothing but the waiting steel of my longblade.
11
MEGAN
The doors of the grand foyer slam open, the concussive force vibrating straight through the marble.
Stepping from the recess of the central stairwell, I anticipate the usual measured, silent return of the estate’s master. Instead, Zhetrin breaches the threshold like a storm breaking over the mountains. He moves with terrifying velocity, the dark leather of his coat snapping behind his frame. The biting tang of ash and burnt copper surges into the hall, coating the back of my tongue.
I step into the ambient glow, parting my lips to ask how the Patriarch received the new trade tallies.
Zhetrin halts the instant he tracks my movement.
