"I walked in. The door was unlatched." She dismisses the treason with a ruthless practicality. "Your estate imports a surplus of perishable tithes. The Khuzuth nobles do not consume coarse grain, and the Zagfer servants are restricted to fixed rations. Therefore, a fraction of your wealth rots in the storehouses every week before it is discarded."
The sheer audacity of her logic keeps me in place.
"I tracked the spoilage rates." Her mind turns with brilliant, rapid precision, weaponizing my own numbers against me. "I calculated the exact proportion of meat and grain scheduled for the disposal carts. I am simply reallocating the rot-margin before it spoils. Maelis balances the books at the end of the week, writing off the missing food as natural decay. The ledgers remain perfect. The children eat."
A stunned void devours the corridor.
My mind, taught for centuries to process raw numbers and brutal truths, stalls. A mortal from the filthy Lowtowns has successfully audited the Thosti provisions, identified the spoilage margins, and created a shadow-economy directly beneath the nose of my most ruthless steward.
She wielded no magic. She used sheer intellect.
The ink smudges staining her fingers and the stubborn jut of her chin form a devastating equation. The math of my reality shatters—I am irrevocably captivated by the mind of a human.
"You are manipulating the spoilage fractions." The realization strips the Warlord from my tone, leaving only raw, predatory fascination.
"It is basic trade logic." She braces against my quiet, anticipating a blow. "It costs you nothing. It creates no deficit. If you intend to execute me for outsmarting your steward, do it. But I will not apologize."
I eliminate the remaining physical space. My body eclipses the cramped corridor, forcing her to tip her head sharply to accommodate my height. I drag a breath into my lungs, the bright trace of dried lavender obliterating the damp rot of the catacombs.
"If Maelis conducts a mid-cycle audit, she will weigh the actual decay against the expected margin."
A sudden, sharp hitch fractures her breathing. She finally slips.
"Adjust the salted meat tally by two additional fractions. Leave the rinds in the disposal bins to mimic the weight of the missing decay. It will mask your reallocation flawlessly."
Surprise flashes in her eyes. She does not expect a Khuzuth warlord to flawlessly refine her treason.
"You..." The jagged edge of her defiance dissolves. "You are allowing it."
"I am balancing my ledgers."
I pivot, my coat striking the damp stone. I must cut off our connection before the visceral, predatory compulsion to drag her against my chest shatters my discipline. She is a brilliant, feral disruption to everything I have created, and I possess no desire to eliminate her from the board.
I ascend the grand stairwell, leaving the damp rot of the catacombs below.
Before my boots clear the first landing, Tharion appears in the corridor. The captain of my guard heaves for air, his armored hand locked around the hilt of his drawn longblade.
"My lord." The rough syllables scrape against the quiet. "We have a breach. Three of our trade shipments on the surface have been burned to powder."
The volatile heat lingering in my chest turns to ice. The flawless, lethal void of the Undercity crashes back down over my shoulders.
"Kryven."
The captain's jaw hardens into a ruthless line. "Yes. And his emissary left a mandate in the ruins. He demands the mortal be surrendered to the High Assembly by nightfall, or he will destroy the Thosti trade routes."
5
MEGAN
The heavy ironwood door of the master study yields to my push with a faint, oiled sigh.
I slip inside, sealing the corridor behind me. The air in Zhetrin’s private sanctuary is thick with the scent of his magic—the sharp, biting tang of crushed ash and the heavy, electric weight of an impending storm. The room is vast, a cavernous testament to the absolute control of the Khuzuth nobility.
Towering bookshelves carved from obsidian stretch toward a ceiling lost in gloom, filled with centuries of bound history, ancient alchemy texts, and the endless records of House Thosti’s wealth.
Everything in this room is built for a giant. The grand desk occupying the floor is a slab of dark, polished timber. To see the surface, I have to stand on the tips of my bare toes.
I pull a heavy, high-backed leather chair around to the side of the desk and climb onto the seat.
