Page 7 of House of Crimson Cloak and Silver Teeth

“I’m not running.” I pull back enough to meet her eyes. “Where would I go? I don’t exist outside these walls. I have no papers or name except the one they gave me.”

She turns back toward the window. “You had a name once. Before all this.”

“That boy is dead.” I don’t tell her that I sometimes wake up trying to remember it. My grandfather called me little wolf. My mother called me her heart. But my actual name? It’s gone, burned away the day they pressed the guild mark into my skin.

When she looks back, her expression is carefully blank. “If Shade makes his move against the Wiolants, get as far away as you can. Don’t let him drag you down with him.”

Then she’s gone, slipping out of my cell as silently as she entered. The door closes and I’m alone again. I finish packing in silence. Kitty’s fear settles over me, seeping into my bones and making everything feel heavier.

I tuck my grandfather’s teeth into the inner pocket of my armor, close to my heart where I can feel their weight with every breath. If I die, at least that part of him will be with me.

The carriage is waiting when I descend the seven flights of stairs to the sanctum level. It’s an unremarkable vehicle that can carry both vegetables or corpses with discretion. The driver doesn’t look at me or speak. His mask is a simple leather thing, marking him as guild property but not an assassin. Probably one of the broken ones, destined to drive carriages with those lifeless eyes until he dies.

Inside, the seats are worn but clean. There’s a packet waiting for me with more details about the young lord. I open it as the carriage lurches into motion.

The first thing I see is a portrait. My breath catches.

Garrett Clayborne is beautiful.

The portrait stares back at me as the carriage rattles through Tiamat’s diseased veins. I can’t look away. His eyes are dark emerald. He’s smiling like he’s in on a joke the rest of the world hasn’t figured out yet.

Beautiful and dangerous.

The carriage hits a pothole, sending me sliding across the bench. Outside, Tiamat screams past in a blur of smokestacks and crumbling tenements. We’re moving through the Washworks where the air is so thick with chemical fog that even the mutated rats scurry away. Through the greasy window, I watch a group of children fighting over something in the gutter.

The next page makes me pause.

It’s a list of attempts on his life. It’s longer than my arm.

Poisoned wine (survived).

Stabbing in an alley (survived, attacker did not).

Arranged carriage accident (survived, walked away without a scratch).

Crossbow bolt to the chest (survived, caught the arrow mid-strike).

What kind of lordling is this fucker?

I flip to the last page of the packet and find additional orders, sealed with black wax. I break the seal.

Secondary objective: Determine who wants Lord Clayborne dead. The family suspects betrayal from within. Trust no one in the household.

My hands tighten on the parchment. It’s not enough to keep him alive for fifty days. I have to solve a conspiracy too.

The carriage begins to descend, winding down through Tiamat’s lower levels toward the harbor district. The pollution thickens again, pressing against the windows. I can taste salt on the air now, mixed with the usual chemical burn. We’re getting close to the docks.

It’s been years since I took a job abroad. After so long in this cesspit, I’m going to see somewhere else. I burn the secondary orders using the carriage’s lamp, watching the words turn to ash. The smoke smells like endings.

The carriage shudders to a stop.

“Out,” the driver says. His first and only word to me.

I grab my pack and step into the bitter wind of the dock. The sun is setting, painting Tiamat in shades of rust and poison. From up here, the city looks almost beautiful if you squint. You can’t smell the rot or hear the screaming.

The ship I’m looking for sits at the end of the furthest pier. It’s larger than I expected for a guild-chartered vessel. The hull is painted dark to hide the stains. I make my way down carefully on the warped planks. Other passengers are already boarding. Merchants and minor nobles.

Then I see them.