Aiden laughed.
It wasn't a quiet, polite chuckle. It was the kind of laughter that rolled like a storm across the stones, echoing in the corridors and spilling into the shadows.
The man had come to kill him — a blade in the dark, a shadow lurking behind oath and loyalty — and now he scattered like dust in wind, his confidence shattered, his fury impotent.
Golden eyes, sharp and unyielding, had met his own, and in that reflection, Aiden had seen everything. Fearless delight, yes, but also confusion, helplessness, and the scattered essence of a man who realized the war had already been lost before the first arrow was loosed.
He allowed himself a breath, long and slow, tasting the cold metallic tang of the air in the dungeon hallway. Victory, he mused, was a curious thing. Not the grandiose triumphs sung in halls of kings and viscounts. No, this was subtler. Quiet. Complete. The enemy didn't even know it yet.
And that was perfection.
