The applause for Lucas was distant. In the silence of the alley, with the dead assassin at my feet, the world narrowed to the small, coded note in my hand. It felt heavier than a simple piece of parchment. It felt like a choice. A dangerous one.
My training, my conditioning, every lesson beaten into me by Kael and the Curator screamed one thing: Report back. A tool does not improvise. A tool follows its orders. To disobey was to invite punishment, a lesson I had already learned in principle. But my first taste of real fieldwork had taught me something else. The files were incomplete. The masters in their shadowy halls didn't know everything. They had missed this note. To ignore it felt like a greater failure than disobedience. It felt like incompetence.
I made my decision. I would follow the thread.
The note was my only clue. The coded symbols were gibberish, but the wax seal was stamped with a faint, barely perceptible image: a crescent moon over a bushel of wheat. It wasn't a noble crest or a guild mark. It was simpler. A trade sign. The crescent moon was a common symbol for nighttime or secrets. The wheat was obvious. A bakery. A clandestine meeting at a bakery, after dark.
I pocketed the note and dragged the assassin's body deeper into the alley, hiding it behind a pile of overflowing refuse. It wouldn't stay hidden for long, but I only needed a few hours. I stripped off my dark Association tunic, revealing the plain, grey shirt I wore underneath. I scuffed some dirt on my face, ruffled my hair, and slouched. In seconds, I went from a shadowy operative to just another hungry street kid. I melted back into the edge of the celebrating crowd, a ghost of a different kind.
The sun began to set, painting the sky in hues of orange and purple that the city's poor would never appreciate. The celebration wound down. The crowds thinned. I spent the time moving through the lower city, my eyes open. There were dozens of bakeries, but I was looking for a specific kind. Not the bright, clean ones that served the rich, but the small, struggling ones in the poorer districts, the kind of place where secrets could be bought and sold as easily as stale bread.
I found it in a cramped, twisting lane called Weaver's Alley. "The Golden Sheaf," the sign read, the paint peeling. A crescent moon had been crudely carved into the wood above the door. This was the place.
I didn't go in. I found a spot across the lane, a darkened doorway that offered a perfect vantage point. And I waited. Patience was a skill the Association hadn't needed to teach me. My life was now made of waiting. Waiting for orders, waiting for pain to subside, waiting for the right moment to strike.
Hours passed. The street grew quiet. The last of the city's honest workers shuffled home. The bakery's lights went out. The owner, a fat, flour-dusted man, locked the front door and headed off. The street was empty.
Just when I thought the lead was a dead end, a figure emerged from the deeper shadows of the alley beside the bakery. He was dressed in the simple, grease-stained clothes of a kitchen worker. He moved with a nervous, furtive energy, his head constantly darting from side to side. He looked completely out of place, a mouse venturing into a hawk's territory.
He didn't try the front door. He slipped down the side alley. I followed, a shadow trailing a shadow. He stopped at a small, grated window at the back of the bakery, the kind used for venting oven heat. He reached through the bars and pulled out a small, cloth-wrapped package that had been hidden inside. He tucked it quickly into his coat and scurried away, his pace hurried.
This was the drop. This was the exchange.
I followed him. He led me on a winding path through the city's underbelly, always sticking to the darkest streets. He was careful, constantly looking over his shoulder, but he wasn't a professional. He was an amateur playing a dangerous game. He never saw me.
His destination surprised me. He didn't go to a criminal den or a hidden safe house. He went to the castle.
He used a servant's entrance, one I recognized from the schematics I had been forced to memorize. He was on the palace staff. I couldn't follow him inside—not dressed like this, not without authorization. It was a dead end.
Frustration churned in my gut. I had the man, but I didn't know his role. I had the package, but I didn't know its contents.
Then I saw it. A chance.
The kitchen boy was stopped by a guard at the servant's gate. They had a brief, hushed conversation. The guard gestured, and the boy was led towards a small security checkpoint. It seemed new security measures were already in place after the day's events.
The boy looked terrified. He knew that if the package was found, he was dead. As he walked towards the checkpoint, he passed a large, overflowing bin of kitchen waste—potato peels, vegetable scraps, and other refuse waiting to be hauled away. In a moment of pure panic, thinking he was unobserved, he deftly slipped the cloth-wrapped package from his coat and dropped it into the bin. He planned to retrieve it later, after he was clear.
It was a foolish, desperate move. And it was the opening I needed.
I waited until the boy and the guard had passed through the checkpoint and disappeared inside. I casually ambled over to the waste bin, acting like a scavenger looking for a meal. My hands dove into the filth. It was disgusting, but I ignored the stench of rotting vegetables. My fingers brushed against the rough cloth of the package. I palmed it, slipped it into my own pocket, and walked away without a second glance.
I found a deserted alley several streets away before I dared to look at my prize. My hands trembled slightly as I unwrapped the cloth. It wasn't gold. It wasn't a weapon. It was a stack of papers.
I smoothed them out in the dim moonlight. The first page was a meticulously detailed map of the upper levels of the castle's royal wing. The second was a schedule of the changing of the guard patrols for the next week, highlighting specific times when security would be lightest. The last page was a detailed breakdown of the Hero's training regimen—his preferred sparring times, his known abilities, his stamina limitations.
My blood ran cold. This wasn't a plan for another assassination attempt. This was intelligence. A complete package detailing the Hero's vulnerabilities. The demons weren't just trying to kill Lucas. They were studying him. They were learning his every move, his every weakness. This was a continuous, ongoing threat, far more insidious and far more dangerous than a few assassins at a party.
The weight of the papers in my hand felt immense. I had disobeyed a direct order. I had gone rogue. And I had stumbled into a conspiracy that reached right into the castle kitchens. I couldn't handle this alone. But I couldn't go back and admit what I had done. A tool doesn't make its own decisions. A tool doesn't follow threads.
I had no choice. I had to report it. And I had to find a way to do it without signing my own death warrant.
I walked through the city, my mind racing, crafting a story, a plausible lie. I slipped through the hidden entrance to the Association's headquarters, the dangerous information burning a hole in my pocket. The familiar damp cold of the corridors did nothing to cool the frantic heat in my brain.
As I reached the entryway to the cell block, a figure stepped from the shadows. The Curator. He was waiting for me. His hooded face was unreadable, but I could feel his gaze on me, analytical and sharp.
"You are late," the Curator said, his voice flat, holding no accusation but promising no mercy. "Explain."