In the bottom hall of the Ghost Tower, torches cast twisted shadows against the cold stone walls.
The captured assassin was firmly chained to a chair. The black face covering had been roughly ripped away, revealing a face that surprised everyone—not the grim, hardened man they expected, but a young woman with a pure, almost childish appearance. Her figure was petite, and were it not for the lingering professional coldness and current terror in her eyes, she would have looked like any ordinary girl next door.
Dagmer stood panting to the side, holding a whip soaked in brine. The lashing he had just delivered had failed to make the girl speak.
Euron raised a hand to stop him. He stepped forward slowly, his cold gaze scraping across the girl's face like a scalpel.
"A Sorrowful Man," he said in a low voice, instantly identifying her origin. "The merchant guilds of Qarth truly live up to their reputation, able to train a woman so skilled in concealment." His tone was flat but carried chilling pressure. "But your organization won't come to save you. A failed assassination is merely a 'business expense' to them. Your life, and the information you hold now, are your only value."
He leaned in slightly. "Who hired you? Give me a name, and I'll make it quick."
The girl bit her lip, remaining stubbornly silent.
Euron straightened up and waved to Dagmer, putting on a show of terrifying menace. "Heat the flaying knife," he ordered, as casually as if asking for an extra dish at dinner. Then he turned to Shadowbinder Evelyn in the shadows. "If she's still breathing after being skinned, you have your new experimental material."
Euron wasn't Ramsay Bolton, and he didn't possess the Bolton family's skill of flaying a whole human skin. The threat was merely to scare this young Sorrowful Man.
Though terrified, the girl bit her lip harder, refusing to utter another word.
What finally broke her psychological defense wasn't the whip or the threat of flaying.
Euron signaled for her to be dragged into Maester Qyburn's laboratory. As the door opened, the strong scent of preservatives and blood rushed out. On a stone table lay a corpse, fully dissected. Qyburn, wearing bloodstained gloves, was focused on recording the properties of the organs as if they were merely tools to be studied. That cold, inhuman, emotionless "academic" scene was more soul-shaking than any direct torture.
Watching the cold scalpel and the scholar's indifferent eyes, imagining herself becoming the next "specimen," the girl's last line of defense collapsed completely. She screamed, tears mixing with the blood and grime on her face.
"Qohor!" she shrieked. "It was the Qohorik! Their merchant guild paid for it!"
She stammered out the reason: It turned out that Balf had successfully traded fifty high-quality curved blades for one horse with the Dothraki Khal—a deal far superior to the Qohorik's previous offer of twenty inferior blades per horse. The enraged Khal, feeling he had been deceived by the Qohorik for years, led his tribe to the city of Qohor to demand massive compensation. The Qohorik suffered heavy losses. Upon investigation, they discovered that the top smiths who had disappeared some time ago had been recruited by Euron Greyjoy of the Iron Islands. Euron was now forging weapons far superior to theirs, completely disrupting their business and bringing disaster upon them.
The Qohor Merchant Guild harbored a deep grudge and spared no expense to hire a "Sorrowful Man" from Qarth, swearing to eliminate Euron, the root of their troubles.
So it was trouble caused by the smiths and the saber trade. That makes perfect sense.
The hall fell into a brief silence, broken only by the crackle of torches and the female assassin's heavy breathing. She tilted her head back and closed her eyes with an air of utter resignation. "I've told you everything. Kill me!"
Euron didn't respond immediately. He rubbed his chin, calculating lights flickering in his eyes. After a moment, he spoke unexpectedly. "I don't necessarily have to kill you. Death is sometimes a waste. I could hire you to serve me."
The assassin opened her eyes abruptly, filled with disbelief and humiliation. She almost screamed her rebuttal: "D-Don't even think about it! I would rather die than be your bed-slave!"
Euron's lips curled into a mocking smile. His gaze deliberately swept over her flat chest, then glanced at the voluptuous Red Priestess Gwendolyn beside him. The comparison was self-evident. "You're overthinking it," he said, his tone flat but utterly humiliating. "I have very little interest in a body type like yours—where the front looks just like the back."
Before the assassin could explode again, Euron continued, "I traveled across the Narrow Sea and met one of your colleagues, also a Sorrowful Man. He accepted my employment and served me for three whole years. If he could do it, surely you can too."
The assassin froze for a second, then blurted out subconsciously, "Castor Daniels?" Her tone carried disbelief and suspicion.
This time it was Euron's turn to be surprised. "Huh, you know him?"
"He's... extremely 'famous' among the Sorrowful Men," the assassin said, her tone complex, mixing disdain with a strange familiarity. "Almost every Sorrowful Man knows his name."
Euron raised an eyebrow. "I didn't realize Castor was so formidable. He has such a reputation?"
"He is a disgrace to the Sorrowful Men!" the assassin interrupted excitedly, her voice filled with professional shame. "Zero professionalism! He does whatever he wants, acts more like a vagrant than an assassin. He was expelled from the guild long ago! Now, every new recruit uses him as a cautionary tale during training—warned never to tarnish the organization's reputation like he did!"
Euron was silent for a moment, digesting this information, then let out a low chuckle of understanding. "...So that's how it is."
The assassin turned her head away, her voice dropping lower, carrying an imperceptible tremor. "He is my brother."
"The world truly is small! Haha!" Euron finally laughed out loud. This unexpected connection felt like fate—wonderfully strange. After laughing, he looked at the assassin again, his tone returning to its probing nature. "So, given this wonderful twist of fate, are you willing to accept my employment?"
The assassin didn't answer immediately. After a silence, she asked, "If I refuse, will you kill me?"
"If I release you, will you come back to kill me?"
"No," she said decisively.
"Then I probably won't kill you. You are just a pawn used by others; killing you or not doesn't make much difference. Besides—" Euron shrugged, looking casual. "You are Castor Daniels' sister. I happen to know where he is. If I send someone to deliver you back to him safe and sound... well, he would owe me a significant favor. A favor from a former Sorrowful Man might come in handy someday."
This exchange was harder for her to accept than death. Imagining facing the disgrace of her family, and having him owe a favor because of her failure, facing his endless mockery in the future... She jerked her head up.
"I accept the employment!" she said through gritted teeth, speaking fast as if afraid she would regret it.
Euron paused slightly. "Oh? Changed your mind so quickly? Afraid to see your brother?"
"Once you fail, you are no longer a Sorrowful Man," her voice held a trace of loneliness but was unusually clear-headed. "I don't want to die, but I want even less to have anything to do with that disgraceful brother. Serving you... at least sounds slightly more acceptable than the former."
She added, "On the condition that you don't get any ideas about my body!"
"Little sister, don't flatter yourself. There are plenty of empty rooms; find one to sleep in." Euron smirked. He put his left arm around Red Priestess Gwendolyn and his right around Shadowbinder Evelyn, gave Victoria a look of disdain, and walked away. Before leaving the hall, he turned back. "By the way, since you've accepted my employment, you should at least tell me your name."
The girl's tone was still angry, but she gave her name: "Victoria Daniels!"
"Welcome, Victoria Daniels. You are now a member of this island," Euron called back, his voice fading as he walked away.
Dagmer looked at the sudden new resident—an assassin who had just tried to kill his young master—with deep suspicion. Even though Euron had casually said she was recruited, Dagmer wasn't reassured at all. He warned, "I'll be watching you. If I see you doing anything wrong..."
Victoria sneered, showing no weakness. "Hmph. You whipped me twenty-eight times. I remember it clearly!"
"Then you'd best remember it forever! Next time, it won't be a whip!"
Everyone dispersed, leaving the hall suddenly cold and quiet.
Victoria found a corner to sit down. Though she was no longer a Sorrowful Man, she still wanted to reflect on the reasons for her failed assassination. Suddenly, she heard a soft, gentle voice:
"Do you want to stay... and join the experiment?"
Qyburn, the scrawny Maester forgotten in the corner, held a knife and a saw in his hands. Before him lay the open corpse. On his pale face, he wore what he thought was his cutest, kindest smile.
"AHHH~~~ GHOST~~~!!!"