I let Gullyman lead. He was quiet, and his head was bowed, with a miserable face.
You'll be free soon, Gullyman. I just need you for theatrics, plus I don't know where Woodborn was.
We threaded between dark hedges and low walls until the glow of a large residence loomed before us.
It sat in a district close to the palace. It was made of squat stone, three stories high, with tall windows and balconies.
Guards, women, and a few men clustered around all corners, alert to all around.
Perfect.
I had planned the theatrics in my head a dozen times on the walk over:
The silhouette at the window, the dramatic questions, the darkness, and gods far above.
But planning was only a framework to go off.
I breathed in slowly and recast Nyx to wrap the shadows tighter around me.
My steps made no sound as I advanced. Gullyman shuffled along. He said nothing. I had told him to speak only if I spoke to him. He agreed because that's just the kind of person he was: prone to orders.
We slipped past the guards with ease in the shadows and entered through a servant's entrance - the latch was loose, and inside it smelled of wet coals and a type of brandy.
But past all of that, the house opened into that soft beauty all expensive medieval-like houses had.
I heard snoring - most likely the servants, some drunk by the smell of it.
I heard the ticking of a clock.
Finding Woodborn was easy. He was exactly where I thought he'd be: not in the great hall, not in the library - but sleeping in his bed, next to what must have been his wife, Lady Woodborn.
I watched them sleep for a beat.
The lord was younger than I'd expected. A few years younger than Alarick.
Waking him needed a touch of theater and the right nerve.
I didn't want a fight in the bedchamber. I wanted him awake, lucid, and curious enough to walk himself into my scene.
A curtain whispered with a draft I coaxed along the pane. Hinges sighed, and a loose tile in the corridor gave a soft complaint. Nothing too loud. Nothing that would call guards. Just the right thread of unease.
Inside his room Woodborn stirred. He parted sleep uneasily. He sat up, looking for the cause, brow furrowing. I let him find nothing at first. Confusion breeds attentiveness. That's useful.
I cast a speed spell and stepped closer to his threshold and let a fingertip of cold press the back of his ankle, an almost-imperceptible touch that slid like the memory of a hand rather than the hand itself.
I must have looked extremely stupid doing it, but it must have made him mad paranoid.
He blinked, the way a man blinks when he thinks he's imagined the sound of a footstep. He called out quietly, the words coming out small and oddly polite, as if he were asking the house itself to answer.
When he rose - half-dressed and disoriented - I waited behind the curtains. He couldn't have spotted me; I was just a blotch of darkness in the night.
I did not place my hand upon him. I did what paranoia does best: guided.
A gentle pressure on the elbow, a warmth that might have been the brush of a robe, and a whisper along the back of the neck that might have been the rush of air while walking down the corridor. Small, plausible things that a tired and guilty man would read as his own impulse.
I put everything I had into this. If I slipped even once, all the theatrics would crumble.
I just wanted a quiet, tense confrontation in the night. Was that so much to ask?
Woodborn followed all the way to his study.
He rubbed his palms together, still trying to catalog which small thing had roused him. He glanced at the doorway once, the way a man checks a reflection for signs of a visitor, and then he found the room empty and felt foolish.
His study smelled of smoked paper and old wine.
He sank into a chair by the hearth and exhaled a long breath.
That was the moment I let my shadow speak. I spoke from the darkness of his armchair - not a storm, only a silhouette - and the hearth lighting up to illuminate the room, like an omen for darker times ahead.
He stared because by the time I chose to appear, I had already arranged for him to be in precisely the right mood: vulnerable, alert, and a little paranoid.
"Who-" he started, eyes darting into the dark until they found the shadow in his chair. "What is this?"
"You know," I said softly. "You know all too well, my little Woodborn. The throne isn't fit for you." I kept my voice small. Small is intimate. Intimate is terrifying. "You don't need to play at kingship."
He blinked, trying to orient himself - the sign of a trained predator who suddenly finds himself prey. "You shouldn't be here. Guards-"
I pushed him, and he stumbled.
If I had wanted, I could have smashed him to the floor in the foyer and made the rest of the night considerably shorter, but I wanted something else. I wanted him conscious, full of excuses, and in front of a single, bright fire where his face could be read like a confession.
I let the room frame him - the firelight warming his cheeks, the books like silent witnesses. "I want you to stop wanting the king dead," I said. Plain, blunt. No flourish. The simpler the demand, the more it sat in a man's chest like a stone.
Woodborn laughed at first. A low sound, the sound of someone who thinks not being believed grants them immunity. "What are you?"
Then I snapped my fingers. A call.
Gullyman appeared at the threshold like a bad thought. He did not speak. He only stood, eyes down, and did what he'd been told.
"What will you do when you've walked into danger?"
He blinked. "What danger?" His voice sharpened. "You threaten me? In my own house?"
"No." I leaned forward. "I only tell you what is already true. There are assassins poised ready to take the lives of your wife and children if you do not call off your play-king."
That was a lie. There were no assassins, but Gullyman's presence made it feel like there were more.
For a moment he simply listened, like a man tasting a bitter herb. Then he laughed, thin and brittle. "Blackmail? Threats? Who are you?"
"Call me what you need to sleep," I said. "Call me nothing. Call me prophet. Call me child. I know your frustration. We want the same thing, after all. Our ways are different. But that can be rectified. Understand this: I will not let either you or your line die tonight without trying to make a bargain first."
"Bargain?" He spat the word out like it was a cheap coin. "What could you possibly want? Wealth? Power? You threaten me with death and offer me the kingdom?"
I smiled inside my dark. "I offer you something. Far more than any kingdom can hold, Woodborn. I offer you the room to rule as you have always wished - not merely a crown on a head that answers to councils, but the kind of dominion a man of your ambition strives for. Help me spread the work of Entropy. Let the old structures fall. Chaos breaks the brittle control the gods have imposed on you. In that ruin, what you truly deserve will come to you. Not one crown, not two - maybe the whole continent, if you are patient and wise enough to see."
That was also a lie. I just wanted Woodborn on my side.
He seemed like a man easily swayed by power - he wanted to kill the king after all. So, why not offer him more?
I don't know what else he'd planned, but why not cut it all short?
Not just for me and my story's sake, but unironically for the people of the kingdom?
He made a sound like a man trying to swallow a burning idea. "You promise me… the continent? You promise me everything?" It wasn't a question of belief. It was the cadence of temptation.
"I promise opportunity," I said. "I promise that I will stand in the dark and take care of those who stand with me against control. When the old order fractures, there will be room to seize what's left. You will have power."
He studied me then, eyes narrowing. "And if I refuse?"
I let that silence sit like an anvil.
"If you refuse," I said softly, "you will have nothing. I will ensure the very men you sent to the palace find their way back home to you - but not in the way you prefer. Their throats will be opened where you will see it. Your wife will not be spared because you were too proud to accept aid. That - or you accept a partnership that will make you more than your petty birthright."
He paled and flinched - almost comical.
"I would remove any obstacle in the pursuit of the freedom we will make," I said.
Heaving breath, Woodborn fought to gather himself. Pride is a slow beast and always offers one last roar. "You are insane," he said. "Or mad with illusion."
"Insane men make better prophets," I told him. "Less to lose."
He gave a resigned sigh. "That's alright by me."