Chapter 1
Chapter One
I’ve been watching Garrett Clayborne for four days and I’m starting to understand why his hired guards die.
I’m crouched on a bakery roof in Aelfheim’s market district, watching him move through the crowd below like he owns the very air.
The terracotta tiles are warm under my boots.
I’ve been here since dawn, tracking Garrett’s usual route through the city.
My mark doesn’t make it easy. He constantly shifts his pace and direction, doubling back through side streets and pausing at random intervals to speak with vendors.
You wouldn’t know he’s a noble’s son from how people react to him. Their faces light up with genuine joy when they spot that blonde hair.
For four days, this is what he does. He walks the city, talks to everyone and helps where he can.
Yesterday I watched him spend two hours fixing a merchant’s broken cart.
His expensive armor was covered in axle grease while he worked.
The day before that he mediated a dispute between two feuding bakeries over recipe theft.
The sun makes his armor painful to look at with all that reflected light. Every polished plate throws back the morning glare. His scarlet cape should make him a target, but he wears it like a challenge.
Come at me, it says. I dare you.
Garrett is the champion of the Tavas tournament for seventeen consecutive years according to the file they gave me.
Seeing him move, I believe it. Even walking through a crowded market, he flows.
He shifts his weight smoothly before someone steps into his path.
It’s instinct honed over decades of combat, the kind of awareness that can’t be taught.
The report listed him at six-foot-four. Same as me. But standing here watching him move through the market, he looks taller somehow. Maybe it's the way he carries himself, shoulders back and head high like he owns every inch of space around him.
He stops at a fruit vendor’s stall, examining the apples on display. The owner is an elderly woman with silver hair tucked under a faded scarf. Her hands are gnarled from years of work.
“Two dozen, dear boy?” she asks, already reaching for a basket.
Boy?
Garrett’s well over two hundred years old. He is a full-blooded elf like Shade. They age slowly, enduring the years with an unchanging grace that makes it impossible to judge their true age by appearance alone. But their eyes always give them away. Those green eyes carry the weight of centuries.
“For the orphanage on Riverside,” Garrett says, paying triple what she asks without haggling. He drops the coins into her weathered palm and turns to her young helper. “Please take these to them. Make sure they get there safely.”
The woman protests, but Garrett is already moving on, leaving the two of them staring at the bag of coins like he’s just performed a miracle. Maybe he has. That amount of gold could feed the orphanage for a month.
He slips away from the market crowd, moving toward quieter streets on the outskirts of the city. The noise fades as the cobblestones thin and the buildings grow sparse.
Garrett reaches a small square with a dried-up fountain at its center.
The basin is cracked, filled with dead leaves instead of water.
He sits on the stone edge and pulls a piece of wood from his belt.
I can’t make out the half carved shape from this distance.
He produces a knife and starts whittling.
Then he stops and tenses for the first time all day. It’s subtle, just a shift in his shoulders and his hand drifting toward his sword. I follow his gaze and spot them immediately.
Three elves emerge from the shadows of a boarded-up shop. Dark hair frames their pale faces. One bears a jagged scar running through his eyebrow. I know without a doubt they mean trouble. Their hands hover near concealed weapons.
Amateurs.
Garrett acts as if he hasn’t noticed them. He pulls an apple from his pocket, polishing it against his cape before taking a bite. The crisp sound echoes across the empty square. His assailants exchange glances. They’re unsure now, seeing how relaxed and exposed he is.
It feels like a trap because it is one.
I could intervene. I should probably. I’m his fucking hired guard. But I want to see what he does. They move the moment he rises from the fountain.
So fucking predictable.
The first one goes for a frontal approach. The second circles left. The third is already falling to the ground.
I did not see Garrett move. One moment he’s standing by the fountain, the next he’s driven the pommel of his knife into the third assailant’s throat. The attacker drops, gasping like a beached fish, both hands clutching his ruined windpipe.
“Really?” Garrett sounds more disappointed than angry. “In broad daylight?”
The first attacker draws his blade. Garrett catches his wrist mid-swing and twists it without hesitation. The sword clatters to the cobblestones. He follows with a sharp headbutt and the attacker screams, blood streaming from his shattered nose.
The second one is already running. Smart.
Garrett looks at the two groaning on the ground. He nudges one with his boot. “Tell whoever sent you that next time, they should send someone competent.”
He steps over them and continues on his way, finishing his apple.
I notice he doesn’t check to see if they’re seriously injured or call for city guards.
He simply leaves them there like discarded trash.
The contrast between this casual violence and his earlier gentleness with the townsfolk is jarring.
I follow him silently as he winds through narrower streets. He stops at a small shrine tucked into an alcove between buildings. I recognize the symbols carved into stone. It belongs to Kvatosh, the god of war.
Shade worships the same god. Kvatosh is the most popular of the seventy-seven gods in the elven pantheon, the one warriors pray to before battle and thank after victory.
Being half-werewolf and half-elf, I never bothered with any of them.
Prayers seemed useless when survival came down to skill and luck, not divine intervention.
But I know what training in Kvatosh’s temple means.
A warrior can be called accomplished if they last a year inside the shrine.
Shade spent twenty-three years there. I remember when he went in, barely my age at the time.
When he emerged, I’d grown into adulthood and he was still a child in appearance.
Time works differently in the realm of the gods.
Garrett trained under Kvatosh for sixty-nine years according to the file. Sixty-nine years of combat, meditation, and divine testing. No wonder those three amateurs didn’t stand a chance.
He pulls off his gauntlets and produces a coin, placing it carefully among the flowers already adorning the shrine. His lips move in silent prayer. I can’t make out the words, but his expression is peaceful. Whatever he’s asking for or thanking Kvatosh for, he believes it will be heard.
When he finishes, he retrieves his gauntlets and moves on. But he’s left something behind besides the coin. I wait until he’s turned the corner, then slip from the shadows to examine the shrine more closely. Nestled among the flowers sits a small wooden carving.
A wolf.
I pick it up, turning it over in my hand. The work is skilled, every detail rendered with care. The fur has been carved to show individual strands. The eyes hold a lifelike quality that makes me uncomfortable. It fits perfectly in my palm.
Why would he leave a wolf carving at the shrine? My heart twists with unease. I shouldn’t keep it. It’s an offering to a god, and stealing from shrines tends to bring bad luck.
I tuck it inside my vest anyway.
By the time he reaches his destination, the sun is already bleeding orange and purple across the sky.
The tavern is called The Fool’s Heart, tucked in a rough district where nobles don’t venture after dark.
Nobody would expect to find the Commander of the Valorian here.
But Garrett frequents places like this. Over the past four days of surveillance, I’ve watched him slip in and out of similar establishments in the company of lords and ladies.
I find a vantage point across the street, settling in for what will probably be a long wait.
The roof of an abandoned cooperage gives me a clear view through the tavern’s grimy windows.
I can make out Garrett at a corner table, his back to the wall.
Three people join him within minutes, fellow Valorian officers by their bearings.
They talk for hours. Garrett buys round after round, but I notice he barely touches his own drink.
His mug sits full in front of him while he laughs and tells stories.
The others grow looser with each refill.
Every so often Garrett’s eyes flick to the windows and the door, a brief assessment before returning to his companions.
He knows he’s vulnerable in the tavern.
Anyone could walk in and slit his throat while he’s distracted. Either Garrett just doesn’t care, or he knows exactly what he’s doing. Maybe he’s purposely placing himself as bait, drawing out whoever wants him dead this month.
One of the officers says something that makes the whole table roar with laughter. Garrett’s smile looks sincere, but I’ve been watching him long enough to see the calculation behind it.
He’s performing.
The evening stretches on. Candles are lit inside the tavern as darkness settles over the district. I shift position, working out the stiffness in my legs. The cooperage roof smells of old wood and bird droppings. Not the worst surveillance point I’ve endured.
It’s well past midnight when Garrett finally leaves. A dark-haired woman walks beside him, laughing at something he said. Her hand rests on his arm with familiar ease. They part ways at the corner with a lingering touch and she disappears into the night, her footsteps fading down a side street.
Garrett watches her go. Then he turns and heads straight toward the safety of Elvarstyne Keep. The moon hangs low in the sky.
At this hour the city sheds its skin and transforms into something hungrier.
This is when the capital shows its teeth.
Cutthroats and worse things prowl these alleys.
But Garrett walks through the dark streets like he’s taking a garden stroll.
His scarlet cape billows behind him in the night breeze. Then he starts humming.
The balls on this guy.
He turns down a narrow side street and stops near a wall, clearly intending to relieve himself. I hang back, giving him privacy while keeping watch. Somewhere nearby, a dog barks twice and falls silent.
That’s when I notice them.
Four figures detach from the deeper shadows of a recessed doorway. I don’t think they are thugs looking for an easy mark. These guys are trained killers.
It’s an ambush.
If Garrett follows his usual route back to Elvarstyne Keep, he’ll have to pass through the junction up ahead. They’ll corner him there. Four on one with no escape routes. The buildings on either side are too tall to climb quickly and the nearest cross street is blocked by their positioning.
I move closer, using the darkness and my natural advantages. Being half-werewolf gives me better night vision and hearing than most. I catch fragments of their whispered conversation.
“Make it look like a robbery gone wrong.”
“No, you idiot. The client was specific. He wants the commander to suffer before he dies.”
Someone’s paying good money for this. Professional killers don’t come cheap, and four of them together suggests serious coin behind the contract. My breathing grows ragged as I move faster. I can’t let Garrett die. My life depends on his.
If I fail this contract, Lord Clayborne will report my failure back to Tiamat. Three failed missions in a row means retirement. The guild’s idea of early retirement involves a very deep hole and very little air.
Shit, shit, shit.
I drop from the roof to a lower balcony. Laundry lines snap as I vault over them. I can see the junction ahead, where narrow buildings create a perfect kill box. The assassins are moving into final position. I need to reach Garrett before they spring the trap.
I round the corner and freeze.
Bodies.
A dozen of them scattered across the narrow street like broken dolls. Their blood pools in the gaps between cobblestones, black in the moonlight. I can tell by their equipment and positioning that they were set up for an ambush. Crossbows at the high points and swordsmen blocking the exits.
But they’re all dead.
Well, one is still alive.
He’s propped against a wall with one hand nailed to the stone by his own crossbow bolt. His mouth opens and closes like a dying fish. When he sees me approach, his eyes go wide with fresh terror. Blood bubbles at his lips.
I check the others carefully before approaching, weapon drawn.
His accomplice lies in front of him, opened from throat to belly.
The ground is scarred where he clawed at the stones trying to crawl away.
Another body lies face down and two more are twisted at unnatural angles.
Someone went through them like a reaper through wheat.
“Who did this?” I ask the one still breathing, though I doubt he can answer with his throat ruined like that.
He makes a rasping sound. His eyes flick toward the darkest part of the alley where the moonlight doesn’t reach.
That’s when I realize we’re not alone. Every hair on my body stands on end.
“Too slow, little Wolf.”
The voice comes from directly behind me.
Pain explodes at the base of my skull. The world tilts and my knee gives out completely. I fall and my weapon tumbles from my fingers. It clatters on the cobblestones.
My vision darkens at the edges, closing in like a tunnel. I try to turn to see my attacker, but my body won’t respond. The last thing I see before consciousness abandons me is a figure standing over me.
Tall and cloaked… with a scarlet cape.