Page 8 of House of Crimson Cloak and Silver Teeth

Guild masks. Three of them, scattered among the boarding passengers. We don’t acknowledge each other or make eye contact.

Four Grimsbane assassins on one ship to Aelfheim is not a coincidence. War is brewing, just like Shepherd said.

I find a corner in the cargo hold, surrounded by crates of silk and spices. The other passengers give me a wide berth. Through a gap in the crates, I can see the skyline receding. Tiamat slowly shrinks behind us. I close my eyes and try to imagine Aelfheim. Clean air where green things grow. A place where the rain doesn’t burn and children don’t have to wear masks to breathe.

I pull out the portrait again, studying that dangerous smile.

Keep this red-caped knight alive for fifty days. Uncover a conspiracy. Don’t fail.

The portrait slips from my fingers, floating to the floor. When I pick it up, those emerald eyes seem to follow me. His smile has grown wider. A trick of the light. But my instincts are screaming that Lord Garrett Clayborne is going to be nothing like what I expect.

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.