Night fell over Faeloria.
The palace, radiant by day, became a place of shadows and silence after sundown. The stars shimmered above, but down in the rose gardens, a presence moved in the dark.
A black-cloaked figure crept silently between flowerbeds and hedges, blade coated in silver oil meant to nullify healing magic. His target was simple: the halfblood prince.
Serenil sat alone on the garden bench, gazing at the moon, his wooden practice sword resting across his lap. Most four-year-olds would be asleep. But Serenil hadn't slept early in weeks. He preferred the quiet.
His amethyst eyes narrowed.
He had felt it.
The air was wrong.
Footsteps too soft. A heartbeat too fast.
He's here.
The assassin lunged from the shadows, dagger aimed for the boy's heart.
But the boy was gone.
In a blur, Serenil moved behind the attacker and struck his wrist with the wooden blade. Bones cracked. The dagger clattered to the stones. The man hissed, spun, and launched a second strike.
Serenil stepped inside the arc of the blade and jabbed the assassin in the throat.
The man fell choking, gasping for air.
"Who sent you?" Serenil asked in a low tone—not childlike at all.
The assassin didn't answer.
Serenil knelt beside him and touched his forehead. "Then sleep."
A glimmer of black light briefly flickered in his palm—a tiny pulse of Voidrender's essence, summoned without drawing the blade.
The assassin collapsed, unconscious.
Moments later, Kael and the palace guards arrived, weapons drawn.
"Prince—!" Kael stopped cold as he saw the scene. The four-year-old prince, standing calmly beside a disarmed and broken intruder.
"What the hell…"
Serenil turned to him with an innocent expression.
"I heard something. I was lucky."
Kael's gaze darted from the prince to the unconscious man. His instincts told him Serenil was lying. But more than that, they screamed: This boy is far more dangerous than anyone here realizes.
King Sylas arrived shortly after.
He saw the scarred man bleeding at his son's feet.
His expression was unreadable.
"Prepare for more," he told Kael. "This was only the beginning."