The door groaned wider, spilling a shaft of light across the blood-streaked library floor.
"Lorraine?" The voice that was steady, far too steady for the carnage it walked into, echoed through the library.
Lysander. Her brother.
Not a warrior, never a warrior. His fine robes draped awkwardly over a frame better suited to counting coins than lifting swords. He was a man of contracts and ledgers, of trade routes and tallies, not of steel and fire. He blinked hard against the stench of iron in the air, his gaze stumbling from corpses to clashing blades, uncomprehending.
What was he doing here? Lorraine was shocked. Why would he leave his wife and son to be here?
And in that single heartbeat of stunned stillness, the last mercenary saw his chance.
