The market was loud enough to hide a murder.
Fishmongers slapped their wares onto wooden tables slick with brine. Butchers argued over whose cleaver was sharper. Street hawkers shouted over one another, voices like blunt knives scraping against tin. To most, it was noise. To me, it was a veil. The kind you could move beneath without anyone noticing the shadow you cast.
I moved through the crowd without haste, without purpose — or at least, that's how it appeared. Inside, every step was measured. Every angle calculated. I had already counted the exits, the watchmen posted on the rooftops, the half-drunk mercenaries leaning against a wine stall. All of it was information to be filed away, in case I needed it later.
Reed trailed a few paces behind, disguised as a laborer carrying a sack of grain. His role was simple: watch my back, and don't speak unless absolutely necessary. In the slums, the wrong word could draw a knife faster than an insult to a man's mother.
My target appeared exactly where I knew he'd be — because I'd spent the last two nights shadowing his movements. A small man in his late twenties, quick eyes, thin frame, the kind who looked like he could disappear in a crowd if you blinked too slowly. His name was Min Ta. Crooked Dagger foot soldier. And like most of his kind, his loyalty was worth less than the wine he drank.
I approached him while he was haggling over the price of dried seaweed. The stall owner looked ready to throw him out for trying to pay in counterfeit coins. Perfect.
"You're wasting your breath," I said quietly, stepping to his side. "The old man knows the coin's fake. He's just deciding whether it's worth the trouble to call the guards."
Min stiffened, half-turning to glare at me. Recognition flickered in his eyes — not because he knew me, but because he recognized my tone. The tone of someone who knew something he shouldn't.
"Who are you?" he asked, his voice low.
"Someone who can keep your little habit from getting you gutted," I replied. "But that depends on whether you can keep your mouth shut and your ears open."
His suspicion lasted all of three seconds before curiosity won. "What do you want?"
"Information," I said. "About your brothers in the Daggers. Specifically, the new hideout you've all been herded into like fattened pigs."
That earned me a sharper look. "And why would I tell you that?"
I stepped closer, letting my shoulder brush his, as if we were nothing more than two men sharing idle gossip. "Because I know you've been skimming from your crew's cut for months. You think no one's noticed, but I have. And if I know… well, you can imagine how long you'd last if Elder Jian knew."
His jaw tightened. He didn't deny it. They never did. "What's in it for me?"
"Enough silver to get you out of the city," I said. "And a story that paints you as the smartest man in your crew instead of the most cowardly."
I didn't smile. Smiling in a negotiation made you look like you were trying to convince yourself as much as the other person.
Min hesitated, eyes darting toward the crowd. Reed had already moved into position to block the nearest exit. I didn't need to look to know — I trusted his timing.
"You have one chance," I said softly. "Talk now, or I'll spread word that you've been selling your brothers out to the Hwan clan. Then I'll sit back and watch."
That broke him. He leaned closer, whispering fast, tripping over his words. "Textile mill, east quarter, near the dye pits. They moved us there two nights ago. Guard shifts change every four hours. And…" He swallowed. "…and the leadership's meeting there tomorrow night. Full council. Even Jian will be there."
Exactly what I wanted to hear.
I pressed a single silver ingot into his hand — real silver, not plated trash — then stepped back. "You'll hear rumors in the next day or two. When you do, keep your head down and your mouth shut. Understand?"
Min nodded quickly, clutching the ingot like it was the only thing keeping him alive. In a way, it was.
* * * * * * * * *
By the time Reed and I reached the edge of the market, he finally spoke. "You didn't have to pay him."
I glanced at him. "Of course I did. If I'd taken without giving, he'd have felt cheated, and cheated men talk. Payment buys silence just as much as it buys loyalty. And besides—" I let my gaze drift back toward the crowd, where Min was already vanishing into the press of bodies. "—he won't live long enough to spend it."
Reed didn't reply. He didn't have to.
* * * * * * * * *
We didn't head straight for the textile mill. That would've been amateur work. Instead, I went to the one place in the slums where rumors grew faster than mold: The Broken Jug, a tavern that smelled like rotting wood and desperation.
Inside, I found the right ears — a pair of drunk dockworkers, a spice seller with more debt than customers, and a street whore who could charm the teeth out of your mouth. I planted my words like seeds. Small, believable things.
"Did you hear? Hwan's enforcers have been spotted in the east quarter…"
"…they say Elder Jian's days are numbered…"
"…big raid coming, mark my words…"
By the time I left, the seeds were already taking root. Rumors had a way of growing on their own, warping into something more dramatic with each retelling. By tomorrow morning, half the quarter would be convinced the Hwan clan was preparing to burn the Daggers out of their new hideout.
That paranoia would be my weapon.
* * * * * * * * *
The east quarter looked different at night.
Not safer — never safer — but quieter, in a way that made every sound sharper. Boots crunching on grit. The muffled cough of a sentry fighting the cold. The faint creak of wooden signs swaying on rusted chains.
I moved in the shadow of a dye pit wall, its surface stained a dozen unnatural colors. The textile mill loomed ahead, squat and broad-shouldered, its windows boarded from the inside. A trickle of light leaked through cracks in the planks, enough to silhouette the figures moving within.
The place stank of wet wool and rotting wood — a smell that clung to your clothes like guilt.
Reed crouched beside me, eyes narrowed. "Four guards outside," he murmured. "Two at the main entrance, one on the roof, one walking the perimeter."
I nodded. "Shifts?"
"They rotate every two hours. Just like Min said."
Min had been telling the truth, then. Useful. Pity for him that his usefulness was almost over.
We stayed in the shadows, watching. Patience was the difference between a clean kill and a messy one. And tonight's work needed to be surgical.
* * * * * * * * *
By the time the guard rotation came, the fog off the river had rolled in thick. Perfect cover.
Reed slipped away to take care of the rooftop sentry — a faint scuffle and the creak of a shifting body told me the job was done. I moved in from the rear, where the perimeter guard's lantern threw long, shaky shadows against the wall.
A quick, silent step.
A hand over his mouth.
A single thrust of my dagger between his ribs, angled upward to pierce the lung.
He died without a sound, eyes wide, still trying to understand that this was how his night ended. I lowered him gently to the ground and dragged the body into the dye pit shadows.
* * * * * * * * *
Inside, the air was warmer but fouler, thick with the scent of damp cloth and unwashed men. I could hear voices — some laughing, some arguing — from deeper in the mill. The Crooked Daggers weren't expecting trouble tonight.
Good.
Reed and I moved along the wall, past piles of raw fabric and half-broken looms. My eyes picked out the details automatically: the support beams, the firewood stacked near the hearth, the barrels of oil for the dye vats. Flammable. Useful.
I wasn't here to simply kill.
I was here to cripple.
If Elder Jian's council met here tomorrow, then by morning the place needed to be crawling with fear. That meant bodies on the floor and smoke in the air.
* * * * * * * * *
We found three more men in the side room — drunk, dice scattered across the table. Reed took two; I took the last. The dice hadn't even stopped rolling before all three were slumped forward, necks opened like slaughtered pigs.
I took a moment to wipe my blade on a scrap of cloth. The action was as much ritual as necessity — a habit from my first life I'd never quite shed.
"Main hall," I whispered.
* * * * * * * * *
The hall was larger than I'd expected, lit by a single swinging lantern. Maybe twenty men inside, scattered — some on bedrolls, some sharpening blades, some arguing over a map pinned to the wall.
Killing them all outright would be risky. Noise carried, and even with the fog, the city guard might take notice. No — this would be slower, quieter.
I motioned for Reed to circle left while I stayed right. On my way, I "accidentally" kicked a loose plank, drawing the attention of one of the sentries.
He came to investigate, hand on the hilt of his short sword. He never made it to the end of the corridor.
* * * * * * * * *
By the time the first scream finally tore through the mill, we'd already taken down half the room. The rest scrambled for weapons, some charging toward the noise, others bolting for the exits — exits they didn't know we'd already blocked.
I didn't fight fair.
I didn't fight for honor.
I fought to win.
When the last man fell, chest heaving and eyes glassy with shock, the mill was dead silent again.
I stood in the center of it all, surrounded by the smell of blood and the faint hiss of oil catching fire as Reed tossed a lantern into the dye pit barrels. Flames caught fast, licking up the wooden supports with greedy fingers.
We left before the blaze took hold. By the time the city woke, the mill would be ash and rumor. And every surviving Crooked Dagger would be looking over his shoulder.
* * * * * * * * *
Outside, in the fog, Reed glanced at me. "What about Min?"
I didn't answer right away. The silver I'd given him earlier had been enough to buy him a night in some brothel or gambling den. He'd be easy to find.
"I'll tie off loose ends tomorrow," I said at last. "Let him think he's safe for one more night. Fear tastes better when it's had time to ripen."
We vanished into the dark, smoke curling into the sky behind us like a black banner.