"You polish your blades, weigh your oaths, and dream of thrones. But I have already seen the soil that will drink your blood. Don't mistake your planning for power, it's only the rhythm of your march toward death."
We had all but concluded our grim plotting, the Wolf guard standing rigid, the Silver Fangs slinking into their shadows, Luna Seraphine's silk voice still curling through the air like smoke that refused to clear. My old bones were ready to rise from the cold stone seat when the air shifted like a draft through a crypt, and then Niko was there. No one had seen her enter, and of course, no one ever did. She was present, as though the shadows themselves had remembered they owed her a favor.
"Leaving so soon?" she asked, her voice a singsong laced with knives. "And here I thought we were just getting to the good part."
