The secret stair of the cathedral was narrow, its stones slick with centuries of candle smoke and damp. Darian ducked beneath the low archways as he climbed, his great frame filling the passage like a bear in a hunter's den. When at last he emerged into the cloister, he found her waiting.
Dowager-Queen Serena stood with her back to him, her black veil drifting in the night breeze. The moonlight silvered her hair, but her stance was iron-straight, the posture of a woman who had learned long ago never to bow.
"You disobeyed me," she said without turning.
Darian stopped short. "I freed innocents bound for the dungeons."
"You revealed yourself," she hissed, her voice low but sharp. At last she faced him, her eyes like steel beneath her veil. "Every whisper I have spun, every secret I have coaxed, you risked undoing with one reckless act. You are a shadow, Darian. Shadows do not step into torchlight."
Her words cut deeper than any sword. He had stood in the street, towering over Mansis' men, his blade flashing. For a heartbeat he had been vengeance itself, unhidden, unmasked.
"Would you have had me do nothing?" he asked, his jaw clenched.
"I would have had you wait," Serena snapped. "Patience builds kingdoms. Impulse destroys them. Do you think Mansis has not doubled his guard already? Do you think Sir Silas does not hunger for your blood more than ever?"
Darian said nothing. Her fury was not wrong.
At last, Serena exhaled, her anger cooling into sorrow. "You are not only one man anymore. You are a name, a hope. That makes you more dangerous than any sword. Do not squander it."
Darian bowed his head. "I will be more careful."
She studied him for a long moment before nodding once. "See that you are. For the realm cannot afford a dead legend."
The following night, the city was hushed beneath a blanket of fog. Darian slipped from alley to alley, his cloak trailing mist as though the night itself cloaked him.
At the edge of the royal gardens, beneath an ancient elm, a woman waited.
Queen Nina, consort of Mansis.
She was veiled in dark silk, her face hidden, her bodyguard dismissed with a single command. Her voice was low, urgent, when Darian approached.
"You should not be here," she said.
"Neither should you," Darian replied.
Her laugh was bitter. "Perhaps. Yet here we stand, two ghosts in the dark." She lifted her veil just enough for him to see her eyes — sharp, calculating, glinting like emeralds even in moonlight.
"I bring news," she whispered. "In three nights' time, Mansis will host a delegation from beyond our borders. King Halvek of Tirnovia, to the east, will ride with his retinue. He seeks Harta's swords for his war against King Dorvain of Khandralis, across the northern seas."
Darian frowned. He had heard of Tirnovia, a land of endless steppe and iron-fanged cavalry. Halvek's riders were as feared as wolves. Khandralis, by contrast, was a jewel of the coast, a kingdom of white harbors and merchant fleets.
"Mansis will agree?" Darian asked.
"He already intends to," Nina said, bitterness lacing her words. "Tirnovia's gold will fill his coffers, and he cares nothing for the blood of Harta's sons. Our fields will be emptied, our people left to starve while he sends them to fight another man's war."
Darian's great hands clenched into fists. "What would you have me do?"
Nina's eyes narrowed. "Prevent it. Without exposing yourself. If Mansis' alliance with Tirnovia crumbles, his standing among the lords weakens. Already some doubt his right to the throne. Show them he is unfit to lead, and their whispers may turn to knives."
The fog curled between them, cold and damp. For a moment, Darian thought he saw her tremble.
"You despise him," he said quietly.
Her jaw tightened. "I know of his indiscretions and crimes. How can I not despise him? He repulses me."
Then she lowered her veil and slipped into the shadows, vanishing as silently as she had come.
Darian returned to his hidden refuge — a derelict barn on the edge of the city — and sat in silence, his sword across his knees.
The problem before him was no simple raid. Rescuing prisoners had been bold, but it had been direct. This required cunning. Subtlety was no weapon he had ever wielded easily.
He thought of the delegation. Halvek of Tirnovia, proud and ruthless. His riders would expect strength, not meek diplomacy. Dorvain of Khandralis, though absent, would surely have spies watching as well. To disrupt Mansis' plans without showing his own hand would require guile enough to set one wolf against another.
The beginning of a plan coiled in his mind.
If Tirnovia's envoys could be made to see Mansis as weak, or dishonorable, the alliance would falter. If the people of Harta whispered that Mansis sold their blood for gold, unrest would spread.
And if, in the confusion, the delegation's trust turned to scorn, the serpent's crown would tarnish.
Darian rose, towering in the moonlight spilling through broken rafters. His shadow stretched across the stone floor, vast and unyielding.
"For Eleyna," he murmured. "For Jameson. For the princes. For the people."
The war for Harta would not be won with swords alone.
It would be won in whispers, in shadows, in plots.
And Darian Duskbane would learn to wield them.