The dagger was old.
Blackened steel, worn from a hundred killings, and kissed with ancient oils that dulled its shine. Widow Fang balanced it on her fingertip as she crouched on the rooftop, eyes fixed on the window across the street.
Behind that pane of golden glass, Verrick — the Empire's spymaster — laughed with a pair of silk-clad nobles, unaware that death waited in the dark.
Below, the street bustled with late-night revelers. Lanterns swayed. Minstrels sang. Coins clinked.
And no one looked up.
No one ever looked up.
Fang whispered to the shadows, calling them closer as her old blood quickened. This was her gift — not magic, not power, but centuries of honed instinct. She didn't need to see fate to twist it. She simply cut it, one strand at a time.
Tonight, she would sever a particularly thick thread.
Across the city, in the old chapel that served as Leonhart's temporary war room, Donmar chewed his lip and muttered, "It's too soon. She should've signaled by now."
Leonhart, seated with one boot propped against the cracked altar, said nothing.
His fingers drummed a slow beat on the hilt of his sword. Thum. Thum. Thum.
"Maybe she got caught," Donmar pressed. "Maybe—"
Leonhart's hand snapped up. Silence fell.
He stared at the crumbling mural on the chapel wall — once a holy symbol, now faded to little more than stains. His voice, when it came, was calm but sharp enough to cut.
"If she fails, she dies. If she dies, we mourn tomorrow. But tonight… we wait."
Donmar swallowed thickly and nodded. No one argued with Leonhart when he spoke like that — not anymore. The man who once smiled too easily now carried a weight that even the roughest thugs respected.
Meanwhile, Evelyne was already moving.
She stood at her private mirror chamber, a hidden sanctum within Varlock Keep. A dozen mirrors faced each other, creating endless reflections — some clean, some cracked, some dark as obsidian. Each one shimmered faintly with power, linked to her network of spies scattered across the city.
A servant entered, bowing low.
"My lady… there's movement. Widow Fang has been sighted."
Evelyne's lips curled into a thin smile.
"So. The rat shows her whiskers."
She turned to the largest mirror, which rippled as Verrick's face appeared.
"I take it you've baited the trap?" she asked coolly.
Verrick grinned. "The old crow thinks she's clever. But I have my own birds in the sky tonight. She won't reach me."
Evelyne's gaze sharpened. "I don't want her dead yet. I want her broken. Bring her to me alive."
Verrick's expression faltered for a heartbeat — long enough for Evelyne to notice. But he recovered smoothly. "Alive. Understood, my lady."
Evelyne turned away, her thoughts racing.
Leonhart was escalating faster than expected. Widow Fang wasn't a common knife-for-hire — her involvement meant Leonhart had begun gathering serious power. And if he dared to reach for Verrick now, it meant he was testing her defenses, probing for weaknesses.
Her pulse quickened — not from fear, but from something colder. Something hungrier.
"So you're serious after all, Leonhart," she murmured to herself. "Good. Let's see how far you're willing to crawl for your crown of bones."
Back in the alley across from Verrick's safehouse, Fang exhaled and moved.
She slipped down the wall like a shadow spilling across stone, landing silently behind the guards at the door. A flick of her wrist — two thin wires snapped out — and both men slumped with garrotes biting into their throats.
She stepped over the bodies, her heart steady, her breathing measured.
Inside, the hallway stretched long and gilded — too opulent for a spymaster. Fang's instincts screamed. This was a stage, not a home.
Still, she moved forward.
She found Verrick in the grand salon, lounging with a goblet in hand, dressed like a lord rather than a spy. His smile was wide.
"Ah, Widow Fang. The ghost of the old clans. How fitting you'd come to haunt me tonight."
Fang's blade was in her hand before he finished speaking.
But she froze.
Not because of Verrick.
Because of the shimmer behind him.
The air warped — and a dozen men stepped from the shadows. Black-clad. Faces painted with the marks of the Empire's secret police.
An ambush.
Verrick chuckled, rising to his feet. "Did you really think we didn't know? Evelyne anticipated this the moment Leonhart started gathering his strays."
Fang's eyes narrowed. Her muscles coiled.
Verrick's smile faltered — just a little — as he continued. "But we don't want you dead, old woman. We want you to deliver a message to your master. He's playing a game that will only end with him in chains — or on a pike."
Widow Fang didn't answer.
She just moved.
Faster than sight.
Her dagger sang as it flashed through the throat of the nearest guard. Blood sprayed. Chaos erupted. Blades clashed. Shouts rang out.
Verrick stumbled back, cursing, as Fang cut through two more men like wheat before a scythe. But numbers were against her. Even her deadly grace couldn't hold against twelve trained killers in such a confined space.
A baton cracked against her ribs. A boot smashed into her knee. She staggered.
Another blow split her scalp, blood running into her eyes.
Still, she fought.
Because death was cheaper than failure.
Meanwhile, in the chapel, Leonhart felt it — not through magic, but through the sudden silence in his gut.
Donmar cursed. "No signal. She's either dead… or captured."
Leonhart rose slowly, his face like stone.
"So they want to send a message," he murmured. "Fine. Then let's make sure the city hears it."
He turned to Donmar and the others.
"Gather the street lords. The beggar kings. The guildless mercenaries. Tell them the time of silence is over. Tonight, we light fires — real ones. No more whispers. No more shadows."
His fists clenched.
"If Evelyne wants to dance, I'll give her a funeral dirge."
At the safehouse, Fang finally fell.
Her body hit the floor hard, pain blooming in every joint. Blood soaked her clothes. She spat red at Verrick's boots as he approached.
The spymaster knelt, gripping her chin and forcing her to meet his gaze.
"Tell Leonhart," Verrick hissed, "that next time, it won't be one of his pets we break — it'll be him."
Fang's lip curled.
She spat again, this time in his face.
Verrick's smile vanished.
He stood and gestured to his men. "Throw her in the gutter. Let the rats chew on her pride."
Later that night, Widow Fang's broken form was dumped in an alley near the market square. Word spread like wildfire — the once-untouchable assassin queen, beaten and left as a warning.
But when her eyes fluttered open, bloody and swollen, she whispered one word.
"Leonhart…"
And though her body was broken, her will wasn't.
In the chapel, when Leonhart heard of her return, something deep in him snapped.
He rose from his chair, eyes burning with cold flame.
"No more games," he said softly. "Tonight, we take the first piece of her empire."
Donmar blinked. "Wh-what do you mean?"
Leonhart's smile was thin. Deadly.
"We're going to burn Verrick's network. His spies, his safehouses, his contacts — all of it. Gone by dawn."
He turned toward the city.
"Let Evelyne see that when you wound a monster… it bites back."
Far above, in her tower, Evelyne watched the flames begin to flicker in the lower districts.
She smiled.
"So he chooses open war, after all," she murmured.
Her reflection in the mirror gazed back — dark-eyed and hungry.
"Let's see who drowns first in this sea of blood, my love."