The first rule they taught her: never speak to the target. The second: never listen.
The coal-fog of dawn hadn't yet cleared from the rooftops of Aerlyn when Cerys dropped from the upper gallery of the palace into the servants' courtyard.
She landed in silence, knees bent, cloak fluttering behind her like smoke.
Her hands trembled.
Not from the fall—but from him.
From his voice. From the name on his tongue. From the way he'd looked at her, like she was something he remembered—not someone he'd just met.
She hated it. The confusion. The heat behind her eyes. The way her blade hand had twitched but never struck.
Cerys had killed kings, nobles, mercenaries, warlords in the dark. She'd never flinched. Never hesitated.
But she'd hesitated last night.
"A blade that hesitates," Thorne had once said, "is a blade that breaks."
She moved quickly through the winding service corridors behind the palace—no longer a ghost on a mission, but a shadow running from her own heartbeat.
Why didn't I kill him?
Because he said her name.
Because he remembered the fire.
Because his voice didn't tremble when he told her he'd been waiting.
She reached the rebel safehouse—a dilapidated townhouse tucked between a chapel and an old spice merchant's shop—by sunrise.
Kael Moraine was already waiting for her.
-
Kael sat at the weathered table beneath the cracked skylight, his coat dusted with ash, maps and rune-sigils spread across the wood. He didn't look up as she entered.
"You're late."
"Had to adjust the route," she lied. "Too many patrols."
"No injuries?"
"None."
"And the heir?"
Cerys hesitated. Just a beat.
Kael looked up slowly, eyes sharpening. He had that way of seeing through people without needing magic—just silence and a stare.
"You didn't kill him."
She didn't flinch. "No."
Kael's jaw ticked. "Why?"
She met his gaze, level. "He saw me. Knew my name."
He blinked once. Then again, slower.
"Impossible."
"Apparently not."
He stood, pushing back from the table. "We don't use names for this reason. Ghosts aren't named. Ghosts don't have stories."
"He does," she said quietly.
"And what? You felt something?" His voice hardened. "You're not here to feel, Cerys. You're here to end things."
Her name on his lips felt different than it had from the prince.
Kael had been her savior once—dragged her from rubble, put a blade in her hand, gave her rules to live by.
But now?
Now he felt more like a warden than a rescuer.
"He knows too much," Kael muttered. "We'll move up the timetable. Tonight, you strike during the Moon Offering."
"That's heavily warded," she argued. "Every royal will be present."
"Good." He stepped closer. "Make it loud."
She froze. "You want a massacre."
"I want a message."
Her voice dropped. "I didn't sign up to slaughter civilians."
Kael's expression shifted. "You signed up to be free."
Freedom.
A lie carved into her ribs. A dangling string she chased like light through a cracked door.
She said nothing.
Not because she agreed.
But because part of her already knew:
She wouldn't do it.
-
Later that night, after Kael left to "prepare the second blade" in case she failed again, Cerys sat on the roof of the safehouse, legs dangling over the edge.
The city below buzzed with anticipation—silver banners for the Moon Offering waving from windows, fires lit in blessing circles, children laughing as they scattered petal-charmed dust on doorsteps.
Not everything here was rotten.
She'd forgotten that.
The rebellion didn't want the city. It wanted the throne broken. Wanted blood in the gutters.
But for the first time, Cerys wondered if maybe—
"Didn't think I'd find you here," came a voice behind her.
She spun on instinct, blade at his throat in less than a second.
Thorne didn't flinch.
His hand closed over hers, steady. Cold. Efficient.
"Easy, Vale. I'm not your enemy."
She lowered the blade but didn't sheath it.
"What are you doing here?"
Thorne wore no uniform, no insignia. Just a dark overcoat and a worn leather cuff engraved with dead language sigils. He was the ghost behind the ghosts—her handler, her shadow, her judge.
"Kael sent me to make sure you're still… loyal."
Her stomach twisted.
"I told him what happened."
"And that's the problem."
She narrowed her eyes. "You think I'm compromised."
"I think you looked him in the eye and didn't finish the job."
Thorne stepped closer, voice low, colder than before.
"Let me be clear, Cerys. If you don't kill Darian Rathborne tonight… I will."
She stared at him.
At the man who had taught her poisons and passwords, whose silence had kept her alive more than once.
"Is that supposed to scare me?"
"No," Thorne said. "It's supposed to remind you that you're not the only one with a past."
He turned, disappearing into shadow as easily as smoke from a blade's edge.
"Don't make me clean up your mess," he said, already gone.
Cerys sat in the silence, hands clenched, pulse thudding in her throat.
She thought of Darian again.
Of the way he'd looked at her like she was more than just a weapon.
And for the first time since she was twelve—
She wanted to be more.
Even if it meant breaking everything.
Even if it meant choosing her own ending.