The footsteps came closer. Louder.
The assassin stilled, lungs burning, heart hammering like a caged beast. Two knights moved down the marble corridor, their eyes fixed on a quivering shadow stretched across the floor.
One frowned. His voice dropped to a murmur.
"What is it?"
The other stepped forward, sword hand tense.
A sudden scuttle...
A rat burst from behind the vase, claws scratching against polished stone. It froze, whiskers twitching.
The knight cursed under his breath. "Tch. Damn vermin."
The other chuckled, and the sound of their boots faded into the halls.
The rat's eyes followed them until their shapes vanished. Then its hind legs lifted to scratch at its ear. Something small fell,a nail-sized shard that shimmered in the light.
The shimmer swelled. Shadows bent. The shape grew until the rat was lost beneath it.
The assassin stood, reborn in black.
A crack split the silence,the vase had fractured under the strain.
His hand slipped inside his black dress. When it came out, a sphere pulsed in his palm.
Inside the sphere, the image moved.
A maid rocked a baby in her arms, humming softly. A silver cup of milk rested in her hand. The infant squealed, kicking toward the cup. The room hung above him, revealed through the orb's glow.
The image died.
The assassin crossed to the window. Claw-hooks caught stone as he scaled upward. The keep's carvings and floral grooves gave him purchase. He climbed with the ease of long practice and slipped inside another chamber.
The door groaned open.
Marly turned. The cup trembled in her hand. She saw the steel first,her scream died in her throat.
The blade struck. Bone grated. She collapsed, blood and milk pooling together at her feet.
The baby laughed.
He caught her before she hit the ground, lowering her with deliberate care. Her body twitched like a dying fish. Fingers clawed at the air, at nothing.
He let her hand fall.
The crib waited. Blade rising...
"Finally, one of the seven witch. You must perish." His voice cut the air as steel flashed.
The baby smiled.
Another hand caught his wrist, cold and unyielding.
"Well, that's amazing. Sleeping past the guards, that's rare." Elowen's voice.
"He..lp…." Bloodied fingers clutched at her gown. The maid's hand dragged, unseen, until it stilled.
The assassin tore another knife free. His strike came quick. Elowen slid past it, eyes narrowing.
"Well trained…"
But his reflection vanished from her gaze.
The assassin's shadow stretched long across the wall,past the crib, and past Elowen
stretching from behind her.
His blade swept in one line, striking through where crib and mother stood.
Steel screamed against wood. Splinters burst across the floor. No blood. No body.
His breath caught.
Elowen's lips moved, voice sharp as a curse.
"Keep her safe! If she even gets a drop of blood on her body, you are dead!"
A maid darted past the doorway, clutching Celestia in her arms, vanishing down the corridor.
The assassin's grip faltered.
"When did she...? That's impossible. It felt like I was still. What is her ability?"
"That was amazing," Elowen said, her arm glinting under the light.
The assassin slipped once more from Elowen's sight, but her gaze did not wander aimlessly. It drifted, slow and deliberate, to the door and there, a thin smile curved her lips, sharp as a drawn blade.
Her wrist flicked. A knife spun, embedding itself in the stone before the door.
The assassin's gaze locked on the blade. His reflection stared back,whole and complete.
"Did she figure out my ability...?"
The thought drowned as a massive shadow loomed. A giant foot, growing larger, threatening to crush him like a fly.
His body shrank in a blur. A mouse slipped free from his black garb, the assassin clinging to its back. The creature bolted across the stone.
Elowen smiled. Her hand snapped. The knife flew.
Steel pinned the mouse to the ground. It screeched once before going still.
The assassin shot free of its body, slammed against the wall, and collapsed in a heap. His form stretched, bones groaning, until his full size returned.
He roared and charged. Their blades clashed, steel shrieking in the chamber. Once. Twice. Sparks flew.
On the third clash, Elowen's wrist turned, smooth as water. Her knife kissed his throat. Blood gushed hot.
He collapsed, choking.
Elowen did not even break a sweat.
She crouched, voice breaking low and raw.
"I was called worse things. Witch. Demon. Whore. But never mother. Not until her."
The baby's cry echoed faintly from the hall.
Elowen rose and stepped into the hall. The maid stood waiting, trembling, Celestia still safe in her arms. Elowen took her child, holding the baby tight against her bloodstained chest.
She turned back into the chamber, the maid following close behind.
The room stank of death. Marly's body lay where it had fallen, the assassin sprawled lifeless beside her, and the mouse still pinned to the floor by Elowen's knife.
Elowen rocked her daughter, touching her cheek with a hand that shook.
"She is my blood. My heart. My world."
She lifted her gaze, voice like ash.
"Compared to her… this kingdom, this world, you, all of you…"
She stepped past the corpse.
"None of you are anything."
The maid knelt by Marly's side. With trembling hands, she closed the dead woman's eyes.
The curtains swayed in the wind, carrying the reek of blood through the keep.
And in Elowen's arms, Celestia slept on
untouched by it all, untouched by anything but the nightmare that had made the world hers.