The scribe did not cry out.
Aurelia bound the boy’s wrists and ankles with strips of rawhide cut from the courier harnesses, stuffing a rag of coarse linen into his mouth. She worked with efficient, quiet detachment, leaving him bundled beneath his wool blankets in the corner of the loft where he could neither rattle the wicker birdcages nor reach the door.
She moved systematically along the roosts. With swift, merciless precision, she twisted the necks of the twelve imperial ravens one by one, dropping the dark, feathered carcasses into an empty grain sack.
Without wings to carry the alarm, the southern fortresses were blind.
When she descended the interior stairwell into the tower’s second floor, she found the heavy oak door of the commandant’s quarters hanging in splinters from its iron pintles.
Inside, the room was lit by the soft, golden glow of tallow candles standing in brass sconces. A peat fire crackled in the hearth, chasing the river damp from the heavy woolen tapestries that lined the walls.
Commander Lucian—the regional warden of the Oak haven garrison—sat slumped behind a broad walnut desk. A heavy broadsword lay half-drawn from its scabbard on the floorboards beside his limp hand. Malakor stood across from the desk, his great sword already cleaned and latched across his shoulder, his fingers sifting through a stack of vellum scrolls bearing the crimson wax seal of the High Inquisitor.
"The birds are dead," Aurelia said, stepping through the ruined doorframe. Her boots made no sound against the thick wool rug.
Malakor glanced up from the documents, his amber eyes settling on her with immediate, heavy focus. The tension that coiled through him whenever she was out of his line of sight loosened, his features softening into that grim, possessive stillness that always followed bloodletting.
"The warden had visitors due tomorrow," Malakor said, his voice a low, graveled purr that cut through the crackle of the hearth fire. He tapped the parchment with the edge of a blackened fingernail. "An imperial supply train from the eastern mines. Six wagons of silver bullion and five score horses destined for the front lines in the capital."
Aurelia walked to the desk, her gaze tracing the spilled ink and the crimson seal. She reached out, her fingers brushing against Malakor's as she picked up the dispatch.
The brief contact sent a jolt of warmth arcing between their palms, the shared resonance of their sovereign blood flaring like an ember stirred by wind. Her chest hitched slightly, her gaze rising from the parchment to lock with his.
"Six wagons of silver," she murmured, her voice laced with quiet wonder. "The High Inquisitor is financing a full-scale purge of the northern clans."
"He was," Malakor corrected, stepping around the massive desk until his chest was inches from hers. The radiating heat of his body was overwhelming in the enclosed room, smelling of woodsmoke, old leather, and sovereign iron. "Now, he is financing us."
He reached out, his rough, calloused fingers catching the dark strands of her hair where they clung damply to her temple, tucking them gently behind her ear. His touch lingered against the warm curve of her cheek, his thumb tracing the soft line of her jaw with an unhurried, intoxicating deliberate pressure that set her pulse racing.
"You look tired, Aurelia," he murmured, his eyes darkening to the hue of aged whiskey as his gaze dipped to her mouth.
"I am alive," she countered, her hand rising to grip his wrist, her thumb pressing against the heavy beat of his pulse beneath the leather vambrace. "That is more than the Concord planned for us."
A slow, wicked smile spread across Malakor’s lips, dangerous and laced with dark intent.
"They planned for cattle," he whispered, leaning down until his lips grazed hers, speaking directly into the heat of her mouth. "They got wolves. Tonight, we sleep in the warden's bed. Tomorrow, we bleed the empire dry."