Two weeks passed like water through a cracked barrel. The days blurred into a single grey streak of patrols, bounties, and formation drills. The 4th Company swept tunnels, cleared nests, and hauled carcasses for silver. Renn talked. Terro grunted. Pol blocked. I swung. The machine ran smoothly. The nights belonged to Silas. I came to the cave every evening after the tavern closed. Two hours of sleep, then the long walk through the tunnel system. The goblins always heard me coming first — their heads snapping up in perfect unison, clicking softly to each other before going back to whatever small, obsessive task Silas had assigned them. The training shifted. Silas stopped explaining and started demanding. He would carve a shape into the wall — a niche, a shelf, a doorframe — and tell me to replicate it. The first few attempts were disasters. I shattered stone, cracked my own knuckles, and once nearly brought down a section of ceiling that Silas had to catch and re-seal with a lazy wave of his hand and a look of theatrical disappointment. But by the end of the second week, I had carved out something that could almost be called a room. It was small. Barely six feet across. The walls were uneven, the corners rough, the ceiling slightly lopsided. Compared to Silas's glassy, perfect hemisphere, it looked like a drunk had tried to sculpt a cave out of mud. But it held. The stone didn't crack. The ceiling didn't sag. And I could stand inside it, run my hand along the wall, and feel the compacted fibers of rock pressed smooth — not torn, not shattered. Pressed. "It's a closet," Silas said, leaning in the doorway and inspecting my work with the exaggerated disappointment of a master painter reviewing a child's sketch. "A deeply mediocre closet. But..." He tapped the wall with his knuckle and listened to the sound. Solid. Dense. "...it won't fall on your head. So. Progress." I wiped the dust from my hands. My palms didn't bleed anymore. * * * The note arrived on a Tuesday. Same wax seal. Same cramped, precise handwriting. Same instructions: southern warehouse district, midnight, alone. I tucked the note into my belt. I reached the warehouse at midnight. The streets were empty, the lanterns guttering in a low wind that carried the reek of the tannery district. The door was open. Inside, there was no crate. The bald merchant stood in the center of the empty warehouse floor, hands folded behind his back, flanked by two men I hadn't seen before. They were big, well-fed, and wearing matching dark leather jerkins with the faintest glint of chainmail underneath. House Verant muscle. Their swords were sheathed but their hands rested on the pommels. "Good evening," the bald merchant said. His voice was the same as last time — smooth, measured, entirely without warmth. Like a man reading terms of a contract aloud. "Where's the crate?" I asked. "There has been a change in the arrangement." He smiled. It didn't reach his eyes. "Lord Greyve wished to express his gratitude for your prior service. Personally. A carriage is waiting outside. I would strongly recommend accepting the invitation." I looked at the two guards. They looked back. Patient. Professional. "And if I don't?" The merchant tilted his head, as if genuinely confused by the question. "I am merely an intermediary. I don't make threats. But Lord Greyve does not extend invitations twice. I trust you understand what that means." I understood. The carriage was black, unmarked, with curtains drawn over the windows. I climbed in. One of the guards sat across from me. Nobody spoke. The wheels clattered over cobblestones for fifteen minutes before the carriage stopped. * * * The building was a private dining hall on the edge of the merchant quarter — the kind of place where deals were made over roasted pheasant and sealed with a handshake that was worth more than most men's lives. Greyve sat at the head of a long oak table, alone. A single candelabra threw warm light across a spread of cold meats, dark bread, and a bottle of wine that probably cost more than my monthly pay. He didn't stand when I entered. He didn't smile. He gestured at the chair across from him with two fingers, the way you'd gesture a dog to sit. I sat. "Eat," he said. I didn't touch the food. "Where's the crate?" Greyve poured himself wine. He took a slow sip and set the glass down. "I pay you four gold pieces," he said. "Do you know what a dockworker earns in a year? Two gold. A guild footman? Three, if he's lucky. I'm paying you twice a laborer's annual wage for a single night's work." He paused. "Does that seem reasonable to you? For carrying a box?" I said nothing. "It doesn't," he answered for me. "Because I'm not paying you to carry boxes. I never was." He leaned back in his chair. The candlelight carved deep shadows under his cheekbones. "A boy from a village smithy. No family name. No guild patron. No noble connections. No one who would come asking questions if he disappeared tomorrow." He ticked each point off on his fingers. "And yet this same boy walked into a goblin camp alone and walked out alive. And somehow he knows magic." He picked up his glass again. "House Verant does not invest in porters. We invest in people with a very specific set of... capabilities. People who can solve problems that the Guild's rules do not allow us to solve openly." "I'm not your man," I said. "You took my gold," Greyve said quietly. "Twice. You are already my man. The only question is whether you continue to be useful... or whether you become a problem." Greyve reached under the table and placed a folded piece of parchment beside the wine bottle. "A group of local thieves intercepted a shipment of ours two nights ago. Alchemical tinctures and refined dust. Valuable. They're holed up on a decommissioned barge in the eastern docks. The cargo needs to be recovered." He pushed the parchment toward me. A crude map. Dock numbers. "How you handle the thieves is your concern. The cargo is mine." He placed the leather purse on the table. Four gold coins clinked softly inside. "The gold is yours when the cargo is returned. My man will be waiting at the south dock gate." He picked up his wine and turned his attention to the window, as if I had already left. "That will be all." * * * The eastern docks were a maze of rotting piers and half-sunken hulls. A low fog clung to the waterline, thick enough to muffle sound and thin enough to see shapes through. I found the barge thirty minutes later. It was an old river hauler, wide and flat-bottomed, moored at the end of a half-collapsed wooden pier. The hull was black with age and neglect. A faint orange glow leaked through cracks in the deck planking — a lantern or a fire pit. Voices. Low, rough laughter. I crouched behind a stack of rotting crates on the pier and counted. Two men on the open deck, passing a bottle between them. One sitting on a coil of rope near the bow, a crossbow resting across his knees. At least two more below deck, judging by the shadows moving behind the glow. Five. Maybe six. I closed my eyes and breathed. My heart hammered against my ribs. They also have your cargo and swords and a crossbow pointed at anyone who walks down that pier. I opened my eyes. The two on deck were closest. The one with the crossbow was the biggest threat. I needed him down first, and I needed it silent. I moved along the pier, staying low, keeping the fog between me and the barge. The old wood groaned under my boots, but the lapping water and the men's own voices covered the sound. I reached the mooring line and dropped down to the narrow ledge where the hull met the pier. The crossbowman was six feet above me, sitting with his back to the gunwale, his legs dangling. I could hear him breathing. I reached up with my left hand and pressed my palm flat against the hull plank beneath his feet. I pulled mana from my core and let heat flood through my fingers. A sharp, contained burst — not a fireball, just a violent detonation of force concentrated into a single point. The plank beneath the crossbowman exploded upward in a shower of splinters and orange sparks. He screamed, his legs dropping through the shattered wood, the crossbow spinning away into the dark water. Before anyone could react, I was over the gunwale. The hammer caught him across the temple. He went limp. The second man on deck spun around, bottle still in hand. "Oi, what the—" I closed the distance in two strides. He reached for his sword. Too slow. The hammer hit him in the sternum, and he folded like wet paper, the bottle shattering on the deck. He didn't get up. Two down. No alarm. The third man — the one who'd been sharing the bottle — was already on his feet, eyes wide, hand on his blade. "Raid!" he screamed. "We got a—" Too late for silence. I threw myself sideways as a crossbow bolt hissed out of the hatch below deck, punching through the air where my chest had been a heartbeat ago. Someone below had heard the commotion and was shooting blind through the grating. The third man charged me, sword high. I brought the hammer up to meet the blade. At the point of contact, I let fire pour through the iron head — a white-hot flash that lit the fog like a second sun. His sword melted at the point of contact. The steel sagged and dripped like candle wax, the heat traveling down the blade and into his hand guard. He screamed, dropping the ruined weapon, and I hit him in the jaw before he could process what had happened. Three. Boots pounded up the hatch stairs. Two men burst onto the deck together — one with a short sword, one reloading the crossbow. The deck was slick. Bilge water, spilled ale, fog condensation. I could feel it under my boots. I slammed my palm down onto the wet planking. Lightning — raw, instinctive, barely controlled — raced across the soaked wood in a crackling web of blue-white arcs. Both men seized up instantly, their muscles locking, weapons falling from spasming fingers. The one with the crossbow toppled backward down the hatch. The swordsman dropped to his knees, twitching, and I put him down with the hammer before he could recover. I stood on the deck, breathing hard. The fog swirled around me. The barge rocked gently on the black water. Below deck, I found the last one — the crossbowman who'd fallen back through the hatch. He was crumpled at the bottom of the stairs, groaning, trying to crawl toward a knife on the floor. I stepped on the blade and looked down at him. He stared up at me. Young. Maybe my age. Terrified. "The crate," I said. "Where." He pointed with a shaking hand toward a canvas-covered stack in the corner of the hold. I walked over and pulled the canvas away. Three wooden boxes, sealed with House Verant's mark. Rows of dark glass vials packed in straw — alchemical tinctures. And beneath them, small linen pouches of fine, iridescent dust that shimmered faintly even in the guttering lantern light. Behind me, the young man was crawling toward the ladder. I let him go. * * * The bald merchant was waiting at the south dock gate, exactly where Greyve said he would be. Two guards flanked him. A cart stood behind them. I set the three crates down on the cobblestones. The merchant inspected each one, checking the seals, counting the vials. He nodded once, satisfied, and gestured to one of the guards, who handed me the leather purse. Four gold coins. Heavy in my hand. "Lord Greyve knew you would not disappoint," the merchant said. He straightened his coat. "Have a pleasant evening." He climbed into the cart without looking back. The cart rattled away into the fog. I stood alone on the dock. The stench of tar and brine pressed against my face. My hands were sticky. I looked down. Blood — not mine — had dried in the creases of my knuckles, dark and cracking. I walked to the edge of the pier and knelt. The black water was freezing. I plunged my hands in and scrubbed. The blood came off in thin, curling ribbons that dissolved into nothing. I scrubbed until my skin was raw. Then I sat back on the wet wood and stared at the four gold coins in my palm. This is the last time, I told myself. After this, I disappear. I train. Somewhere far from people, far from Greyve, far from all of it. I come back when I'm strong enough to tear this whole arrangement apart with my bare hands. And somewhere in the back of my skull, something laughed. Not a sound. Not a voice, exactly. More like a vibration. A low, amused hum that resonated in my teeth the same way Silas's earth magic did — except this came from inside. The last time. Of course. Just like the last time was the last time. I clenched my jaw. The coins bit into my palm. You came here with nothing. Now you've got two collars and pockets full of someone else's blood. And the funniest part? You like it. Not the gold. Not the power. You like how easy it was. I stood up sharply. The coins went into my belt pouch. My hands were shaking, but not from the cold. Run, then. Train. Get stronger. Come back and destroy ten Greyves at once. That's the plan, right? The hum faded, but the grin it left behind lingered like a stain. I walked back toward the Guild district. The fog closed behind me. Somewhere on the barge, a man I'd hit was probably waking up with a broken skull and no memory of what happened. Somewhere in a private dining hall, Greyve was pouring himself another glass of wine, already knowing I'd deliver. And somewhere in the marrow of my bones, something that wasn't quite me was keeping score.

Chapter 22: The Price