My smile arrived before I could discipline it. A mistake, probably. She had spent two weeks regarding that smile as if it were an unfamiliar weapon left unattended in a public room. She might not see it as genuine. I let her see it anyway, hoping she saw the gratitude, possessiveness, and relief so sharp it bordered on pain.
Catalina’s mouth shifted, just at the corner. Graves looked at no one in particular. Heroic restraint, under the circumstances.
“Come in,” I said.
Catalina crossed the threshold first. Graves followed.
“My father files at six,” I said.
“I know.”
“Yuki told you?”
“She told Dominic. Dominic told me.” Her eyes flicked once to Graves, who had already begun cataloging the room.
The door, the windows, the angle of the chair, the lines of entry and exit. He wanted to know where the knives were before the knives developed ambition.
Then his gaze met mine. The acknowledgment between us took less than a second. “Yuki has the chamber assembling at four forty-five,” Graves said. “Senior elders are already in their robes.”
I looked back at Catalina. “She knew you would come.”
“She knew before we did.”
Yuki had understood my life was ending and beginning before I had finished arranging the thought into language.
For the first time since my father’s order arrived, the tension in me settled.
I offered Catalina my hand. She took it. Her fingers were warm and steady. The dragon in me went quiet. “All right,” I said. “Let’s go.”
* * *
The corridors were too quiet. Quieter than sleep, and nothing like the honest hush of a building before dawn, when even stone seemed to breathe differently. At this hour, Ashenmere should have been beginning its little daily performance of importance. Kitchen staff moving belowstairs. The distant rattle of service carts. Junior clerks carrying the first files of the morning with the grave solemnity of men trusted with state secrets, when in fact most of them had been trusted with stationery.
Deputies should have been changing shifts. Lamps checked. Doors opened and closed before anyone senior could suffer the indignity of noticing that buildings did not run themselves. Instead, there was nothing. No footsteps. No voices. No useful accidents.
The patrols had been rerouted around the eastern wing. Staff had been cleared from our path between four-fifteen and five by Yuki’s order, which meant every empty stretch of corridor was not absence. It was design. Every witness had been removed before they could become inconvenient.
Yuki had not prepared a path. She had sterilized one.
Catalina’s hand stayed in mine as we walked, warm and steady. She did not cling. She did not pull away. She simply remained there.
Graves moved just behind her left shoulder. Close enough to intercept a threat. Far enough away not to make one of himself. It was an infuriatingly elegant balance. Naturally, he managed it well.
We were halfway to the council chamber when I saw Bjorn.
He stood in the gallery alcove where the eastern hall narrowed, hands folded before him, posture correct enough to be mistaken for calm by anyone who had not spent a lifetime watching him.
Bjorn had bad news to deliver. His shoulders were squared, but there was hesitation in his eyes. He was still deciding where to put the knife.
I stopped. Catalina stopped one step later, her hand still in mine.
I released her carefully. “Give me a moment,” I said.
Catalina followed my gaze. “How long?”
“Two minutes.”
She squeezed my hand once and let go. Then she stepped three paces back down the corridor. Graves moved with her.
