Page 17 of Hellbound

She would need to lure the pair of guards stationed at the stairwell entrance to the curtain wall. Her gaze assessed the marketplace. At its center, merchants were unfurling bolts of textiles, a spice seller with precarious piles of saffron and peppercorns, and a produce vendor quartering fruit with a knife.

Up ahead, a horse-drawn cart loaded with six wine casks presented a solution. She crouched low and watched the driver show his permits to the castle guard.

Heart racing, she drifted behind a passing cart stacked with sugared dates and nuts. When it brought her close enough, she darted forward and pressed herself flat against the wine cart.

Ahead of her, a dull thud drew her attention. She could smell the apple’s sweet tang as it hit the flagstones with a hollow thud, bouncing and rolling toward the gate. The produce merchant chased after it, cursing her bruised product.

The corner of Ksenia’s mouth lifted. With a quick flash of her dagger, she slashed the rope securing the casks.

The barrels tumbled free with a splintering crash. Each one was as thick as a man’s torso; they hit the solid ground and gained speed downhill, careening in different directions with thunderous booms. Their iron bands loosened, wine spraying from cracks in the bent wood.

The little girls screamed. Marketgoers dove aside as their stalls and carts were obliterated. One cask clipped the spice seller’s display and split open entirely. A plume of golden saffron exploded into the air, settling into the wine that now ran in rivulets.

Ksenia ducked beneath the cart, holding position until both guards abandoned their posts and rushed into the chaos. Once inside the cold and dusty stairwell, she took the steps two at a time.

Her fingers were damp from sweat and twitched on Caromir’s hilt, itching to get there faster so she could twist it deep into Bohdan’s back and make him suffer.

She had never killed before. But she couldn’t resist the allure of revenge.

The enclosed wooden gallery ran the length of the torch-lined wall. Thick timber posts created alcoves that doubled as hiding spots should she need one, and she braced herself as the wind whistled through the gaps, carrying shouts from below.

Ksenia remained crouched, her muscles protesting as she peered around the corner and spotted her target, twenty paces away. She pressed forward, keeping to the shadowed sections as the sun sank lower on the horizon.

One foot forward. Two.

His crimson cloak now within reach, she lunged forward.

He turned.

She caught the briefest flash of amusement in his eye as he crushed her wrist in his grip.

She hissed as he twisted her arm and flipped her so her back pressed flat against him, redirecting Caromir up to the hollow of her neck.

“Let me guess, another Bound Eye fighter with a grudge and a knife. You presented your angle of attack so clearly to me.” His whisper was cruel, chafing her ego.

“Envorsen scum,” she spat.

He pushed the razor’s edge into Ksenia’s skin, blood beading on the surface. She felt her face mottle red as she angled her neck, determined to break free.

“You picked a terrible day for martyrdom.” His green eyes bore down on her as the dagger bit deeper into her neck.

Before he could finish the job, a leather-gloved hand intervened, effectively preventing Caromir from slitting Ksenia’s throat.

“Bohdan! Good to see you alive and well.” A woman’s voice cut through the chaos—clear, commanding, almost amused. “But please, unhand my charge.”

The woman’s eagle-eyed gaze locked on Ksenia’s for a beat too long, something unreadable flickering there.

Bohdan wrenched his hand free, releasing her, and she stumbled back and away as she used her tunic to mop up her bleeding throat. The woman nodded once, then leaned casually against a nearby timber post, as though she hadn’t just prevented a murder.

“You know her, Varka?” Bohdan’s tone was low as he readjusted his uniform, cutting a suspicious glare between the pair.

The same question ricocheted through Ksenia’s mind.

Varka Beranek?

She studied the young woman. Light green eyes paired with tousled dark brown hair shorn to chin-length. She was dressed in a fine emerald tunic beneath a tailored leather corset. The woman—Varka—squared her broad shoulders in response and crossed her trousered legs at the ankles, the picture of ease despite the tension in the air.

Everyone knew the Beranek name. Varka was astonishingly young to have achieved the matriarch title of a noble house; she had to be scarcely thirty years old by Ksenia’s guess. Theirs was one of the oldest houses in the kingdom, and their influence had run deep in previous courts before they fell spectacularly out of favor with Karsan. Now they kept to the kingdom’s edge, content to live off old wealth and older grudges, according to rumor. Ksenia had never met any of them, but if not for Varka’s intervention, she’d be dead—not even a day old in her new body.