Page 150 of The Dark Lord’s Guide to Honeymooning (and Other Acts of Tyranny)

The mass sleep spell took them all at once. Bodies crumpled. A few remaining bystanders screamed, but I was already opening the portal.

“Efficient,” Thorne commented, beginning to drag bodies through. I levitated five at once. “Morally questionable, but efficient.”

“Story of my life.” I paused, hearing more guards approaching. “How many city guards do you think that is now? Twenty?”

“Twenty-three, my lord.”

“Excellent. Let’s see if we can make it an even thirty before we leave.” I cracked my knuckles, shadows already gathering. “After all, Kheldvar’s guard could use some downsizing. I’m practically doing them a favor, weeding out the ones too slow to run from a Dark Lord.”

The guards rounded the corner, saw me standing amid unconscious bodies, and actually had the audacity to charge.

“Points for bravery,” I admitted, right before the shadows took them. “Negative points for intelligence.”

Dozens of guards dead, and the voice that usually screamed for more carnage when Arabella witnessed my violence was barely a murmur. Distance from her made everything clearer—my thoughts, my control, even my shadows moved with less resistance. I filed that observation away, disturbed by its implications.

As we hauled the last of our kidnapped heroes through the portal, I couldn’t help but reflect on the absurdity of it all. Here I was, the Terror of the Western Realms, reduced to running a recruitment fair and playing hide-and-seek with city guards.

“Next time,” I told Thorne as we prepared to return for another batch, “we’re just conquering the kingdom first. This heroic restraint is exhausting.”

“Sounds good, my lord.”

“And Thorne? Remind me to send Kheldvar a donation for their guards’ widow fund.”

“The one you just created?”

“The very same.”

The last hero of the day—a silversmith who crafted blessed jewelry and apparently descended from some obscure saint—went through the portal without much fuss. Unconscious people were remarkably compliant.

“That’s the last on the list for today,” Thorne said, hefting the man through the swirling darkness. “Shall we return to Skyspire, my lord?”

The alley was particularly narrow, wedged between a tannery and an apothecary. The competing scents of leather and medicinal herbs made my nose burn. I held out my hand, and Thorne handed me the list.

I scanned it, pausing on a name halfway down. I glanced through the portal, where our unconscious recruits waited in their magically induced slumber, and then closed it. “They’re not going anywhere. There’s one more we should investigate tonight.”

44 Feel Something Genuine

(and Immediately Regret It)

Kazimir

The Black Eagle squatted in Kheldvar’s merchant quarter like a stubborn old soldier refusing to retire. Three stories of weathered stone and timber, windows that glowed amber against the evening dark, and a sign depicting an eagle so faded it looked more like an angry chicken. But the moment Thorne and I approached the entrance, I felt a peculiar tingle of old magic—the kind that predated most kingdoms and gave exactly zero fucks about Dark Lords or their ambitions.

“This is the place?” Thorne asked, eyeing the door.

“According to the list.” I consulted Vex’s notes again. “Istvan. Proprietor. Heroic bloodline through his great-grandfather.” I paused, rereading Sebastian’s addition. “Also makes exceptional goulash and has ‘a laugh like summer thunder,’ whatever that means.”

“Are we taking him now?”

“After a drink.” Arabella wouldn’t be at Skyspire tonight anyway. She was probably off charming Meridian Isle with her aggressive compassion.

I pushed open the door, and the scent hit me immediately—ale and pipe smoke, yes, but also hearth fire and something indefinable that made me think of my mother’s kitchen before everything went to shit. Which was to say, I had no actual memory of such a thing, but the smell convinced me I should.

The interior was exactly what you’d expect from a establishment frequented by mercenaries, smugglers, and the occasional assassin between contracts. Rough wooden tables, benches scarred by knife fights and spilled drinks, walls decorated with weapons that had definitely seen use. But despite the rough clientele—I spotted at least three I recognized from wanted posters and a demon who was supposed to be banned from this plane—everyone unconsciously wiped their feet at the threshold.

Including me.

I paused, staring down at my boots on the worn mat, irritated that I’d done it without thinking.