Page 160 of The Dark Lord’s Guide to Honeymooning (and Other Acts of Tyranny)

I melted into the shadows, trailing at a distance. My mother had taught me this particular trick when I was seven, right after she’d carved the concealment rune into my left shoulder blade. Shadows recognize their own, my son. The memory came with phantom pain—the exact pressure of her blade against bone, the smell of my own burning flesh as she sealed the magic.

Soon after, I’d learned to hide from the sound of her footsteps on the stairs, though it had never worked for long.

She moved through Kheldvar’s vertical maze with confidence. The two mages flanking her kept a respectful distance—not equals, then. Subordinates.

Which meant my dear mother had climbed high in Auremar’s service.

Of course she had. Amaryska never did anything by halves.

The walk felt endless. Time moved strangely, stretching and compressing as I noticed everything and nothing—the exact rhythm of her footsteps (the same rhythm that used to echo up the stairs), the way other pedestrians unconsciously moved aside for her (sensing the predator among them, just as I had), the precise shade of gray in her robes (storm cloud gray, the color of her eyes, my eyes).

They turned into the merchant quarter.

She was heading directly for the street we’d left earlier. Toward the houses we’d already emptied of their heroic-blooded occupants.

I kept pace, moving to the rooftops now. Shadow-walking between buildings. Part of me—the Dark Lord part—cataloged exit routes, noted potential ambush points, calculated the exact angle needed to drop down and snap her neck before her mages could react.

The other part couldn’t stop counting her footsteps.

I’d counted them as a child too, listening from my room, trying to predict if she was coming for me or going to her workroom without me. Forty-seven steps meant workroom. Twelve meant my door.

Stop it. You’re thirty-three years old. Count something useful.

She paused outside Brightwater’s warehouse, studying the entrance with that particular tilt of her head I’d learned to read before I could read books. Considering. Calculating. Deciding which bone to break first.

No. Which door to break first.

“The records indicate Lord Brightwater often sleeps in his office, Lady Amaryska.” The eager young mage stepped forward, practically vibrating with the need to please her.

Lady Amaryska. She’d come far from the island sorceress who’d traded her soul for power.

“The door is ajar.” Her voice carried despite the distance—silk over steel, beautiful and terrifying. The same tone she’d used when she’d said, “Hold still, darling, this will only hurt for a moment.” A lie. “Check inside.”

The mage disappeared into the warehouse. The smell of bitter herbs drifted up to my rooftop perch. Old blood. The scent of her workroom. I could taste copper on my tongue.

You’re not there. You’re here. On a rooftop in Kheldvar. Thirty-three years old. Dark Lord. Not—

The mage emerged, face pale. “The office is empty, my lady. There are signs of dissolution magic. Shadow residue.”

My mother’s stillness was absolute.

The stillness before the storm that I’d learned to fear as a child. Before her hand moved and the world became pain.

My left shoulder blade burned. Not real pain. Memory pain. Except my body didn’t know the difference.

“He was here,” she said finally.

“Who, my lady?”

She didn’t answer, already moving toward the next address. The Fekete twins’ clinic. Where they’d find more emptiness, more shadow residue, more evidence of my efficiency.

I followed.

They reached the clinic. Found it empty. Moved to the next location. And the next.

Each empty house seemed to tighten something in her posture. I watched her shoulders, reading the tension there. She was getting angry.

“Seven locations,” the second mage reported nervously. “All empty.”