The air in the manor was too still. Starling didn't like it. But she'd liked very little about this job from the beginning. She moved in near silence beside Jacek, their footsteps ghosting across marble, darting past shadowed doorways and statuary. The place reeked of wealth and old magic, gleaming glass panels, arcane locks, the kind of decor that dared you to try to steal it.
And of course, they were doing exactly that.
"Do you think it's better," Jacek whispered, crouching beside her as they reached the upper landing, "to slit his throat clean and pin a flower in his mouth, or go full spectacle and paint a rune on the wall in his blood?"
Starling didn't answer right away. She was too busy listening. There was a weight to the quiet she didn't like. A poised kind of silence. Like something waiting.
"Something a blood mage would do," she murmured finally. "Or a greedy noble with more ambition than sense."
Jacek pulled a face. "You're boring, Star. You bore me."
"Oh no," she deadpanned, eyes still scanning the hall ahead.
They reached the door they'd been told led to the diplomat's chambers. No sound. No movement. She exchanged a nod with Jacek, and he eased the door open.
And there they were. Three guards. Armed and awake. Surprised to see them, but not as surprised as she would have thought.
Fuck.
Blades were drawn in an instant. Steel sang. A cry rang out, not from her or Jacek, but from the far side of the room where the diplomat bolted from the bed, half-dressed and panicked.
Jacek swore. Starling shouted, "Go!" as she lunged for the nearest guard.
He didn't argue.
Steel crashed. Sparks flared. The guards weren't exceptional. Not like her, not like what the Crows made. But they were strong, prepared, and Starling had to drop her usual finesse in favour of brutal efficiency. One dropped with a blade across his throat. Another lunged at her, sword high, but she ducked and drove her dagger up beneath his ribs. He twitched and crumpled.
The third one had turned to run - maybe for reinforcements - but she flung a throwing knife that landed in the back of his neck. He hit the floor like dead weight.
Breathing hard, Starling stood still for one beat. Listening. Nothing.
Blood pooled around her boots, soaking into the plush rug. She stepped over it, wiped her blades on the curtain, and ran. Down the hallway, down the stairs, retracing Jacek's route.
Her heart hammered. Every shadow looked like a guard. Every creak of the manor's old bones sounded like the clatter of armour or the scrape of a blade being drawn. The blood on her hands was tacky now, beginning to dry in dark smears along her knuckles.
She found Jacek two halls over, crouched over a body.
Their mark lay sprawled across the marble, neck bent at an unnatural angle. His eyes were still open.
Jacek rose smoothly, holding up the signet ring they'd been told to take as proof of death. "Let's get back to the meeting point," he said coolly, as if they'd just finished sparring, not assassinated a high-ranking official in a house full of guards.
Starling only nodded. No witty retort. No quip. She followed him through the narrow staff halls, then out a side window into the gardens. The air out here was heavy with jasmine and summer heat, thick with the hum of insects and the quiet, rustling breath of leaves.
They crept low through the hedges, staying in the shadows, avoiding the footpaths. Somewhere in the house, someone was bound to discover the mess soon. Someone would scream. And then the manor would erupt into chaos. But for now, they moved silent as ghosts.
Starling's boots were damp from the dew-wet grass by the time they reached the wall. Jacek went first, scaling it with practised ease. She followed, her hands stinging as she grabbed the stone and pulled herself up and over.
They landed in a crouch in the dry grass beyond the wall, and without a word, they slipped away from the estate grounds and toward the creek.
The others were already gathering there in ones and twos, boots muddied, armour light, faces pale in the moonlight. No one was laughing now. The earlier teasing and bravado were gone.
Starling looked around. Ridge. Cade. Tenna. Brin. Vasha. Neri. Alis. Ledo. The chest being carried by Brin and Ledo. All accounted for. The job was done. But the knot in her chest hadn't gone anywhere. It pulled tighter with every passing second.
She looked at Jacek again, the signet ring now tucked safely away. His face was unreadable in the dark.
It should feel like a success. So why didn't it?
They moved in silence through the dark, the city coming into view on the horizon like a sleeping beast. Rooftops glinted faintly from torch and lantern light, and the closer they got, the louder the world became, the chirr of insects giving way to the bark of a distant dog, a shout from some drunken reveller who hadn't yet made it home.
Brin and Ledo peeled off with Vasha and Neri at the edge of the city, taking the heavier burden - the chest of stolen artifacts - toward the drop point. The rest of them, Cade, Tenna, Ridge, Alis, Jacek, and Starling, headed for the Hall.
They didn't speak. They didn't celebrate. Just walked with the taut, shared silence of people still braced for the echo of their choices.
When they reached the Hall, the sky was bleeding into grey. They filed inside, a few muttering about tea or the washrooms, but when Jacek led the way to Elihu's office with the signet ring in hand, they found the room dark and empty.
She stood in the doorway, frowning.
"He must've gone home," Alis offered. "He'll meet us tomorrow."
Starling nodded, but unease tightened her shoulders. He'd said he'd be here. He always followed up. Still, she said nothing. Just turned and headed for the front doors, Cade catching up with her.
As they stepped out into the night, the cool air met her skin like a balm. She glanced down at her hands, at the smudged red-brown stains under her nails and the crusting flecks along her wrist. She hadn't even noticed. She flexed her fingers.
"Trouble?" Cade asked casually, his hands shoved into his pockets.
She shrugged. "There were guards in his room."
He lifted an eyebrow. "How many?"
"Three." Another shrug. "I handled it. Jacek chased the mark."
A short pause, then a low whistle. "Damn. Good on you."
He clapped her shoulder once, firm and friendly, then peeled off toward the street that would take him to his own place.
"Night, Star," he called.
"Night," she murmured.
And then she was alone. She made her way to her own small place. Quiet. Hidden. Home only in the loosest sense of the word.
Inside, she stripped off the dark clothes, tossing them onto the chair, and pulled on a nightdress. She cleaned her hand and then sank onto the bed and exhaled.
It was done. They'd completed the job. No witnesses. No mistakes. And yet…
Her eyes drifted to the ceiling, following the faint lines of the beams above.
It didn't feel clean. It didn't feel right. And Elihu hadn't been there.
She rolled onto her side, eyes wide open in the dark. Sleep didn't come. Not with her mind this loud.
It circled back to the job again and again - every step, every flicker of a shadow, every breath she took before sliding her blade into a man's ribs. It should've felt like all the others. She'd done this before. Dozens of times. It should've rolled off her like water, but...
Her thoughts turned. Slipped sideways to something more pleasant.
Viago and Lucanis.
But she hadn't seen them all day. She hadn't even tried to. She could lie to herself and say she'd just been too busy. That the recon and the infiltration and the sprint through the city had left no time for anything else.
But the truth was simpler. She didn't want to lie to them. So she'd stayed away.
Still, lying in the quiet of her small room, her body aching and adrenaline finally gone, she thought about going. About pulling on her boots, climbing up to the estate wall, slipping over like smoke and padding silently through the upper floors until she could crawl into their bed and surprise them.
The idea brought a faint smile to her lips. It vanished just as fast.
Breaking into the First Talon's estate, she reminded herself, was the kind of stunt that got you executed.
Even if you were only there to sleep with her grandson. She could imagine the conversation if she got caught, 'Sorry First Talon, I wasn't here to steal or kill, I promise. Just to fuck your grandson and his friend.'
No. That wasn't how it worked. They invited her. Always. She didn't just show up.
She'd rest for a few hours. Just enough to be sharp. Just enough to seem like nothing was wrong when she met with Elihu tomorrow.
Later today, she corrected herself as she rolled over again and closed her eyes.