The war had begun. But war never starts with blood. It starts with silence and movement and the slow, careful repositioning of pieces on a board that most people cannot even see yet.
The tower was no longer safe and Alaric knew it.
He stood by the narrow window with his arms crossed, watching the courtyard below. The soldiers were changing positions more often than usual. Patrol routes had shifted in small ways that most people would not notice.
His father had not attacked again since the hallway confrontation and that, more than anything else, was the problem. A man like the Old King who goes quiet is not a man who has given up.
He is a man who is thinking, and thinking men with unlimited resources and unlimited cruelty are far more dangerous than men who simply swing hard and hope for the best.
"He's thinking," Alaric said quietly, his eyes still on the courtyard.
