The next morning had been almost peaceful. Too peaceful.

  The men were scattered; Thorne lounging with a book he clearly wasn’t reading, Grabber working his blades with methodical precision, and Riven scribbling notes across parchment with his usual focus. Bagel dozed in a patch of sunlight at my feet, tail twitching.

  It was the kind of quiet that felt like it couldn’t last.

  Thorne broke it first. He strolled out the door, before returning minutes later, whistling low with a sheet of parchment dangling from his hand. “Well, isn’t this charming,” he said, dropping it onto the table.

  Riven’s gaze flicked to it immediately, brows drawing down. Grabber took it without a word, his eyes skimming the page. Something tightened in his jaw.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  Grabber passed it across. The words were jagged, written in some of the worst penmanship I had ever seen.

  We know what you have. We’ll take the girl. You and your families will die for keeping her.

  The air seemed to thin.

  I didn’t move at first, my fingers curled against the edge of the table. Bagel sat up abruptly, fur bristling, ears angled toward the window.

  “Where was this?” Riven asked, his tone clipped.

  “Tied to the fencing,” Thorne replied, though his smile was more a baring of teeth than amusement.

  · ─ ·?· ─ · ·

  The day dragged on after that. Every hallway seemed to echo with whispers, the castle itself holding its breath. I caught fragments of their speculation as they shifted from room to room, discussing the names of rival groups, mentions of debts unpaid, shadows of alliances that might have frayed. None of it made me feel safer.

  Grabber buried himself in correspondence, sealing letters with quick, decisive movements, though his eyes flicked to me whenever he thought I wasn’t looking. Riven stalked the walls, the sound of his boots overhead like a steady drumbeat of impatience, while Thorne toyed with his dagger, spinning it idly as if daring danger to show its face.

  I kept to the hearth, Bagel purring across my lap, her warmth a fragile anchor. But even she seemed restless, her ears flicking at sounds too faint for me to catch. Every so often, I found the men’s gazes converging on me, not accusing but calculating, as if I were the key to a lock they couldn’t yet force open.

  The sun sank low, afternoon shadows stretching long against the stone, and with each hour the silence grew sharper, ready to split.

  · ─ ·?· ─ · ·

  “Well, maybe we have some time. There is no way to know right now when they’ll try and attack.” Riven said.

  That was when the first arrow hit.

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  It struck the frame of the window with a crack that splintered wood. My breath caught, Bagel hissing as more followed, sharp, deadly bursts that rattled stone and glass alike.

  Riven was on me in an instant, dragging me down beneath the table, his body a wall of heat and muscle. “Stay down,” he snarled, the words rough in my ear.

  Grabber cursed, jerking back as one arrow sliced across his arm, leaving a bloom of red. He didn’t falter, only shifted closer to the wall, scanning for angles.

  Thorne was gone the next second, vaulting over the barricade with lethal ease, his laughter sounding so out of place in the chaos. “Let’s see how fast they run!”

  Bagel pressed against my chest, a trembling little anchor as I clutched her close. My pulse roared in my ears.

  The attack ended as abruptly as it began. Silence pressed in, broken only by distant footsteps and Thorne’s shout from the dark outside. “Portal! They’ve jumped!”

  Riven eased back, his hand still gripping my arm as if to make sure I stayed grounded. Grabber lowered himself into a chair, blood running steadily from his arm. He was pale, but his expression was iron.

  I hesitated only a moment before moving closer. My voice came softer than I expected. “Let me help.”

  Grabber studied me, unreadable. Then, with a small tilt of his chin, he extended his arm.

  The wound wasn’t fatal, but it was messy. I tore a strip from my sleeve and pressed it against the cut, my hands steadier than I felt. His breath hissed between his teeth, but he didn’t pull away.

  Thorne returned, empty-handed, rain dripping from his hair. He smirked at the sight. “Well, look at that. Our girl’s got talent.”

  Riven gave him a sharp look. “She’s keeping him alive. Show some respect.”

  Grabber’s lips curved faintly, just enough to betray amusement despite the blood. “Not bad.”

  Before I could answer, Bagel trotted over and planted herself beside his arm, curling into the crook of his side with a steady, insistent purr.

  The sight of him, bloodied, stoic, kitten clinging stubbornly to him, was absurd enough that a laugh bubbled up before I could stop it.

  The others stared for a beat. And then, like a crack in the storm, Thorne barked out a laugh. Riven shook his head, chuckling under his breath despite himself. Even Grabber’s mouth twitched.

  The danger wasn’t gone. The letter still sat heavy in my mind, the promise of more violence pressing close. But something had shifted. For one fragile moment, the laughter knit us together. Not allies, not yet, but no longer strangers on opposite sides of a cage, either.

  I felt their attention turn to me, all at once, like the air thickening. My throat tightened, but I forced myself not to shrink back.

  “Someone went to a lot of trouble,” I said slowly, eyes flicking from the letter to their faces. “But how do I know it isn’t you? A trick to keep me… compliant.”

  Grabber’s gaze snapped to mine, sharp, but not cruel. “You think I’d risk an arrow through my arm for theatrics?”

  Heat crept into my cheeks. “I think you’d risk a lot for control.” The words came out quieter than I intended, more wary than accusing.

  Riven’s chair scraped against the floor as he stood, cutting across the moment. “Whoever it was knows what we have and where we have her. Knows enough to reach our walls, and has enough wealth and magic to vanish in an instant.” His jaw tightened. “They didn’t come to bluff.”

  Thorne leaned back, twirling a dagger between his fingers. “Could be a rival clan. Could be someone with too much gold and too little sense. Either way, they knew the letter would sting.”

  Grabber studied the page again, his expression grim. “A portal doesn’t come cheap. Whoever they are, they have resources.”

  The silence stretched, heavy with unspoken calculations. My stomach knotted. I wanted to argue, to insist it wasn’t my problem, but the truth pressed in sharp as glass. Whoever they were, they wanted me.

  Grabber’s voice cut through the quiet, low and certain. “Like it or not, Liora, this ties us together. If they come for you, they come for us. Cooperation isn’t a choice anymore, it’s survival.”

  A thread of trust, fragile and new, had been woven between us.