Chapter 12 · free to read
Two guards on the step. One walkway. A bar of lamplight across the only water anyone could swim. It was the most watched room in the palace.
Half a dose, badly stirred. Whoever carried that bowl across the walkway was in a hurry, or shaking, or had never mixed a poison before in their life.
The seal was cut with a blade and rehung. Nobody forced that door. Somebody opened it, in the light, in front of two guards, and walked back out again.
So I stopped hunting the leak and started feeding it. Five strips. Five different lies. Whichever one came back would name its own carrier.
Artwork and narration generated with AI.