“Every puzzle has been seen, complete, by its creator. Every strike begins with a plan by its aggressor, and every good trap refuses escape by its design. Who are you that thinks they can change the world?”

  Emperor Cairn

  Year 520

  Ukame Desert, Talcot

  Soft feet padded against the boardwalk.

  There was no creaking or scuffling, just a barely audible tap as a silent figure blended into the mists behind them. The night consumed the silks of their dark robe and leathers, and their practiced movements blended into the shifting air around them.

  The night had been as carefully selected as the stranger’s route. The moon was half-full above the boardwalk, and the clear waters of the Myriad Sea lapped calmly below. If the rolling mists had not already obscured their journey, the proximity to the ocean and the moon’s half-light would have. There were few better conditions for those skilled at moving unseen.

  After making their way through the dock, with its crates ready for transport into the interior or onto a ship, the figure slid quietly onto the cobblestones of the port. As they hit the hard-packed rocks, they stopped to let their muscles adjust to the now solid earth below them.

  Only a single dock guard stood watch this evening, lounging against a large landside pier. There should be several more on post or patrolling the walkways; it seemed the right money had greased the right palms.

  The guard stifled a yawn and kicked the toes of his boots against the cobbles. Had he been looking in just the right direction, at just the right time, he may have noticed a shadow just out of place, a length of black that was abnormal to the world around it. As was typical for Ironcloaks on a damnable night watch, he would notice nothing. A swirl of cloaks floated along the cobblestones of the wharf and into the alley behind.

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  Now that there was no danger of a creaking board, the stranger eased into a light, crouched jog. They weaved in and out of the shops near the dock, past the few bunkhouses for dockhands and sailors, and further into the city until they were deep into the residential district. The shadow slid between each residence, finding small alleyways and garden paths to keep them out of city patrol routes.

  They slowed at a corner villa that was not much different than any other construct in this part of the city. In fact, finding the correct residence would be the most difficult part of their night. This was no Etosian city, with its street signs and markers. If you hadn’t grown up in this neighborhood, it was not an easy place to navigate, even with the information that had been passed to them.

  The swirling fog was lighter here, further into the city, and they needed to be careful. After glancing up and down the empty street, they started their examination of the front gate and low stone fence that surrounded the house’s small front courtyard. As they ran their hand along the smooth, worn stones of the wall, they found what they were looking for.

  A stone wobbled under the sensitive tips of their fingers, and on giving it a slight tug, it freed easily. The underside had been carved with the symbol they were looking for, a smooth S with a diagonal line sliding through, joining, and extending past the ends. The one that had carved it, the scout, had even managed the small spiral on the bottom curve of the S, and the stranger scoffed under their hood at the wasted time.

  This was the house then. The cloaked figure lifted lightly over the wall into the shadows of the trees lining the side of the small courtyard. They made their way up the treeline to the side of the stone villa and glanced up, spotting their window. As they had done hundreds of times before on many walls, they smoothly scaled the vertical limestone and pulled themselves neatly over the lip of the second-story window.

  Their eyes adjusted immediately to the darker interior of the room, as they were meant to, but they still took time to let their body adjust to the slick boards underfoot and confines of the walls. The canopies of the bed flowed in the breeze from the open window, disorientating them slightly. A night crystal collected and sprayed slivers of moonlight into the room, illuminating small patches of a colorful nursery. And there, laying sound asleep in a light blue wrap, under a cloud of blankets and toys, was the child they had been sent for.

  The grey stranger’s dagger flashed in the dim light of the half-moon.