The Shadows Within

“It seems you’ve run into a spot of trouble.”

The assassin suddenly felt a profound chill.

It was a cold that seeped not just into her bones, but into her very soul.

She stiffly raised her head.

Celicia was cradling the unconscious Ewan, a howling, miniature blizzard swirling around her slender frame. An aura of pure, unadulterated killing intent, like a dam that had shattered into a million pieces, was pouring out of her in endless, terrifying waves.

“Do you require my assistance in solving your little problem?” Celicia raised a hand, her gaze as cold and hard as forged steel. “By which I mean, solving the problem that is you.”

The assassin’s eyes widened in horror.

Without the unholy flames of the Withered King to protect her, the terrifying chill invaded her body in an instant. A pure white frost, starting from the dagger still clutched in her hand, began to creep rapidly up her arm. In the span of a few breaths, her entire limb was encased in solid, unforgiving ice.

“Damn it.”

A ferocious, desperate snarl twisted the assassin’s face. She knew, with sickening certainty, that thanks to Ewan Campbell’s selfless, idiotic act of obstruction, her mission was a catastrophic failure. The sudden disappearance of the sacred flames was a troubling mystery, but this was no time to ponder it.

She had to get out of there. Now.

Gritting her teeth against the agony, she used her one free hand to bring a brutal, crushing force down upon her own frozen right arm, shattering it into a thousand glittering pieces. At the same time, a small, egg-sized ball fell from her feet and instantly burst open. A thick, white smoke, designed to obscure both sight and senses, billowed out, instantly filling the room.

Celicia’s eyes narrowed. The blizzard around her raged, and the smoke was torn to shreds in seconds, but the assassin was already gone.

“Escaped?” Celicia glanced at the room’s shattered window, a flicker of cruel, predatory amusement in her eyes. “No. You cannot escape.”

“Did you truly think you could get away?” she whispered to the empty room. “Not on my territory.”

…

“Damn you, Ewan Campbell!”

The assassin—no, the agent codenamed Number Eight—clutched the bleeding stump of her arm, scrambling desperately through the deep shadows along the mansion walls.

“I was so close…”

“I should have known. Even if he wasn’t the target, I should have killed him first!”

Number Eight’s heart was a knot of bitter, seething resentment. A nearly perfect operation, foiled at the last possible second by the interference of an insignificant, worthless ant. Anyone would be furious.

And yet… as she listened to the sound of her own blood dripping onto the cold stone, feeling the sharp, grinding agony from her severed limb, she felt a sliver of something else.

Relief.

“Ever since Number Nine died,” she mused with a dark, self-deprecating laugh, “have I also begun to fear death?” She quickly suppressed the inappropriate emotion, her focus returning to the desperate, ongoing escape.

…

“I believe I just heard someone say they were going to do something… to my darling son?”

Number Eight’s frantic escape came to a dead, heart-stopping halt.

She had no choice but to stop. A man was standing in her way.

A man with the majesty and raw power of a lion.

“‘The Lion King,’ Rhun Campbell?”

The color drained from Number Eight’s face, leaving it as pale as a ghost.

“Oh? I am surprised an honored guest such as yourself would remember my humble, unworthy name.” Rhun Campbell reeked of strong wine. He had just returned from the “battlefield” of the banquet hall, where he’d been fending off greedy hyenas, a delicate wine glass still held loosely in his hand. But even dressed in the exquisite, civilized finery of a nobleman, he could not conceal the terrifying, bloodthirsty aura radiating from him. It was an aura that could only be forged by a man who had walked out of a true mountain of corpses.

“But, my dear guest, I do not recall extending an invitation to you. So tell me, why have you come uninvited?”

Rhun Campbell was still smiling, a gentle, fatherly smile. But his eyes were as cold as the grave, and he looked at her as if she were already a corpse.

“Tell me everything,” he said, his voice dangerously soft. “Especially the part about what you intended to do to my precious son. I will be… listening… with… rapt… attention.”

…

On the far side of the ducal estate, another figure in a maid’s uniform was also fleeing at top speed. It was the other assassin, Number Six, who had sensed things were going south and had made her escape a step earlier.

“So that is the ‘Lion King’? Truly terrifying. I’m glad I chose a different escape route.” Glancing at the fearsome aura erupting in the distance, a trace of genuine, lingering fear appeared in her eyes. “My apologies, Number Eight. You’ll have to serve as a decoy for a little while. I cannot afford to die just yet.”

“Great King of Withering,” she prayed under her breath, “may your soul return to the crimson earth.” Pushing through the bone-deep exhaustion from the earlier ritual, she continued to flee.

…

“How very strange. As a professional assassin, after failing a mission, shouldn’t you commit suicide to atone for your failure?”

Number Six’s pupils shrank to pinpricks.

Her escape came to a sudden, jarring halt. Like a fish darting through water, her body twisted in mid-air, dodging a lethal shadow that had sliced toward her from a wicked, impossible angle.

“Who’s there?!”

Ignoring the burning, stinging pain on her cheek where the attack had grazed her, Number Six stared intently into the nearby darkness.

“Who am I? Hehe, just a humble, ordinary maid.”

A young woman in a black and white dress stepped out of the shadows. A sudden, dramatic flash of lightning illuminated Anne’s prim and proper profile.

“A maid?”

Number Six, also clad in a maid’s uniform, let out a derisive laugh. “I have never met a maid as terrifying as you.” She lightly wiped her cheek with her finger, then brought it to her lips, tasting the blood. That last attack, even with her quick reaction, had nearly decapitated her. This woman was incredibly dangerous.

“There are many people in this world you have yet to meet. Just as I have never met assassins as utterly, disappointingly useless as you,” Anne’s voice was filled with a profound, almost tragic sense of disappointment. “I went to all the trouble of leaking such important information, and yet, you failures are the ones who answered the call.”

“What… what do you mean by that?” An inexplicable chill, colder than any magic, ran down Number Six’s spine.

“What do I mean?” Anne’s eyes suddenly widened, her polite facade cracking. “You don’t even know what you’re doing? Do you have any idea how completely and totally worthless you are?!”

“What does that have to do with you? Aren’t you just a maid here?”

“Hehe, a maid. Of course, I am a maid. But you… you all are just so… so very disappointing.” Anne suddenly wrapped her arms around herself, her body trembling as she let out a pained groan, as if suffering some great, internal torment. “I was so close. So close. That b*tch Celicia, who insists on getting close to Young Master Ewan, could have disappeared from this world forever.”

Before Number Six’s horrified eyes, Anne’s perpetually prim and proper mask began to crumble. Her breathing became heavy and ragged, and a ferocious… yet bewitching and utterly insane smile spread across her face.

“But you failed?”

“And not only did you fail, you even hurt Young Master Ewan.”

“How could you… how could you hurt him? In this entire world, the only one who is allowed to hurt him—is me!”

BOOM!

A deafening clap of thunder drowned out Anne’s terrifying, possessive roar.

“Ah, no.”

Anne placed her hands on her face and slowly, deliberately, wiped them downwards. Her bewitching, ferocious expression was smoothed away, bit by bit, until she was once again prim and proper, elegant and composed.

“As Young Master Ewan’s personal maid, how could I be so discourteous?”

She lowered her hands, folding them neatly at her waist as she gave the trembling, terrified Number Six a deep, respectful bow.

“In that case, allow me to see you on your way, honored guest.”

Behind her, countless delicate, shimmering knives, each as thin as a cicada’s wing, slowly floated into the air. Their tips all aimed at Number Six, each one glinting with a cold, merciless light.