The rain over Verance fell in slick, silent sheets, washing the blood from the cobblestones and the name Elara Vex from every official record. To the world, she was just another casualty of a noble feud. In truth, she was being reborn in a leaky safe house, her old life peeled away like wet silk.

Trade: winter fair. Cipher in play. Hostage: son.

The door slammed. Mira held her breath for a full minute after the footsteps faded. Then she slipped out, re-tucked the already-tucked sheets, and carried her basket of linens down to the laundry. There, she palmed a stub of charcoal and wrote on a scrap of cloth:

The hunt had begun.

Behind that wall, she guessed, was a safe. And behind that safe, the cipher.