Ludger glanced at her once more and said, “You should focus more on the labyrinth than on me.”
Elira’s smile thinned just slightly at that, becoming more thoughtful.
“I am focusing on the labyrinth,” she said. “I’m also focusing on the person most likely to reshape what happens around it.”
That was a better answer than he expected. Which meant he disliked it more.
Because it was not flirtation. Not entirely. Not empty curiosity either. It was strategic interest, layered together with personal fascination in a way that made it harder to swat aside.
Elira wasn’t just watching him because he was unusual. She was watching because she understood that he changed the shape of things around him. Guilds. Labyrinths. Trade. People. And now, possibly, her guild as well.
That made her more dangerous than the average overeager noble girl or guild daughter. Still annoying. But dangerous in a more respectable way.
Ludger exhaled through his nose and said, “That sounds like a terrible use of your time.”
Elira laughed softly.
“Maybe,” she said. “But it hasn’t been boring.”
Ludger looked back to the road and muttered, “That seems to be the problem.”
They kept walking after that, the morning stretching out around them, the false expedition moving steadily toward the labyrinth while the real intent hid beneath it. Elira, apparently content for the moment, let the conversation rest.
Which was good.
Because if she had kept going, Ludger might have had to seriously reconsider whether letting her walk beside him counted as an acceptable risk to the operation or a punishment from the world for surviving too many more straightforward battles.
A few minutes later, Ludger felt a stare digging into the back of his head. Not hostile. Not exactly. Just persistent enough to become irritating. He glanced over his shoulder.
And, as expected, Viola was still at the center of that ridiculous little group from before, walking like she had somehow been crowned queen of the world during the march and everyone else had accepted the result without protest. She was laughing at something one of the instructors had said, one hand brushing lightly at her hair while the men around her hovered between trying to look competent and failing in embarrassingly ordinary ways.
Luna and Elira were still near her too. Luna looked mildly resigned, which for her was practically expressive. Elira looked entertained, which was worse.
Ludger turned back around. Those people wanted to help him with undercover work somehow. The thought would have been funny if it were not completely insane.
Viola could not even walk through a training march without turning half the instructors into awkward idiots, and these were the same people who thought they might somehow move quietly through an operation built on secrecy, control, and not attracting exactly this kind of attention.
Absurd.
He kept walking and let the road shorten under their feet until the northern camp finally came into view. The change in atmosphere was immediate, as always.
The air felt rougher there. Colder too, though the difference was not severe this far south. Smoke from cookfires drifted low between sturdy structures built more for use than beauty. Northerners moved through the camp in steady lines of work, carrying wood, tools, hides, weapons, or children with the same practical ease. Voices carried sharply. Laughter was louder. Even stillness there had a different shape, like everything in the camp remained one breath away from motion.
Ludger nodded to the usual suspects as he passed. Kharnek, broad as a wall and impossible to mistake, returned the gesture with the barest movement of his chin. Freyra was nearby, arms crossed, watching the arriving group with her usual look of stubborn suspicion sharpened by curiosity. Sigrid stood farther off with the cold steadiness of someone who had already measured the entire expedition and decided which parts deserved her attention and which did not.
The exchange was simple. A nod. An acknowledgment. Nothing wasted.
Then Ludger’s gaze shifted toward the labyrinth entrance… And he stopped. Someone unusual was there.
Darnell.
That alone made his eyes narrow slightly.
The captain was usually buried in administrative work around the area these days, mostly because Lionfang refused to stop expanding and every time one part of the town settled into shape, two more demanded organization, labor, or supplies. Darnell had become one of the people holding those parts together while pretending it was less annoying than it actually was.
So seeing him standing there in front of the labyrinth instead of drowning under paperwork was enough to mean something. Darnell noticed him, stepped forward, and offered his hand.
“Good work,” he said.
Ludger accepted the handshake without changing expression. Then he felt it. A piece of paper being slipped into his palm with the same smooth precision as the grip itself.
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Small. Folded. Quickly transferred.
By the time the handshake ended, it was already in Ludger’s hand, hidden neatly enough that no one watching from the side would think much of it.
So it was like that. Torvares had sent a message. Probably an apology, since he had failed to stop Viola again. That seemed likely enough.
Ludger did not look at the note immediately. He simply tucked his hand back naturally, face calm, as if nothing of interest had just happened in front of a whole crowd.
Darnell, to his credit, looked exactly like a man who had just come to greet a superior and say something polite. Ludger gave him a small nod in return, the sort that could mean almost anything, and stepped past him toward the entrance while the trainees began settling into the first stage of the expedition behind him.
On the surface, everything remained normal.
Training. Marching. Logistics. One more Lionsguard operation unfolding at the edge of the north. Only Ludger, with the folded paper now hidden in his hand, knew that the shape of the day had just shifted a little more.
Six hours later, they were deep inside the labyrinth and taking their first proper break.
The schedule had worked almost exactly as Ludger intended. That alone improved his mood a little.
The instructors had finally started acting like instructors instead of fools dragged around by a pretty face, and the trainees had been split into rotating parties that advanced in measured order through the upper sections. Each group took turns facing the frost skeletons under supervision, cycling in and out before exhaustion or panic could turn a training run into a mess.
It was clean. Not perfect, but clean enough. At last, Renn, Marie, Bramm, Jorin, and Tali were taking the job seriously.
That helped.
While the larger group took the chance to eat, drink, check gear, and recover, Ludger moved away from them under the excuse of inspecting the surrounding corridor and finally took out the folded paper Darnell had slipped him earlier.
The labyrinth’s cold blue light washed over the page as he opened it. Then his eyebrows twitched. Only once. But sharply.
He stared at the contents for a second longer, expression flattening even further, and then he tossed the paper up into the air.
A tiny fireball flicked from the tip of his finger. It struck the page midair.
The paper curled black instantly, burned through in a brief orange flare, and fell apart into faint ash that scattered over the frozen stone floor before it could leave enough behind to matter.
“Bad news?”
Luna’s voice came from behind him.
Ludger turned around with a fed-up expression already in place, only to ease slightly when he saw her face properly. She was not smirking. Not prying in Viola’s style. Not watching him with Elira’s bright curiosity. She genuinely did not know. That made the conversation easier.
“The defenses in the capital have been increasing,” Ludger said. “And the execution of Gustav and his family has been scheduled for one week from now.”
Luna’s eyes sharpened. At first she only frowned, clearly still processing the pieces separately. Stronger defenses. An execution date. A week.
Then the meaning aligned. Her expression changed. Not dramatically. Just enough. She understood. Ludger, somehow, intended to get involved with that family before they died. Not to save them.
That part was obvious. To question them. To pull whatever knowledge remained out of them before it was erased with their heads. Luna exhaled slowly through her nose.
“I see.”
The words were quiet. But they carried the full weight of understanding.
This was not a border raid. Not a local infiltration. Not the kind of dangerous work where extra hands simply made things stronger. This was the capital, or close enough to its protected orbit to make no practical difference. Tightened defenses, political executions, Armandis’ people likely watching every approach, and possibly royal guards layered over all of it.
A mission like that could collapse from a single unnecessary movement.
Luna looked at him for another moment, then said, “I finally understand why you didn’t want our help.”
Ludger gave a small grunt.
“You’re as sharp as ever,” he said. “Fortunately, you weren’t contaminated by Viola’s nonsense.”
After a beat, he added, “Or Elira’s, for that matter.”
That drew the smallest smile from Luna. A real one. Brief, but there.
“I’ve known you long enough to connect the dots,” she said.
That was true.
Unlike the others, Luna did not need things spelled out in dramatic detail to understand the shape of his decisions. She had seen enough of him by now, enough of how he moved, how he chose, how he went quieter rather than louder when something truly dangerous entered his head.
She could read the spaces between the facts.
Ludger looked back toward the resting trainees in the distance. Voices carried faintly through the corridor. Armor shifted. Someone laughed too loudly and got corrected for it. The ordinary sounds of a training break continued behind them, absurdly normal against the reality now pressing in from beyond the labyrinth walls.
One week. That was not much time. Not for travel. Not for infiltration. Not for identifying the right prison structure, entry point, timing, and exit.
And if the defenses had truly increased since the executions were scheduled, then the margin for error had become even thinner.
Luna followed his gaze for a second before speaking again.
“You were going to use this trip as the cover.”
“Yes.”
“And then leave from here.”
“Yes.”
She nodded once, more to herself than to him. That fit too.
A fake expedition with a real training schedule. Plenty of witnesses. Enough visible movement that his absence could be hidden inside structure instead of explained. The kind of plan that only worked because Ludger had the patience to build a lie that looked exactly like work.
Luna was quiet for a moment.
Then she said, “If it helps, I still think it’s a terrible idea.”
Ludger glanced at her.
“It is.”
That answer came so easily that Luna nearly smiled again.
“But you’re still going.”
“Yes.”
Because of course he was.
Because now, with the execution date fixed, the problem had become even cleaner. Not easier. Never easier. Just cleaner. There was a hard end point now. A moment after which every secret that family held would either be buried properly by the Empire or reduced to whatever lies others found convenient to keep.
Knowledge lost was worse than money lost. He had already said that. He still meant it.