Catherine disentangled herself from Valerius's dead weight with the fluid silence of a molting snake. Dawn was filtering through the heavy velvet curtains, casting pale light on the chaos of parchments and clothes strewn across the study floor.
For Valerius, it was the scene of a triumphant night of conquest. For Catherine, it was the battlefield where she had just won a decisive victory.
She felt neither sullied nor triumphant in the conventional sense. She felt like a craftsman after a long night's work. Her body was an instrument she had used with expert precision, and the information she had extracted was the resulting raw masterpiece. The Rook.
The name turned in her mind, no longer as simple information, but as a new pole star, a new center of gravity for her ambitions.
She found a silk dressing gown, discarded on an armchair, and slipped it on. Instead of going back to bed, she sat by the dying fire, stoking the embers.
She watched the flames dance, her mind organizing the fragments of images stolen from Valerius's mind.
When he awoke an hour later, the first thing he saw was his new acquisition, not asleep and submissive in his bed, but awake, pensive, wreathed in the glow of the fire like a priestess before her altar.
"I awaken, and you are already at your work, my Oracle," he said, his voice thick with sleep and satisfaction. He approached her, naked and shameless, to kiss her. "You are mine, now. You know that, don't you?"
Catherine did not shrink from his kiss, but she did not return it either. She simply placed a hand on his chest. "We are bound, Magistrate," she replied, her voice still a whisper. "Not through possession, but through destiny. Our ambitions are now two rivers flowing into the same sea."
This answer flattered him more than any declaration of submission. He had not just taken her; he had merged with a mystical being. He felt even more powerful.
"Well said," he rumbled. "And what does destiny tell you this morning?"
"It tells me that the foundations are more important than the facade," she said, rising and beginning to pace the room. "We now know the true threat. But knowledge alone is a sword without a hilt. Tell me, Magistrate, you who know the bowels of this city… Who are the men that even the powerful, like yourself, fear? Whose names are only spoken in whispers in the halls of power?"
Valerius's ego, stimulated by his admiration and his desire to impress her further, drove him to boast. He felt safe, initiating his new confidante into the deepest secrets.
"There are shadows in every city, my Oracle," he began as he dressed. "Underworld kings, guild masters who operate in darkness. Most are rabid dogs, kept in check with gold and fear. But there is one… He is not named. He is called by his emblem. The Rook. He controls the docks, the unions, a large portion of the smuggling… It is said he can make a noble fall or elect a magistrate with a single word. No one knows what he looks like. He is a ghost, a foundation of the city that no one wants to see crumble."
Catherine listened, her impassive face hiding the thrill of confirmation. She had seen the face of this ghost.
She knew now that she could not act alone, nor solely with Valerius. She needed her other pawn. She needed Mathieu. But she was a prisoner in this luxurious cage.
She turned to Valerius, her expression growing serious. "The threads of destiny we must untangle… some lead to the Scriptorium. I have an instrument there, a man sensitive to the echoes of knowledge. For our plans to succeed, to protect you from this… Rook… I must transmit new instructions to him."
Valerius frowned, a flicker of possessive jealousy in his eyes. "An instrument? That runt of a clerk?"
"An insignificant cog can derail a great machine if placed correctly," she answered calmly. "Let me send him a message. A single image. He will understand. It is essential for your safety."
The mention of his own safety, combined with his desire to keep her happy and "functional," won out over his mistrust.
He relented.
He summoned one of his most trusted servants, a hard-faced man named Gregor.
On a piece of blank parchment, Catherine drew no words. She sketched a single symbol with a piece of charcoal from the hearth. The image of a chess tower. The Rook.
She folded the paper and handed it to Gregor. "For Mathieu, at the Scriptorium.
Give him this. Do not wait for a reply."
From the high window of Valerius's study, she watched the servant cross the courtyard and disappear into the city streets.
She was locked in a luxurious suite, a prison of velvet and gold, yet she had just given an order that would be carried out on the other side of the city.
She was no longer a prisoner. She was a general commanding from her headquarters. And she had just moved her first soldier on this new chessboard.