Chapter 4: The Unexpected Knight
The “Grey Market” was a place where the sun seemed to lose its strength, choked out by narrow alleys and the smell of damp stone and desperation. It was the last place anyone expected to see a Duchess, even one who had recently “lost her mind.”
Seraphina wore a heavy hooded cloak, but she couldn’t hide the way she carried herself. She moved through the filth with the focused energy of a woman on a mission—mostly because the smell was making her miss her scented bath salts.
“This is a mistake, My Lady,” Yuna whispered, clutching Seraphina’s sleeve. “We should have brought the family guards.”
“The family guards report to my father,” Seraphina said, her eyes scanning the iron-barred cages of the slave traders. “I need someone who reports only to me. Someone who has nowhere else to go.”
She stopped in front of a cellar entrance guarded by a man with a broken nose and a very large axe.
“I’m looking for the ‘Shadow of the Border,'” Seraphina said, tossing a heavy coin at the guard.
The guard’s eyes widened. He led them down into a damp, torch-lit pit. There, at the very back, chained to a wall with mana-suppressing iron, was a man who looked more like a fallen god than a prisoner.
This was Sir Ixion. In the original novel, he was the fallen prince of a conquered kingdom, turned into a mindless killing machine for the Empire. He was supposed to be “discovered” by the female lead, Eara, whose kindness would heal his broken heart.
Sorry, Eara, Seraphina thought. But I need a meat shield more than you need a tragic romance.
Ixion raised his head. Even through the grime and the matted black hair, his eyes burned with a terrifying, golden intensity. He looked like he wanted to rip her throat out with his teeth.
“How much?” Seraphina asked the slaver.
“For this one? He’s broken, My Lady. Killed three trainers last week. He’s headed for the pits tomorrow.”
“I didn’t ask for his resume. I asked for his price.”
Ten minutes and a staggering amount of gold later, the chains were struck from Ixion’s wrists. He didn’t move. He stayed crouched on the floor, watching Seraphina like a wolf weighing whether to bolt or bite.
“You,” Seraphina said, standing over him. She didn’t offer a hand—she knew he’d probably try to break it. Instead, she threw a clean cloak at his feet. “I have bought your contract. In six months, I will give you your freedom and a ship to the Western Continent. In the meantime, you are my shadow. If anyone tries to kill me, you kill them first. Do we have a deal?”
Ixion’s voice was a low, gravelly rasp. “Why?”
“Because I’m a villainess,” she said, leaning in so only he could hear. “And people tend to try and execute villainesses. I’d prefer to stay alive long enough to see my vineyard produce its first vintage.”
Ixion looked at the cloak, then at the strange woman standing in the dark. She didn’t look at him with pity like the people in the novel were supposed to. She looked at him like a business partner. Like a person.
He stood up, towering over her. The air in the cellar seemed to grow heavy with his presence.
“I don’t care about your wine,” Ixion muttered, his golden eyes narrowing. “But I do care about the freedom. If you lie to me, Duchess, I will kill you myself.”
“Fair enough,” Seraphina chirped, turning on her heel. “Yuna, give him the jerky. He looks like he’s about to faint, and I refuse to carry a six-foot-four knight back to the carriage.”
As they emerged into the twilight, Seraphina felt a strange shiver. She had officially stolen one of the Female Lead’s most powerful allies. The “plot” was no longer just diverging—it was being rewritten in her image.
“Now,” she said, looking at her new, brooding bodyguard. “Let’s go home. We have to prepare for the ‘accidental’ meeting with the Crown Prince tomorrow. I need to make sure he’s sufficiently annoyed so he doesn’t try to visit me again.”
But as she glanced at Ixion, she noticed him watching her with a look that wasn’t quite hatred anymore. It was curiosity. And in a romance novel, curiosity was the most dangerous emotion of all.
