Enslaved by the Crown: The Weakest Slave Has the Strongest Ability

Eldrin stayed beneath the desk.

The footsteps stopped.

For a few seconds, nobody spoke.

Then the man entered the study.

Eldrin could see only his boots through the narrow gap beneath the desk.

They moved toward the drawer.

A hand opened it again.

Nothing.

The man muttered something under his breath.

Another set of footsteps approached.

"Find anything?"

"No."

"Then why are you wasting time in here?"

"I found evidence someone was here."

Silence.

Eldrin held his breath.

The second man stepped into the room.

"How long ago?"

"Minutes."

The first man’s gaze moved across the room.

Eldrin could feel his own heartbeat.

Too loud.

He needed to move.

But the two men were standing between him and the doorway.

His eyes shifted toward the far corner.

A narrow strip of darkness stretched beneath an old cabinet.

Not much.

Enough.

Eldrin reached inward.

The familiar sensation of Shade answered.

He focused on himself rather than the destination.

Veil.

For an instant, the world seemed to soften around him.

Not invisibility.

Something quieter.

His presence simply became harder to notice.

The men continued talking.

Eldrin slowly pushed himself out from beneath the desk.

Neither looked toward him.

He moved one step.

Then another.

The older man turned.

Eldrin froze.

The man’s gaze passed over him.

Stopped.

For a terrifying second, Eldrin thought the Veil had failed.

Then the man looked away.

Eldrin reached the corner.

He slipped into the deeper darkness and let the Veil fade.

A breath escaped him.

Too close.

He waited until the men moved toward the opposite side of the room, then slipped through the doorway.

The corridor was empty.

He moved quickly.

He followed the shadows along the wall until he reached the rear passage he’d used to enter.

Before leaving, he glanced back toward the study.

The men were still searching.

Eldrin stepped into the darkness outside.

The cold air hit his face.

Eldrin slipped away from Westmere before dawn.

He didn’t take the road immediately.

Instead, he circled the property once more, searching for any sign that the courier had passed through the grounds.

The stable was the first place he checked.

Most of the stalls were empty.

Most of it had collapsed, but the old stalls were still standing.

Eldrin looked over them.

Nothing at first.

Then he noticed the ground near the rear gate.

Horse tracks.

He crouched beside them.

For a moment, he simply stared.

Then he remembered the overturned cart near the castle.

The cart.

The horse hadn’t disappeared with it.

The courier must have unharnessed it after the cart was damaged and continued on horseback.

That explained how he could have reached Westmere without leaving an obvious trail on foot.

Eldrin followed the tracks a short distance.

They headed north.

That made him stop.

He remembered the note he’d found inside the house.

I left it where no one from the company would think to search.

At the time, it had seemed like a desperate message.

Now it looked different.

The courier had known someone was following him.

He had left the note deliberately.

A false destination.

Give the people chasing him somewhere to search while he went the other way.

Eldrin looked toward the road disappearing into the darkness.

A faint smile crossed his face.

"Smart."

He didn’t know whether the courier had written it specifically for the people searching the estate or simply expected someone to find it.

Either way, it had worked.

Everyone had been looking in one direction.

The courier had gone in another.

Eldrin glanced back at Westmere.

He had spent too much time searching for the ledger.

The courier was the trail.

And now that trail was heading north.

...

Eldrin followed the northern road.

He kept his pace steady, stopping whenever the trail became difficult to read.

The hoofprints were still visible in the softer ground beside the road. Whoever had ridden through here had not tried particularly hard to hide them.

That bothered him.

A person trying to disappear should know better.

Unless...

Eldrin slowed.

Maybe the courier had stopped caring about the trail.

Maybe he’d decided that getting away quickly mattered more than staying hidden.

The road continued north for several miles before reaching a fork.

One branch followed the river.

The other disappeared into a stretch of woodland.

The hoofprints turned toward the trees.

Eldrin followed.

The path narrowed quickly.

Branches hung low over the road, and the ground became uneven enough that a horse would have to slow down.

Then the tracks vanished.

Eldrin crouched.

He searched the mud.

Nothing.

He looked ahead.

The trees were too dense to see far.

He stood.

Did he dismount?

He searched the surrounding ground.

A few metres away, he found a patch where the grass had been pressed down.

Someone had stopped there.

Beside it lay a discarded piece of cloth.

Eldrin picked it up.

Dark brown.

There was a small stain near one corner.

Blood.

Eldrin’s expression tightened.

The courier had been hurt.

He looked around again.

There was no sign of a struggle.

No broken branches.

No footprints from several people.

Just one set.

The courier had stopped here alone.

Eldrin folded the cloth and put it away.

Then he noticed something else.

A narrow path continued deeper into the woods.

He followed it.

The trail became harder to follow as the trees grew denser.

Eldrin had almost convinced himself that he’d lost it when he noticed a faint smear of blood across a low branch.

He stopped.

There was another farther ahead.

Then another.

Eldrin’s expression tightened.

He’s hurt.

He followed the marks deeper into the woods.

The trail eventually led to a small stone shelter half-hidden beneath the trees.

The door was slightly open.

Eldrin approached carefully.

"Hello?"

No answer.

He pushed the door inward.

Someone was inside.

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