Evening settled over Berakamon in a humid weight.
The street noise outside the shuttered window softened into the lower murmur of night fires and distant fights that never quite stopped.
Kane had barely finished setting Mjoldr within reach of the bed when Kessa and Griselda exchanged a look he already understood.
They knew the pattern by now.
A new city. A new set of eyes already watching. Someone would come.
Kessa stretched, striped tail flicking.
"We’re getting food. Real food. Not whatever that half-sheep would try to charge us extra for."
Griselda nodded and followed her out. The door closed behind them with a click. Their footsteps faded down the narrow corridor and then the stairs.
Kane was alone for less than ten minutes.
The knock came once, firm, deliberate, not the tentative sound of a servant or a curious beastkin.
He opened the door.
Marisa stood there.
She was the same height as him. That alone registered as unusual. Almost no woman in any empire had matched him eye-to-eye without effort.
Long black hair fell past her waist in a thick, unbroken curtain. Amber eyes met his without flinching. The simple dark robe she wore did nothing to hide the clean lines of her body, full breasts, a narrow waist that flared into hips built for more than walking, long legs that the robe only half-concealed.
She wasn’t the exaggerated, heavy beauty common among many beastkin women. She was sharper. More precise. The kind of pretty that felt deliberate, as if every feature had been chosen to pull the eye and hold it.
"Barbarian," she whispered.
Kane leaned one shoulder against the doorframe.
"You must be the sister."
Marisa didn’t wait for an invitation or a greeting. She stepped past him into the room, the scent of night-blooming forest and clean skin following her.
Once inside, she reached up, unfastened the robe, and let it slide from her shoulders in one smooth motion. It pooled at her feet.
Underneath, she wore almost nothing, a thin, dark wrap that sat low on her hips and a matching band that barely contained her breasts.
The rest of her was bare: smooth skin the color of warm sand, faint darker markings along her collarbones and the outer curves of her hips, the long line of her stomach, the soft shadow between her thighs.
She was incredibly pretty. Her features stood out against everything Kane had seen in this empire, refined rather than raw, elegant rather than brutal. Her eyes had their own gravity, the kind that made looking away feel like surrender.
Marisa walked to the wide bed, sat on the edge, and crossed one long leg over the other.
The wrap shifted. Kane’s gaze tracked the movement once before returning to her face.
"You’ve taken over Menual," she said.
"And so you know."
"I can read things about you. Things like how you won the tournament. How you fought the mountain serpent. How you walked into an empire of women and left with their cooperation and a portion of their warriors."
Kane closed the door and leaned back against the wall opposite her, arms loosely crossed.
"So? Did you fall in love with me?"
Marisa’s expression did not change.
She simply watched him, amber eyes steady, as if the question had been expected and dismissed in the same breath.
"I can’t find your origin," she continued.
"What were you doing before all this? Which tribe did you come from? How does a mere barbarian go toe to toe against beasts and now stand here, in an enemy empire, alone with the emperor’s sister?"
"Why are you interested in that?"
"Naturally. Things I don’t understand make me restless."
Kane studied her for a moment. The way she sat, unafraid, nearly naked, completely in control of the space, told him more than her words.
This was not a seduction attempt in the usual sense. It was a test conducted with skin and silence as much as with questions.
"So you know why we are here?" he asked.
"Yes. And I’m afraid it can’t happen."
"The meeting?"
"The unification."
Marisa’s voice stayed even, almost soft.
"The last person who wanted this empire handed over was Grathak himself, years ago, when he first took the throne. He tested the idea. He discarded it. His pride would never allow him to stand as one voice among many."
Kane tilted his head against the wall.
"He can still lead. All I’m asking is that he take a side."
"And his pride would never allow it."
Silence stretched between them for a few heartbeats.
The muffled sounds of the street filtered through the shutters. Marisa did not reach for her discarded robe. She simply sat there, amber eyes on him, the thin wrap and band doing more to emphasize than to conceal.
Kane spoke again.
"Then why did you let me in?"
Marisa looked up at him fully. The pull in her eyes sharpened.
"My brother is a tyrant."
"I heard."
"I want you to kill him."
The words landed without raised voice or dramatic pause.
She stated them the same way she might have commented on the weather.
Kane didn’t move from the wall.
He let the request settle in the room between them, measuring the woman who had walked in, stripped without ceremony, and asked a stranger to murder the emperor of the Beastworld.
Marisa continued, still seated, still calm.
"He keeps the packs loyal by feeding their worst instincts. He gives them freedom to raid, to take, to break whatever crosses their borders. It works. It has worked for decades. But it also means this empire will never stand with the others when the sky breaks. He will watch the rest of the continent burn and call it proof that only the strong deserve to remain. I have seen what comes after that. I have seen the breeding grounds expand until there is nothing left that is not chained or broken. I have seen the guardian wake fully and decide that even Grathak is no longer necessary."
She shifted on the bed, the wrap sliding a fraction higher on one thigh.
The movement was not accidental. Kane noticed.
She noticed him noticing. Neither of them commented.
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