He couldn’t remember how he ended up here, standing over a ledge, watching Lord Gern Jorbert tumbled end over end as he fell to the Flatlands below. He remembered being on the King’s hoverstone, remembered watching the wedding ceremony. And now?

He looked around. He was standing on the Jorbert Horverstone. There was the castle, not far off, sitting squat in the center of the blood forrest. But where was he? Well, there were grave markers all around him. It was Redforest Castles graveyard. And he was standing next to the entrance to the Jorbert Crypt.

He held a knife in his hand.

It was slicked with blood.

He dropped it. Leaned over the edge of the hoverstone and watched the Lord, turning into nothing more than a black speck. He would hit the Flatlands and his body would be obliterated and all evidence of Syrio’s crime would go with him. His eyes fell to the knife. He swung his foot out and kicked it over the ledge, too. Now there was no one who’d ever know.

Including, it seemed, himself, as he couldn’t grasp how any of this had come to be. He had left the King’s Hoverstone--very unlike him--and had stalked Gern Jorbert to the grave yard? How could this be? He closed his eyes and thought hard. There was a lot of murk in his mind, fouls notions and thoughts and feelings he had to clear away. But when he did, the memory occurred to him: he had been just about to talk to Khara, the woman from Frostfight Castle, the woman who could do magic, and she had leaned in instead, and whispered....

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

What?

He couldn’t remember. But she’d said something into his ear. Then his world went blank.

He glanced furtively around. There was no one else in the grave yard. Not even the Lord’s guards were present. But that wasn’t surprising. The Lord was was visiting Lizzel Jorber’ts tomb. It was next the to crypt (only Lords were buried in the crypt). The pale visage of the Lords former wife stared out blindly at him, an accusing look on its face. You! You did this! Yet, how could she know who when she look on him with eyes that did not see. She’s not real, Syrio thought. Was he going mad?

Lizzel Jorbert.

Lilian Jorbert.

The man had replaced one with the other. And he was out here apologizing, asking for the forgiveness of a dead girl, having just taking a new girl into his bed. Syrio saw honor in that.

He needed to get out of here, however. Before the Lord’s guards did come, before they started to ask questions. He wondered if he’d taken his own ship to the hoverstone, or if he’d somehow come along with the Jorberts--Fates, he hoped not. He would have to explain his absence and....

It was best that he disappear back to the King’s hoverstone and hunker down a while. There was no telling what was about to happen; Lance Jorbert would presume his father dead after a while and take the Lordship for himself. He’d have to write to Miro. To see what else had been going on. Why did Hoverstone politics have to be so messy? And how on earth was anyone going to resist Khara, if her magic made it so that men killed one another against their will?