“The first order of business is to move the Lady swiftly to another location,” one of the guards said. His name was Sturell, and the other, his brother, was Heltrell. They were descendants of the missing guild leader.

One of the Feydak, Peckin, scolded the idea. She reminded them how fragile the Lady’s condition was. Moving her discreetly through the busy city streets would not only be nearly impossible but could also jeopardize the entire operation, including the lives of both mother and child.

The brothers conferred privately, formulating a plan. They knew better than to relay a message that could be intercepted by other search parties, so they concluded to let the operation play out until the child was born. Only then would they retrieve both mother and child.

Their whispered plans did not escape the notice of Mascious, who sat in the shadowed rear corner of the room. The moonlight barely reached him. He could hardly bring himself to face his Lady now, having failed her so completely. He couldn’t even bear to look at her.

It wasn’t that he feared judgment in her eyes. On the contrary, he knew she would forgive him—or perhaps already had. Her amber eyes would tell him without words, It was not your fault.

But at that moment, Mascious couldn’t bear her forgiveness. Least of all from her. He had sworn an oath as a soldier, vowing to protect her from the time he was a child. He had failed time and again. And this time, he regretted not holding her back when she accepted the offer of communion.

His past would haunt him again.

Mascious had spent most of his years as Lady Varessi’s retainer, walking a fine line. On one hand, he was responsible for ensuring the Lady was upstanding and presentable, should she catch a suitor’s eye. On the other, he was committed to Lady Varessi’s desire to live freely, not like a caged bird.

His ability to navigate this delicate balance largely depended on his control over the Island of Serrit. The Severidt family might have been custodians of the Island, but in recent times, it was in name only. Even when the Island thrived due to its fishing industry, the Severidts profited very little.

Mascious always found it odd, and in investigating the family’s history, he discovered why. Three generations ago, Lord Fastenen Severidt had sought to ally himself more with the Hayazaki Empire and its practices, rather than the ancient, local fishing traditions of the Island.

He did so to elevate his house in the eyes of other families and possibly secure connections with more powerful ones. He didn’t want the Severidts to be seen as backward.

So, the annual fishing games, which had brought the family a hefty profit, suddenly ended—but not completely. The family merely washed their hands of the practice, leaving it to the Island’s residents. The Fisher Guild branch, which had once hosted the event alongside the family, continued the tradition on its own.

The taxes Lord Fastenen had once levied on the sale of exotic fish—a tax popular among the Island’s residents, as it exempted regular fishers—were abruptly stopped. Exotic fishing continued, but the guild collected the fees, untaxed. Lastly, the Severidt house’s fisher, who had acted as a liaison between the guild, the family, the regular fishers, and House Myrrar, was expelled.

Mascious could only shake his head in disbelief. Under Lord Fastenen, the family distanced itself from its most profitable source of income to appear more regal and aligned with the empire. Yet, the lord made a crucial mistake: he didn’t ban fishing, as House Myrrar would later do; he simply distanced the family from it.

In doing so, he effectively handed over authority of fishing affairs to the guild, which then began dealing directly with House Myrrar. House Severidt, once the intermediary between the major house and the rich industry, was ultimately removed.

At first, Mascious was quietly enraged. Even though he cared little for the old customs, he saw their profitability. But as he delved deeper into the family’s history, a clearer picture emerged, and he began to pity the Lord.

Smaller families, who clung to pre-imperial customs, were judiciously discriminated against. The Severidts could likely trace their ancestry to one of the families that served the Purple Kings who once ruled the region, which naturally aroused suspicion.

Aware that these customs were difficult to abandon, Lord Fastenen likely wanted to walk the fine line between the old and the new. He wanted his family to appear uninvolved in ancient practices and more civilized, to improve their prospects among their peers while leaving the Island free to partake in its traditions.

He wanted to please everyone and win.

He was likely encouraged by the major houses. Mascious could only imagine the pressure. But in the end, it led only to House Myrrar and the guild profiting directly from the traditional practices. Over time, the family became poorer, increasingly reliant on the guild and the Myrrars. Ironically, the cultural renewal Lord Fastenen envisioned did eventually sweep over the Island, but it was too late—the Severidts had declined greatly in the intervening centuries. Their only respite in over three hundred years for this costly mistake was the promised wardship of Lady Varessi’s unborn nephew within their custodianship.

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What would be his Lady’s fate, Mascious wondered. The wealthiest water guild merchants had sent proposals for her hand many times, as had House Myrrar, thanks in no small part to Mascious’s stewardship.

He had turned the young lady into someone highly coveted. Whispers spoke of her stoic and reserved beauty. Hands reached out to claim her, to take her into their strongholds.

And yet, she was always hard to pin down, despite the advances that bombarded her daily like needle projectiles. She was to others as she was to Mascious in those early years at the manor—always fleeting. And this made people want her all the more.

To safeguard her independence, Mascious devised a plan. He secretly borrowed money from the Hastidous-Bright Exchange, a merchant exchange owned by a branch house of the Fullbright family, bypassing the local exchange owned by the fishing guild, which frowned upon such actions.

With this money, he acquired a small treasure of marked needles, which he used to hire rogue hunters. He sent these hunters beyond the enclosure to capture exotic beasts, which were then sold in forbidden markets across Aquillora and to collectors and enthusiasts.

This was a practice the fishing guild had already engaged in, hiring their own hunters to capture exotics beyond the enclosure zone where it was legal.

Now, Mascious, with full control of the Severidt finances, was doing the same. He had pulled the family back into the fishing world through a dangerous underpass, all in the name of his Lady’s independence.

In time, the Severidt household began to accumulate wealth once more. Mascious used the profits to re-establish patronage networks, build new shops, and hire more staff for the manor. Suddenly, the Severidt household, which had once seemed like a mausoleum, was full of life. Even better, his Lady was happy.

Mascious vowed to correct Lord Fastenen’s mistake and restore the Severidt house to its former prestige. But some mistakes can’t be corrected. Sometimes they even repeat themselves.

Mascious would make a foolish mistake. This mistake had nothing to do with the fate of the Severidt household—that was doomed from the start. This was a more personal mistake, one that revealed the fatal flaw in Mascious’s character.

He made the mistake while seated in the leather-bound chair of the last Severidt head, poring over the family’s documents. He had just seen a client who demanded a favor and signed off on the construction of a new shop. He had also summoned the Fullbright family to send an engineer to his house.

The chair felt comfortable, as if its leather was sewn to fit him perfectly. As he leaned back, reclining in the chair, his eyes fell upon a portrait of the first Severidt household.

The picture was old, torn at the edges. In it, the patriarch stood with his wife, their children playfully posed in front of them. To their side were people dressed in the attire of Forgers and Feydaks.

One more person stood at the edge of the picture, his face obscured by a tear in the painting. He appeared slightly older than the children, and judging by his dress, he was likely a fisher.

Mascious had always found that painting fascinating, a personal mystery. At the time it was made, the fishing culture wasn’t refined enough to require such attire. Fishers were more like cultural reenactors, re-imagining rituals from a different age when the waters were heavily contaminated.

Whoever that boy was, he was wearing southern attire long before it was fashionable. Mascious was something of a nerd when it came to the region’s history, so he knew a few things.

He stared intensely at the painting, pondering the mystery. He had his theories—he probably already solved it but pretended he hadn’t because of his peculiar nature.

He was still gazing at the painting, lost in thought, when Lady Varessi passed through the hallway outside his office. He lowered his head as he felt her presence. Their eyes met. She turned briefly, giving him that curt, teasing wave and smile reserved only for him, and he smiled and waved back.

This little custom emerged when Varessi would tease him about using her father’s office. She would accuse him of planning to take over the family since he was a child.

He would turn red, vehemently denying the accusation, protesting about how much it insulted his honor.

He would be out of breath, and she would laugh. But one time, with a voice as soft as a whisper, she told him, “If it’s you, I wouldn’t mind. If you took over everything, I don’t think I would hate it.”

He decided not to think much of it when he first heard it, but every time he sat in that chair, expanding the Severidt name’s power and using it to command authority, the thought crept in.

What if I took on the name he wondered. And then wedded myself to her. Mascious had always looked down on those who fell madly in love with Varessi at first sight. He always insisted to his friends, when they teased him, that his relationship with the Lady was purely one of service and, often, paternal protection.

But he knew himself better than anyone else. He knew he had fallen madly for her that evening when the light broke through the windows and settled on her like a royal regalia.

Mascious didn’t care about the family’s name or power; he cared only for Lady Varessi. And if securing the family’s name and power was the only way to be with her, he would do it.

Dangerous thoughts that left his mind as quickly as they came. But perhaps that was his biggest mistake.

All good things come to an end, though. House Myrrar and the Fishing Guild caught wind of the Severidts’ recent fortunes and colluded to obstruct them. The rogues Mascious had hired to capture exotic fish refused his requests. The patronage network he built turned against them. The house was levied a hefty fine for borrowing money from a foreign institution by the Fishing Guild, and they were sanctioned by House Myrrar for profiting from the now-illegal exotic fishing trade.

His attempts to unbind the family from external pressures, to exert and reinforce their power, had only made them weaker and more reliant on those same external forces. The Severidt family’s hand was weaker now than ever, and it was only a matter of time before someone sank their claws into what remained of the family—especially Varessi.

Those were dark days, with the impending sense of doom growing closer. Then one day, Lady Varessi entered the office where Mascious brooded.

“I have received an offer of communion,” she said.

“From whom?” he asked.

“Lord Koleson Whydit,” she answered.