Dawn Walker

—

Kess said, “Maybe I can sit with the driver.”

It was a reasonable compromise. Humiliating enough already, but manageable.

Elena, perhaps because she understood logistics better than pride, said, “That is a good option, Young Master.”

Sekhmet did not even look at her.

“No.”

One flat word.

Elena’s mouth closed at once.

That in itself taught Kess something. When Sekhmet had decided on a shape for a humiliation, even Elena did not spend energy trying to soften it.

Kess clenched his teeth hard enough that the muscles at his jaw showed. “As you wish.”

Bat Bat, of course, leaned out farther and looked at him with frank interest. “Can you run all the way without dying? This is an educational question.”

Kess did not answer her because he had no wish to be arrested by fate for strangling an important woman of Sekhmet, on a public road before reaching the heir’s camp.

The order of the carriage filled itself quickly after that.

The three rank-three maids entered first, one at each side and one toward the back, forming the kind of elegant internal arrangement that looked accidental from the outside and became murder the moment the door shut.

Elena entered next and took the central side seat with the natural authority of someone who did not ask where the safest place was because the safest place moved with her.

Bat Bat climbed in last before Sekhmet, looked around the interior with immediate delight, and said, “This is nicer than being told to stay home.”

No one answered her.

Sekhmet entered last and took the position nearest the window.

The carriage door shut.

From where Kess stood, the act felt uncomfortably final, as though the world had just decided which people were sheltered and which one was expected to prove usefulness with his feet.

Then the window slid open.

Sekhmet looked out at him.

“Start Running.”

That was all.

Kess bowed once, because there was no dignity left in refusing what could not be refused, and began moving.

The carriage followed.

At first the rhythm of it was almost worse than if they had simply driven ahead. He could hear the wheels behind him. The horses. The muted shift of wood and leather. The constant, patient reminder that he was being measured in the open while those inside sat under comfort and cloth and the right to arrive at the camp looking composed.

Good, he thought bitterly. Let Mihos see that too. Let the heir decide whether the insult to his servant mattered more than the fact that lower Dawn had come on its own terms.

They moved through Slik City toward the western side.

The roads changed as they went.

The inner district’s cleaner lanes gave way to broader trade routes. The western merchant road was one of the city’s great veins, a place through which products came in from beyond the walls in steady streams. Even now, at night, it still carried movement. Late caravans. Guards. Teamsters cursing under their breath. Covered wagons creaking beneath imported cloth, ores, beasts, preserved food, herbs, timber, and luxuries too expensive for sunlight. Slik’s wealth fed through that road the way blood fed through an artery.

The farther west they went, the busier the night became rather than quieter.

That had always been the nature of merchant roads. Trade did not sleep simply because the sky darkened. It merely changed shifts.

Kess ran on.

He was not weak, but he was also not some absurd beastkin courier built only for speed. The first half of the journey he managed with dignity. The second forced sweat down his back. By the time the city walls rose nearer and the westward traffic thinned into guarded spacing and open road beyond the gate, he could feel the carriage’s insult in his lungs.

The western gate watch let them pass with minimal obstruction. Dawn insignia, carriage quality, and the simple force of well-dressed confidence tended to solve such things faster than argument.

Beyond the walls, the world opened.

The merchant road stretched westward in long packed lines of stone and earth, wide enough for serious trade flow. Even at night it held wagon scars and old wheel prints. Lantern posts marked sections of the route where wealth had demanded safer movement. Smaller camps, temporary beast enclosures, and roadside trade shelters dotted the outskirts. Men with money liked to meet where roads fed them options.

And Mihos had chosen precisely that kind of place.

About an hour into the run, Kess finally slowed enough to come level with the carriage window as the road bent through one wider merchant stretch. His breath was harder now, but not wild. He had too much training for that. Still, the effort showed.

Sekhmet opened the window slightly farther and looked at him.

Kess said, between controlled breaths, “The camp is ahead. Outside the western traffic line. It sits beside the main merchant road, not far from where incoming product trains split toward the city compounds.”

Sekhmet let him continue.

“From the road, it appears modest. That is false. It is space-type. Much larger inside.”

“I know. You already told me about that.”

That answer unsettled Kess more than he liked. Of course he knew. Why would he not know? He already told him. Because of the humiliation and the way Mihos Dawn would react made his mind foggy.

Kess focused and told him something new because the practical details still mattered. “There are some beasts outside. Don’t provoke them. Guards in layers. The outer sentries rotate in arcs, not lines. The mounted ones matter more than the lantern men.”

He hesitated and then added the thing most likely to save lives if anyone on either side began acting on pride. “Master Mihos dislikes visible disrespect. You will be angry about me running all the way.”

Bat Bat’s voice floated faintly from somewhere inside the carriage. “That sounds like weakness disguised as pride.”

Kess nearly stumbled.

Sekhmet did not react beyond saying, “You are proving my concerns correct. Bat Bat you said you won’t talk much.”

Bat Bat made a tiny offended sound. “I am whispering.”

No, Kess thought, you are not.

The carriage moved on.

Inside, Bat Bat had pressed herself toward the opposite window and was peering out at everything with the fervent curiosity of someone who believed the world improved by being observed by her personally. Elena sat still as stone. The three fan-girl maids held their positions, their faces calm and their attention moving in tiny invisible patterns between road, shadows, distant beasts, and the servant running ahead.

“Is he going to survive all the way there,” Bat Bat asked.

One maid answered before Elena had to. “Yes.”

“How do you know?”