Dawn Walker

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The maid swallowed once and delivered the report as cleanly as she could. "One of Dawn House’s supply wagons was destroyed before dawn on the western line. The axle was shattered, and the cargo was burned."

Mira’s face changed immediately.

There was no fear in it.

Only work.

That pleased Sekhmet.

Elena added, already shifting her direction toward the strategy room as if the next reports would naturally follow there, "There is more."

Another maid appeared from the opposite hall, moving with just enough speed to show urgency without losing control. "One of the storage rooms for the Dawn shop caught fire just before sunrise. It was contained, but not before damage."

A third runner arrived almost on top of the second, breathless and pale from the effort of carrying bad news quickly. "A contract worker hired recently has gone missing. He did not report for shift. His sleeping room was empty before dawn."

Mira spoke before anyone else.

"Name."

The maid gave it to her.

Mira’s eyes narrowed at once. "He had debt."

That was interesting.

Bat Bat, who had spent the walk home behaving as though the hunt had been an adventurous lesson successfully completed, stopped smiling entirely.

Then Elena gave the final piece.

"Rumors are already moving," she said. "That Dawn House is cursed. That our business is unstable. That workers should leave before worse comes."

There it was.

Stage one.

Territory break.

Iron House had moved.

Sekhmet’s expression did not change, and neither did Mira’s. She stepped forward half a pace and said, "The missing worker had gambling debt from before I bought the contract."

She caught herself almost immediately and corrected the phrasing with no wasted embarrassment.

"From before I bought the contract. He was likely bought again. Or taken."

Sekhmet looked at her. "Fix the panic."

"Yes," Mira answered at once.

She turned and began giving orders before Elena could fully redirect the room, which was exactly the right instinct.

"Get me the merchant list from western line three, the damaged wagon inventory, and every new worker contract from the last seven days," she said. Her voice sharpened as it went on. "No one repeats the curse rumor inside this house unless they want to be thrown out with it."

The maids moved instantly.

Mira kept going.

"Send word to every worker that today’s payment schedule remains unchanged. No one leaves because of gossip before money." She looked toward Elena. "I need one message runner and two clerks."

"You will have them," Elena said.

Mira was already turning toward the study hall by then, and that, perhaps more than anything else in the morning so far, pleased Sekhmet. She understood where stage one truly began. Not on the broken road. Not in the burned storage room. In the minds of workers and merchants deciding whether Dawn House still looked safe enough to stand beside.

Raka’s reply came not much later through a lower-channel message stone.

He had already sent men searching.

That was better.

The bats spread too.

Dozens of them, small dark-winged watchers, pushed outward across rooftops, alleys, and western roads under Sekhmet’s order. They were not strong enough to turn a real fight, and they did not need to be. Eyes mattered first. Eyes always mattered first.

Bat Bat, unfortunately, decided that this was the proper moment to help morale.

It was not.

She flew halfway into the worker yard, where frightened contract laborers were murmuring over the wagon news, and announced at full volume, "Being cursed is still better than being poor."

The first group stared at her as if the curse had just learned sarcasm.

The second group, mostly lower workers who had in fact been poor their entire lives, actually laughed.

One woman with flour on her sleeves snorted so hard she nearly dropped her basket.

Another man muttered, "She is not wrong."

Elena pinched the bridge of her nose with visible control while Bat Bat, encouraged by accidental success, prepared to continue.

Sekhmet cut it off with a single line.

"Enough."

Bat Bat landed with a look of spiritual injury. "I was helping."

"You helped half."

"That is still half more than most speeches do."

Annoyingly, that was true.

By midday, Raka’s men caught the first small sabotage team alive.

There were three of them.

Iron House runners, not elite, but bought hands with enough coordination to matter. One had pitch burns on his sleeves from the storage room fire. Another had western road mud still dried into his boots. The third had a merchant token cut in half and hidden in his belt lining.

They were dragged into Dawn House through a side line, bruised, bleeding, and no longer confident in their employment choices.

Sekhmet looked at them once in the lower holding room.

One tried to speak.

He did not let him.

"Take them to the Void Land," he said. "I will open the gate for you."

The order landed cold and clean.

The three saboteurs went pale almost immediately. They did not know what the Void Land was.

They only knew from the tone that nothing waiting for them there would resemble rescue.

"Take them alive," he added. "They are food."

That word meant more to his people now than it had a month ago. Raka’s line understood it. The house understood it. Even Bat Bat, who still misused seriousness whenever possible, went quiet at the way it changed the room.

The three saboteurs were dragged away.

Stage one had begun.

And Dawn House had answered the first sabotage with movement, blood, and hunger.

(Author Note: Dear readers, only 24 hours are left for the Double Golden Ticket event. If you are enjoying the story and want to support Sekhmet’s journey, please send your Golden Tickets now.

Your support will help this book a lot, especially during this important time.

Every Golden Ticket matters, and each one gives the story a better chance to grow stronger.

Thank you so much to everyone who has been reading, supporting, and staying with me.)