I frowned, looking at the litter of yipping Wolfdog puppies stuffed into a basket. I was outside of Cintra’s castle, having just purchased the creatures, and I could already tell that they would be more trouble than I had expected.

  Though my experimentation with the Double Cross had yet to bear fruit, my hypothesis required dogs as loyal and as well trained as possible, which meant puppies. Puppies and years of caring for them.

  I had already pestered the royal kennelmaster for information on training and raising dogs, as well as his help, but for this to work I’d have to spend a significant amount of time with the dogs myself.

  Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad? I reached my hand inside to pet one, but before I could reach it, the dog pup turned around and licked my hand.

  I grimaced. Saliva was not something I liked covering my hands. What if I had to shake hands with someone?

  “Moigh,” I created a bit of water, quickly washing my hands, before I left the alley I had been in, entering the streets proper, four royal guards forming around me. All wore plate, though their arms consisted of swords and shields instead of their usual halberds, as they were on bodyguard duty.

  Even with my meatshields, I didn’t like being in the city. Sorceresses were ultimately glass cannons. I had absolute confidence in defeating any mooks smuggled into Cintra in a fair fight, but no one sane fought mages fairly, not unless they possessed magic of their own.

  Not even then, in my humble opinion. You’d have to be insane to give your opponent in a life or death fight any sort of advantage. I could only hope that any would-be assassins would have had their minds rotted away by ‘chivalry’ and other such nonsense.

  I’d very much liked to have congratulated the noble who made it up. Chivalry heavily discouraged tactics that a commoner might actually successfully use to fight against the aristocracy, like assassinations and guerrilla warfare, while encouraging ‘fair’ fights where a plate-armoured noble trained in the art of battle from before he could walk would dominate any number of peasants. A rather ingenius way of culturally securing the power of the aristocracy.

  It was just a shame that most of the contemporary nobility fully bought into it. I could already imagine the headaches this would cause in a war.

  As we walked, one of the puppies barked.

  I turned my head.

  A bowstring twanged, the sound near impossible to hear in the ruckus of the city.

  An explosion of force erupted from me, throwing my guards to the ground along with many of the passers-by.

  I didn’t see what happened to the arrow, but the fact I was alive indicated that it had been successfully deflected from my back.

  I finished casting Vaeltha as I turned, my lips already moving to get Adda invaerne going.

  The shield shimmered into existence, a bolt impacting it right after.

  Mentally, I breathed a sigh of relief. This would have been extremely embarrassing if I had mistaken the sound for something else.

  Screams started erupting around me as I locked eyes with my assailant. A lightly armoured person hiding behind a chimney, a crossbow in their hands and a scarf over their face.

  “Protect the Lady!” The leader of my guards shouted as they all regained their footing.

  I narrowed my eyes, my slowed perception letting me evaluate my assailant and their position.

  There was panic in their movements.I quickly understood why.

  Whoever it was hadn’t thought this attack through. The street was enveloped by connected houses from both sides, the assassin sitting on one of them on my left. This meant that they only had two directions to run, one of which would lead them closer to me.

  Obviously, the assassin would want to descend onto the adjacent street, but doing so safely would take time. Enough for me to catch up, certainly. I might not be able to fly, but boosting myself up on a roof? Easily done.

  I thrust the basket into the hands of one of my guards, “Bring reinforcements. The rest, with me!”

  The guards froze, but the leader, Roderic, quickly brought them out of it, “You heard the Lady! Go!”

  Unfortunately, that seemed to do it for the assassin too, making them break into a run.

  “Aespar aedd gynvael,” I broke into a jog, my hands moving incessantly while the remaining three guards kept pace.

  Shards of ice shot after the assassin, spread out nicely along their likely path.

  Unfortunately, my enemy noticed at the last moment, evading one, then smashing another with their crossbow, before skidding to a halt to let the staggered volley in front of them pass.

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  A smile worked its way onto my face.

  I loved incompetent enemies.

  “Treise gaeth,” I incanted, causing a very strong gust of wind to blow up from beneath me as I neared the house. Then I jumped, much to the consternation of my guards, if their shouts were any indication.

  The wind gave me enough of a boost to reach the roof, only twenty or so meters away from the assassin. A cursory glance assured me of my judgement. There was no one else, no other ambush. The thought of an enemy mage flitted through my mind, before being summarily dismissed. There would have been a hundred better ways of going after me had they a spellcaster.

  I grinned at his, and I was now certain it was a he, dismayed look. Well within range.

  “Dhu muire,” I whispered, a tendril of dark liquid coming into existence behind the man.

  The assassin barely had time to react before the tendril grabbed him by the neck, lifting him up.

  I leisurely walked over while he was getting choked out, though my eyes searched for additional enemies.

  Seeing no one, I shook my head in contempt. What an amateur.

  His thrashing stopped once I neared, so I had the tendril lay the unconscious body on the roof, before touching his forehead, “Voe'rle holl,” I incanted the paralysis spell.

  Being both short-ranged and with a varying level of effectiveness depending on the target, the spell was not terribly useful in battle, but it was perfect for securing prisoners.

  Then I recast Adda invaerne just in case, before floating myself and the prisoner down to the street and my disheveled-looking guards. I gave them a smile to reassure them of my safety.

  “Here,” I chucked the body at one of the guards, “We are retreating to the castle.”

  They didn’t argue.

  On the way, we met my fourth guard with a much larger contingent of soldiers. Half of them reinforced my guard detail, while the rest marched on into the city.

  I doubted they’d find anything useful, but there was no harm in trying. The assassin had been amateurish enough that it might just bear fruit.

  We caused a bit of a commotion near the castle, but I reached my tower without further trouble.

  “Give him back,” I ordered the guard, pointing at the unconscious assassin slung over his back.

  “My Lady, we will take care of things from here, it is-” Roderic began.

  “I have no doubt in your abilities, Captain,” I cut him off, “However, in this instance, I possess certain unique capabilities that will speed things along. As it was my life that was targeted, I deserve a say, no?”

  That was bullshit, obviously. Being the target should disqualify me from the investigation utterly, but Cintran law was not advanced enough for concepts like that. I was not above making use of that for my own ends.

  Roderic thought my words over for a few seconds, before conceding.

  I hauled my catch into the biggest room on the ground floor, the one with the rats, before debating how to restrain him.

  Eventually, I just decided to mould restraints out of the walls. I stood the man up, placed his back to the wall, then lifted one of his hands to the wall near his head, before having the stone flow over it. Then I repeated the process with his other limbs, before stepping back to admire my work.

  The restraints were solid. The earth manipulation made the scene look somewhat grotesque, as if the wall had decided to consume parts of the prisoner, but I didn’t care about that. I saw no way for the assassin to escape and that was good enough.

  Stepping outside for a moment, I grabbed a few treats I had prepared for the dogs, before feeding them to the oblivious puppies. While the barking had very likely been purely coincidental, it still made me much more appreciative of the creatures. A good omen for their future usefulness.

  Returning to the makeshift cell, I saw my assassin’s panicked eyes darting around, the man now awake. Not that he could do anything else except that, breathing, and listening to the rats squeak in their cages.

  I hummed, flexing my mind reading abilities, “Marianna, a pretty name. Daughters are such a blessing.”

  The man froze.

  It was interesting how useful abilities like that were. By all accounts, I was a terrible telepath. Anything other than the most surface-level thoughts and I’d be lost. Hell, even those sometimes gave me trouble. A bit of mental discipline was all a person needed to make this ability of mine completely useless.

  “I can read your thoughts, yes. There isn’t anything you could hope to hide from me, nor anything you can offer me,” I continued bluffing.

  “I might be a bit more lenient if I don’t have to pull everything out of your head, though. I imagine you would as well, considering that minds sometimes… crack, when subjected to that,” I spoke, watching the man’s mind. He cycled through quite a few emotions, eventually settling on terror.

  I snapped my fingers dramatically, dispelling the paralysis.

  The assassin gasped and tried to wiggle to no avail.

  “Well? Are you gonna talk?”

  He did.

  Unfortunately, the man knew next to nothing. He was a retired soldier who fell on hard times due to gambling, before being approached with an offer of hundred and fifty ducats for my head. He got paid up front, then told what would happen to his daughter if he tried to run or talk and that was the last time he had any contact with his contractor.

  I was a bit offended at the price, to be honest. Then again, I was merely a young graduate and no longer The Devil of the Rhine.

  I sighed, “You are sure this is all you remember about the man?”

  “Yes, yes! He had a black cloak and it was dark, I couldn’t see anything. His voice was raspy, but that’s all I know!” The man pleaded.

  I tapped my fingers on one of the cages, much to the displeasure of the rat inside of it.

  A black cloak wasn’t practical. It didn’t help you hide at night much and the dye was expensive. A hundred and fifty ducats was likewise a decent sum of money, at least for the average person.

  However, the conclusion that the person who sent an assassin after me wasn’t a pauper wasn’t exactly groundbreaking.

  I could probably rule out Nilfgaard, considering the incompetence of the attempt.

  But who else would want me dead? I’ve just been quietly doing my job.