The original bounty of one million gold coins had been crossed out in heavy charcoal. New words were scrawled beneath in a hand that trembled with either rage or desperation.
Bounty: One Royal Boon.
Anything. The Valorian family, the Vraven Kingdom's ruling house, was offering anything within the king's power to grant. Nobility. Artifacts. Secrets. Whatever the killer wanted, it was theirs. A blank check signed by the crown itself, born from the kind of fear that turned gold into an insufficient currency.
Silver stared at the sketch.
Then he spat on it.
The saliva hit the drawing square between the eyes and dripped down the paper, warping the ink.
Silver's claws closed around the parchment. He crushed it in his fist, then tore it apart. Strips of paper fell to the table like dead leaves.
"I don't need their boon," he hissed quietly.
This was personal.
