Duke Tyler POV
I kept them watched. The naïve ones were always the easiest. Desperate merchants—how utterly predictable. When need outweighed reason, people became pliable. They convinced themselves that risk was bravery, that sacrifice was love, that obedience would somehow earn mercy. They wrapped their fear in excuses and called it hope.
How stupid could they be? Did they truly believe I did not see through them? That I did not know I was merely using them? That, once they ceased to be useful, I would not silence them as easily as snuffing out a candle?
They were desperate enough to risk everything. That alone told me all I needed to know. I sat back in my office, surrounded by the paintings I had chosen with care. Crude. Disturbing. Designed to repel comfort. To offend sensibilities. To test resolve.
