They were strolling through the city, loose and lazy after dinner, when Raul's spine tightened like a wire. The street was quiet, too quiet for this hour. The taverns were still lit, and a cold wind carried the bitter smell of hops and damp stone, yet not a single bootstep, not a single carriage wheel, not even the scrape of a cat. Silence pressed down, and the silence felt out of place.
Arin and Victor were laughing about something, some absurd story from the docks, some rumor about a fishmonger who married his own sister. Raul lifted a finger to his lips. His eyes moved, not his head. He didn't blink much. Five seconds stretched out like five minutes, and the quiet became a shape, heavy, watching.
He grabbed Victor by the collar and slung him up like a sack of flour. With his free hand, he jerked his chin, and Arin started running on instinct.
They made three strides. Two shadows jumped out from the mouth of an alley, sharp and compact, something flashed in the air, a glint, a whisper, the kind of sound metal makes when it wants blood. Raul didn't think. His dagger was already in his hand, small and ugly, and the metal sang when he swept the throw aside. The blade ricocheted off the stone with a dry ring.
"Run," Raul said, voice low but firm, "run as fast as you can, out of the barony."
Arin didn't ask why. Questions were a luxury for people who weren't being hunted.
Victor did ask. Well, not in words. He was babbling and praying, breathless pleadings to gods he only ever remembered when things went wrong. "Saints—please—no—no no no—"
"Keep breathing," Raul said without looking at him. "Just breathe."
They ran. They ran until their chests burned. They ran until the neat stone lanes gave way to dirt and weeds. Raul's senses did not let up. That inner prickle, that old itch between the shoulder blades, the one that had saved him more times than luck ever could, kept pushing. Do not stop. Do not look back.
___________________________
They reached the west border of the barony, the half-broken wall, and the old iron marker driven into the ground like a nail through the world. Beyond it lay the old ruins. No one went there anymore. Two hundred years ago, a monster outbreak had crushed the city that once stood on that earth. The stones cracked under heat and claw, then the forest took what was left, and now those ruins sat on the edge of one of the most dangerous woods in the region.
The Misleading Woods.
Most people said the name with a joke, like they were quoting a fairy tale.
Raul led them through rubble and shattered columns, found a hollow beneath a collapsed arch, and pushed them inside. Dust drifted. The air had that stale taste ruins always have, old ash and rain-soaked dirt.
Victor tried to swallow his panic and failed. "Guys, not to be the mood killer, but what's going on here?" His voice shook. He was close to tears, trying not to be.
"Assassins," Raul said. "Probably. I don't know who sent them. But I have guesses."
"Victor," Arin said, softer but steady, "you're okay. We're okay. Just stay with me."
Victor pressed his palms together and squeezed his eyes shut, like the darkness might be less dark if his head joined in. "We're going to die. We're going to die."
"No one's going to die," Arin said. It wasn't a promise. It was a refusal.
They stayed still long enough to catch their breath. Long enough for Raul to hear past his heartbeats. There were footsteps out there, patient and careful, dragging through dirt, crossing stone, spreading out with the slow skill of people who had done this before. They had time, but not a lot.
"Hiding inside the barony is a bad idea," Raul said. "If the baron's brats sent them, we'd be hunted in a net. Here,"—he flicked two fingers at the broken pillars, "we're not in anyone's house. Neutral ground is still ground."
Arin nodded. "Move?"
"Move," Raul said.
This time, Arin picked Victor up like he weighed nothing, threw him over his shoulder, and they slid out from the hollow and ran again, low, careful, always listening. Their route was meant to take them out the back side of the ruins, toward the trade road where wagons rolled, and faces blended into faces. That road was safe, not forever, but enough to buy time. Enough to disappear.
They didn't make it. A figure stepped out onto a ledge above them, a hooded shape, a narrow silhouette against a strip of clouded moonlight. He didn't attack. He just whistled, and the whistle was the same as a net closing. Three more shapes appeared to block the way toward the trade route.
Raul didn't waste breath on anger. He took two steps, changed direction, and led them toward the forest.
Arin's voice was quiet, urgent. "The forest's a bad idea."
"It is," Raul said. "But standing still is worse."
"Are you sure?" Arin asked. His eyes slid toward the trees. Black trunks crowded together, bark slick with old sap, leaves shifting even when the wind was still.
"I'm not sure of anything," Raul said. "It's a certain death behind us, or a possibility in front of us. I pick the possibility."
Victor found enough air to speak. "Misleading Woods. Doesn't that name mean—like—your eyes lie to you? Paths move? People are never seen again?"
"All woods lie," Raul said. "This one just admits it. Keep close."
They reached the gray edge of the forest, the boundary where roots hooked through broken slabs, where old stone tried to hold back earth and failed. The woods breathed out a damp chill, as if it had been waiting for them. Raul tested the ground with the heel of his boot. The soil sank, then held.
Behind them, the assassins slowed. Raul didn't turn, but he knew when a hunter chooses not to hunt. Any fool could run into open danger. It took a different kind of discipline to stop at the edge and let the prey go.
A low voice carried across the ruin. "Let them go," the assassin leader said. His tone was clipped, matter-of-fact. "The mission's to kill some brats, not risk your life for it. Forest will take them without us bleeding for it."
One of the subordinates shifted. "Should we—"
"Report to the young master," the leader cut in. "Tell him they ran into the Misleading Woods. He'll know what to do with that."
The subordinate swallowed, nodded, then ghosted away. The others melted back, shadows becoming stone and silence once more.
Raul lifted his chin toward the forest. "The entrance disappeared, just like we heard from rumors. Entrance and exit are different; stay vigilant."
They stepped into the first layer of trees, and the world narrowed fast. Even the moonlight faded, not like a curtain dropping, but like it was being drunk by the leaves. The trunks were thick, cracked, and wet to the touch. The ground was soaked in old rain and secret water. Their footsteps sank, and once, twice, something in the mud sucked at their boots like a mouth.
There were sounds. Not birds. Not animals. Just sounds, twigs flicked by invisible hands, breath that wasn't theirs, the low creak of wood remembering storms.
"Stay within reach," Raul said. He set a pace that was steady, never fast. Running in a place like this was a way to never stop.
"Do you know the path?" Victor asked, voice small.
"No one knows the path," Raul said. "We make one, and we don't look back."
Arin touched a trunk with his fingertips. The bark left a stain like ink that wouldn't wash. He frowned and pulled his hand away. "Why would anyone build a city here?"
"They didn't," Raul said. "The city came first. The woods came later."
They went deeper. The air smelled like cold tea and old leather. Twice, they thought they saw lantern light between the leaves, soft and warm like home, but when they turned their heads, it vanished, and the branches were thicker than before.
Arin whispered, "We're not being followed."
"Not for now," Raul said. "They'd rather just watch us die in the forest than come here to kill us themselves. Cowards."
"Practical," Arin said.
"Same thing," Raul said.
Victor swallowed. "What if we get lost?"
"We will get lost," Raul said. "Getting lost is fine. Panicking is not."
Arin grinned nervously, quick and thin. "Noted."
A path appeared where there hadn't been one, a narrow strip of dry ground winding between two ancient stumps. Raul didn't ask questions. He tested his weight, then led them across. The dry ground held. A whisper rose behind them, gentle as a lullaby, and Victor almost turned, almost answered. Arin touched his shoulder and shook his head.
They came to a clearing. It wasn't much, just a circle where the trees stepped back, and the ruin's bones poked through in honest lines. A broken statue watched them with no face. Raul stopped. He listened. His senses were no longer screaming; they were humming. Men were gone. Something else was here.
"We rest," he said. "Two minutes."
Victor sank to the base of the faceless statue. His breathing slowed, then steadied. Arin squatted, checked his boots, checked Victor's, checked Raul's. He didn't say anything. He didn't need to.
The wind turned, bringing a smell like damp paper and steel left in rain. Raul looked up. The leaves shivered, though the air was still, and somewhere a drop of water fell with the grace of a bell.
Arin leaned close. "Do we have a way out?"
"We have three," Raul said.
"And that is?"
"Forward, forward, and forward."
Arin nodded. "Then forward."
Victor wiped his face with both hands. "I hate this forest."
"+1," Raul said.
Arin said the same, " +1."
They stood. The clearing seemed smaller now. The statue seemed taller. From far off, distant and thin as memory.
Behind them, out in the ruins, the assassin leader stood with arms folded, watching the dark line of trees. He listened for screams. He listened for nothing at all. Then he pivoted, and his boots clicked against stone as he left.
Inside the Misleading Woods, Raul took one step, and the world forgot where he had been. He did not forget. He marked each breath, each stride, each glance. He carried their fear like a lantern, covered, controlled, but bright enough to see by.
"Forward," he said again, and the woods opened just enough to let them in.