Sienna Blackwood's Arc

Chapter 4 of 11

The guards spread through town with their lanterns, and Sienna moved toward the square. Her scar had cooled after the watch tower, but the heat lingered beneath her ribs like a warning she couldn't ignore. The beast had scouted every place that mattered — the tower, the poor quarter, the barracks. Every place except one. The forge stood across from the tavern, its entrance crusted with ice that glowed blue in the dark. The blacksmith inside was still frozen where he'd stood when Matthias tore the rift open. Sienna stepped through the doorway and felt the cold bite through her coat. The anvil was covered in frost. The tools hung from hooks like they'd been waiting. She walked the perimeter and counted the exits — front door, back window, a side passage that led to the alley. The beast liked to herd. It liked escape routes it could block. She'd give it what it expected, then take it away. She spent the next four hours dragging timber from the poor quarter. The barricades went up across the back window first, then the side passage, each one wedged tight and spiked with bone she'd taken from the butcher's yard. By the time she finished, only the front door remained open. She placed the bowl in the center of the forge floor, near the frozen blacksmith. The potpourri inside smelled like wood smoke and blood — the same scent that clung to the wounded stranger's coat. The beast would recognize it. It would think she'd left bait and a single way out. It would come through the front door expecting to circle her, and find itself trapped instead. Sienna stood outside and checked the barricades one last time. They'd hold. The beast was smart, but it thought in patterns, and she'd learned every one. Her scar burned steady now, not warning but waiting. She'd set the terms. The forge was hers. And when the creature came hunting, it would find the trap wasn't for her.