CHAPTER 55: [55] EXIT STRATEGY

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The wine goblet shattered.

Raven’s hand jerked backward as the crystal exploded against the polished mahogany table, sending droplets of dark red wine cascading across her fingers, the liquid cool and sticky against her skin. The rich scent of spilled vintage mixed with the sudden, sharp smell of pulverized stone.

The tavern convulsed. A bone-rattling shockwave tore through Orellia’s foundations, raining dust and debris from the ancient beams. The world shook with a single, violent spasm.

"What in the seven hells—" Moreau began, her cultured voice dropping to a dangerous whisper.

Raven didn’t wait to hear the rest.

She shoved the heavy merchant’s table forward with both hands, a violent scrape of wood on wood. The briefcase of Cori went sliding across its polished surface in a spectacular cascade of paper bills—thirty-one million in neatly stacked currency scattering across the tavern floor like oversized confetti in the world’s most expensive parade.

Moreau’s serpentine curse was lost in the crash of overturning furniture.

"What was that?!" Raven shrieked, letting carefully manufactured panic bleed into her voice as she stumbled backward toward the tavern’s carved entrance. The tavern patrons erupted. Amber merchants in fine silk and dock workers in leather aprons scrambled over each other, a panicked herd fighting for the exits.

Moreau’s head whipped back toward her, but the damage was already done. In the swirling chaos of falling dust, scattered currency, and fleeing customers, Raven melted into the crowd like smoke dissipating in a strong wind.

Professional rule number one: when the mark loses focus, you disappear. Always.

She slipped through the tavern’s heavy oak door and into the cobblestone street beyond, where the real chaos was finally revealing itself in all its destructive glory. Thick black smoke billowed from the direction of the town square and she could hear distant shouting. Not the organized bark of pirates, but the raw, ragged screams of the truly terrified.

Whatever had just exploded with enough force to shake buildings three blocks away had given her exactly what she needed most: the perfect distraction.

But as she glanced back through the amber-tinted window of the tavern, she saw Captain Moreau rising from her overturned chair like a serpent uncoiling. Her black coat remained somehow pristine. Calmly, her scaled hand brushed a speck of amber dust from her sleeve.

"Saxe."

The massive, silent man appeared at her side as if he’d materialized from the shadows themselves. His scarred, weathered face showed absolutely no emotion, but his hand rested on the twin curved sabers at his waist, his thumb stroking the worn leather of the hil. The mute enforcer’s presence seemed to drain warmth from the air itself.

"Go," Moreau commanded, her golden gaze swept the scattered money covering the tavern floor with the cold fury of a predator whose carefully laid trap had been sprung by forces beyond her control. "And find me the girl with the red and white hair. Now."

Raven pressed herself against the rough stone wall of a nearby amber merchant’s shop, her heart hammered against her ribs.

Through the tavern’s amber-tinted window, she watched Moreau survey the ruins of what had clearly been a perfectly orchestrated negotiation. The serpent captain’s beautiful face was a mask of controlled rage that barely contained the fury building beneath the surface.

But Raven could see the small tells that betrayed the woman’s true state: the way her scaled fingers trembled with barely suppressed violence, the slight twitch at the corner of her left eye, the rigid set of her shoulders that spoke of someone fighting to maintain control over their own deadly nature.

She’s not angry about the explosion itself. She’s furious about the randomness of it. The uncontrolled variable that ruined her flawless manipulation.

Moreau wasn’t just calculating, she was obsessively, pathologically devoted to control. The kind of person who planned for every possible contingency except the one that couldn’t be planned for, predicted, or manipulated. Chaos wasn’t just inconvenient to someone like that; it was a personal insult.

Lucky break or calculated intervention, either way I need to move. Right now.

Raven slipped deeper into the growing crowd of panicking civilians, using their terror and confusion to mask her retreat toward the harbor. The amber-dusted cobblestone streets were filling with fleeing merchants, crying children, and dock workers shouting incomprehensible questions at each other. Behind her, she could hear the distinct sounds of Moreau’s pirates shouting orders, trying to restore some semblance of order to the chaos consuming the square.

"Don’t worry, everyone! I’ll make sure all the bad guys pay for the damage they caused!"

Raven stole a backward glance toward the epicenter of destruction and froze at the sight: a young man with an absurdly vibrant shock of blue hair. He stood amid the smoldering ruins of what had once been the merchant quarter’s crowning glory—the central amber pavilion where the island’s most precious specimens were displayed. The wreckage sent plumes of golden dust spiraling into the air around him, creating an almost ethereal halo that contrasted sharply with the devastation.

The blue-haired stranger had planted himself in what could only be described as a theatrical stance: chest thrust forward, hands on hips, legs spread wide, while facing off against two of Moreau’s enforcers.

Who the hell is that complete and utter idiot?

She didn’t have time to stick around and watch the inevitable massacre. The harbor was still three full blocks away through winding side streets, and she could already hear the heavy, measured footfalls of Saxe’s military boots echoing through the alleyways behind her.

She ducked down a narrow side alley between two amber-cutting workshops, her soft leather boots making no sound whatsoever on the amber-dusted cobblestones. The sounds of destruction from the town square grew steadily louder, crashes and explosions that made the very buildings shake in their foundations. Whatever was happening back there, the blue-haired stranger was certainly making quite a thorough mess of Captain Moreau’s perfectly ordered little kingdom.

Thanks for the exit, mystery hero.