Nadia bolted from her bed, immediately scanning the room for Markus or anyone else who shouldn’t be there. When no one revealed themselves, she knelt at the nightstand. “Fried, my lord, your servant thanks you for watching over her as she slept and blessing her with another day. Dein Wille ist unser, es wird geschehen,” Nadia finished, lingering at the nightstand in the hopes Fried would speak again. He did not. Disappointed, Nadia rose and retrieved Tobias’ handgun—hers now—and moved to the door for breakfast. After checking the peephole for anyone outside, Nadia slid the gun into her pants and tiptoed out of her room.

  Nadia scanned the provided buffet, both for what looked good and for more assassins. No assassins presented themselves, but several colors of pastries, cereals, and sliced meats—all pale imitations of the genuine articles—stood in neat, soldierly rows. Nadia loaded her plate with pastries and bullshit meat before stealthing back to her room. I will need the protein if I am to kill a demigod, she reasoned as she popped a piece of brittle bacon into her mouth.

  After another check for assassins, Nadia clicked on the holo-projector for the news. I am going to need to augment myself, it seems, Nadia thought dismally as the news showed a rerun of last night’s football match between the 10, 537th air brigade and the 11,234th fast action group, both leading teams nationally. Even the lankiest players had legs chiseled from marble and wider than a watermelon. That is the competition, Nadia thought dismally, looking over her body that was…not that. Fried had never seen fit to give Nadia a task that required augments, so the dainty housewife and opium sommelier—dealer was such a crude title for the kind of clients she provided for—never bothered to get them. Her virtue had lay elsewhere, until it was set ablaze and buried in ash.

  Once she had finished her okay pastries and sad ham, Nadia retrieved Tobias’ laptop, the metal cold to the touch. No reason to put it off further. My lord, give me strength. She started with Tobias’ Stahlgericht portal, the institution responsible for processing, hearing, and sentencing Atlas’ criminal populations. Wardens and executioners—fingers of that larger hand—used the site to store information, both on criminals and criminals to be. If the Reichstag wanted someone disappeared politely, it was a matter of adding or deleting relevant documents before their day in court.

  There was nothing on Tobias, and only a note on Nadia for handling illicit substances. The note had been downgraded in importance, a short justification from Tobias reading used in the regular business of maintaining a greenhouse.

  Nadia’s fingers hovered over the keys, like her hitched breath was buoying them. She didn’t know that Tobias had looked out for her in this way, but she supposed it shouldn’t have surprised her either. Someone had to have known what they were up to. She looked through his file, finding nothing she didn’t know. If this was a hit from the Reichstag, all our dirty laundry would be here and then some. Perhaps it hadn’t been added yet, but Nadia had met other wardens when Tobias brought them for dinner, and she didn’t know them to be a slow lot. And it would not be listed as a hit, she reasoned. We died in a tragic storm.

  She moved to his dex-mails, figuring whatever had damned her family had left a trail to follow. He did say he received a message a few weeks back, Nadia reasoned as she filtered the results.

  As the ouroboros spun on the screen, Nadia considered the possibilities. The Handernacht could have their reasons, she thought. They were the Reichstag’s dirty work division, the hands they used when a message needed to be written in blood or conveyed in hushed whispers. When people disappeared, they could be found in the shadows nearby if one cared to look, and they always brought the disappeared back into the light, smiling and productive. They didn’t technically exists, but too many disappearances and convenient deaths over the empire’s eight myriads wore away at their plausible deniability. That they would outsource their work to a handful of knights was not out of the question. Markus was a spy and favors were his trade…that and buried knives.

  Such a collaboration would have violated the non-partisan sanctity of the Orders, but Nadia reckoned butchering a family of four and fumbling the fifth was not exactly sanctioned either. What the Reichstag wanted with her husband, Nadia could only guess, but she reckoned it more likely he pissed off some middle manager than earned the ire of one of the saints.

  The computer beeped, drawing Nadia from her thoughts. Amidst the sea of results, one stuck out. A message from a knight of the Eleventh Order—Vergoldette Kette— named Emil Vogel. Several other executioners were included in the recipients, and Nadia grabbed a pen to jot them down for later.

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  “Humble executioners, I am writing on behalf of my good friend Leopold Braun that you immediately decrease security presence around him. While I understand that Herr Braun needs to be protected and observed, the surveillance he is currently under has caused undue stress and anxiety. This is particularly the case at night where Herr Braun has confided that he feels he is always being watched, either by guard or by camera, and because of this, he is unable to sleep.

  I understand that such a request is beyond the normal accommodations afforded to prisoners at His Enlightened Holiness’ Prison and would be willing to make a generous contribution to both you and the prison for your cooperation.

  Emil Vogel, Captain of the 13, 091st Battalion of Vergoldette Kette”

  Was he not a drug financier or other? Nadia tried to remember before she searched for Leopold and clicked on an article from two years prior. Warehouse manager by day and money launderer slash mover by night for Zündung 298, I remember now, Nadia reasoned as she read on. The Zündung had been responsible for a new stimulant of the same name. The high—Nadia had been told—was leagues ahead of opium, at the expense of the occasional shredded liver. Coin-flip drugs, they were called, and Nadia had decided early in her second life they were not worth the coin. Reading that her husband might be another amongst the dead made her stomach drop like a man with the stool yanked from under him.

  When the police would go to raid the warehouses of suspected manufacturers, they’d be in flames and the polizei on the scene would have their shuttles or homes torched later. They raided his home and brought him out in his underwear, but the burnings continued after that.

  Is Vogel in bed with Zündung? Nadia considered. It would make logistical sense for him, a captain of Eleventh to want to spare a large warehouse operator, even if he is not in bed with Zündung.

  Would also have the networks set up to move drugs quickly, Nadia reasoned. They could move them across any part of the universe Atlas soldiers are in and nobody would suspect a thing.

  But this email is from weeks ago, and Braun was arrested years ago. Nadia navigated to Tobias’ work page, which auto filled Tobias’ credentials and revealed the sensitive prisoner records that Nadia definitely should not have had access to. Final appeal was denied a day before the dex-mail was sent! Nadia thought as she read more mail, all polite but increasingly urgent.

  Nadia cross referenced the day of death and the schedule, finding that Tobias had been on watch the night before Braun was to be executed. Tobias did not let Vogel break out Leopold, but neither did any of the others. Why was he targeted? Nadia looked back through the mail, finding Tobias quickly became the only warden that Vogel talked to, and that he only gave non-committal answers, a common tactic to not cheat Fried of his dead. And this was no random attack, Nadia thought as she searched for the other executioners, who all still lived. Images of Jan’s beehive kidney flashed across Nadia’s mind and her stomach lurched lower; another target, picked with purpose.

  So how does Markus tie in? This might be for any other reason and the Vogel stuff is just a coincidence, Nadia opened another tab and searched for both knights, pulling up a bevy of articles talking about the common dueling events they both partook in. Two knights were engaged in a side hug, and Nadia wanted to vomit up her pastries—into a toilet, since she was still a classy lady. The caption read that they had been frequent sparring fighters and had both won their latest fight.

  Vogel’s face could cut someone with its angles and his short wedge of blond hair glowed as bright as his gilded gold armor, itself nearly chipping the paint of Markus’ oily black plate. They were smiling in light of their—at the the time—recent victories. How many others have they killed for their sin? Why should they get to be happy? Because they are knights?

  Nadia grabbed a piece of stationery from the corner table in her room and drew a circle. Zündung, chemist(s), identity: ??? Nadia scrawled before drawing three limbs ending in their own circle. Leopold Braun, money man, product mover (???), dead. Markus Richter, hitman. Emil Vogel, product mover, hitman (???), Nadia finished.

  “You have your orders. Ich habe dir meinen Willen gegeben,” the statue drawled behind her. “I’d suggest you arm yourself for the fight ahead, Nadia.”

  Nadia’s head jerked to her computer, fingers already dancing over the keys to search for an augment shop. Several displayed themselves and she filtered by price, figuring her recent lack of expenses gave her plenty to spend. “Peggy’s Augmentatory,” she read off, “certified by the Brotherhood of the Red Eagle and Volkswaffen medical brigades.” Aside from the Orders, those institutions were among the oldest in Atlas, ordained by the Ironclad and saints alike. With a tap of the keypad, Nadia sent the directions to her dex and made for the door.