Ulrich waited near the windows, one hand resting loosely at his side as he kept the masked musician in view.
Astrid was fourteen.
On Earth, sending a girl her age to test a possible assassin would have been madness. In Skargardia, it might be called cowardice instead. A nobleman was meant to place himself between danger and the people beneath his protection, not direct an inexperienced girl toward it.
Ulrich understood that.
He also knew that, at fourteen, Eurich had already taught him how to kill.
Not gracefully. Not mercifully. His father had begun with a wooden blade, then a real one, then opponents who did not restrain themselves because Ulrich's mana core was broken. Eurich had taught him how to read a person's posture, how to lie without changing his expression, how to make another person underestimate him until it became useful.
Astrid had not lived that life.
