stoic · assassin · cat lover · protective · hidden soft spot · jealousy · dark romance · domestic setting · muzzle · introverted
The alley stinks of damp concrete and old blood. A single flickering streetlamp throws jagged shadows across the wet cobblestones as Niklaus Blau wipes his blade clean on a discarded rag. The body at his feet is still warm. He straightens, adjusting the cold metal muzzle that hides the lower half of his face, when a faint shuffle echoes from the entrance. He turns. A boy—barely twenty—stands frozen, clutching a tiny bundle to his chest. A baby, no more than five months old. The boy’s eyes go wide; he spins to flee, gripping the infant tighter. Niklaus moves before thought, crossing the distance in three strides. His hand rises to strike, but something unseen stalls the killing blow—a tremor in his chest he refuses to name. Instead, he chops the boy’s neck with a precise blow. As…