---

Bat Bat said it with all the confidence of a person who believed the answer should obviously be yes and that any other answer would be a personal failing on Sekhmet’s part.

Sekhmet stood near the sofa and looked at her.

She looked back with the full bright force of new adulthood and old Bat Bat stubbornness combined into one impossible expression.

Elena, still seated with the patience of a woman who had already survived enough disasters for one morning, lifted her cup and said nothing.

That silence alone told Sekhmet several things.

First, Elena was curious to see how he handled this.

Second, if he said no, Bat Bat would absolutely argue.

Third, if he said yes, the world would almost certainly regret it.

He considered both paths for one heartbeat.

Then said, "You will stay beside me, not wander, not shout, not start conversations with strangers, and not insult anyone unless they deserve it first."

Bat Bat brightened instantly. "I accept these completely reasonable terms."

"Good." Sekhmet said.

"You should know," she added at once, "that I may have different standards for who deserves it."

"I already know that." Sekhmet responded.

Elena set down her cup with great care. "Take two maids with you."

Sekhmet looked at her.

"For Bat Bat," Elena said, before he could pretend not to understand. "She still has the body of an adult woman and the social instincts of a reckless flying complaint. Until that balance improves, someone must make sure she does not accidentally declare herself engaged to a fruit seller or challenge a noblewoman over shoe quality."

Bat Bat looked genuinely offended. "I would never."

Elena met her gaze.

Bat Bat adjusted. "Not before lunch."

Sekhmet closed his eyes for one second.

Then he said, "Two maids. Fine."

That was how Bat Bat, now dressed, combed, and walking only slightly like a person who had not yet fully accepted where her legs began and ended, ended up leaving Dawn House at Sekhmet’s side under discreet escort.

The city had fully awakened by then.

Slik City morning was a layered thing. Trade streets are filling slowly. Beasts being watered. Lower district merchants lifting shutters with stiff arms and bad tempers. Nobles who had stayed up too late the night before now hiding their fatigue behind servants and tea. The air carried the smell of wet stone, coal smoke, cooking oil, and money trying to become more money before noon.

The Dawn auction house stood in that morning with its usual quiet pride.

Not too loud.

Not too humble.

A house built to suggest stability even when secrets moved through its foundations like blood.

Inside, Mira had arrived early.

Very early.

Before Bat Bat’s new human disaster.

Before Sekhmet had come downstairs.

Before the full shape of the day knew what kind of trouble it wanted to become.

That was her habit now more often than not. She preferred seeing the place before it filled with movement. Before buyers came. Before clerks invented fresh mistakes. Before guards got lazy. The auction house in the early morning had a stripped, practical honesty to it that she appreciated. Ledgers were still ledgers then. Lamps still lamps. Not yet theater. Not yet negotiation.

She sat behind the front preparation desk with account sheets open before her, one elbow resting lightly against the polished wood as she reviewed inventory notes, payment schedules, incoming lot updates, and the quiet little wounds all business gathered overnight.

She looked sharp as ever.

Hair tied back properly.

Clothes fitted for work, not decoration.

Eyes already awake in that intelligent, severe way of hers that made weaker men either stand straighter or begin lying badly.

A few house workers moved through the lower floor arranging the first half of the day’s preparations. Dust clothes. Stair rail inspection. Outer desk setup. Secure room checks. Nothing dramatic.

Then Raka and his men arrived.

That changed the atmosphere before a word was spoken.

Over a hundred of them were too many to ignore and too few to call an army without sounding foolish. They came in groups rather than one clump, because Raka was not stupid enough to send all his people stomping through the front at once. Still, their presence gathered around the auction house like a lower-city storm suddenly choosing a respectable roof to wait beneath.

Raka entered first with a handful of his nearer men.

He looked terrible.

One side of his face had swollen enough to suggest either a very bad decision or a truly memorable night. One eye was darkened. The jaw on that same side carried bruising that had turned ugly and would soon turn worse.

Mira looked up from the ledgers.

Then she looked harder.

Then slowly set the papers down.

"Well," she said. "Good morning to you too."

Raka grunted.

That meant this was not random market spillover, not Iron House retaliation, and not one of those mornings where the underworld decided to inconvenience respectable business just to prove it still had a pulse.

Still. His face.

Mira’s eyes moved over it once more. "What happened to you?"

Raka’s mouth twitched on the good side. "I spar with someone."

One of the men behind him coughed in a way that sounded suspiciously like suppressed laughter and immediate regret.

Raka did not turn his head.

That was enough.

The man became deeply respectful of silence.

Mira’s eyes moved to the men with him. They looked awake in the rough way criminals looked awake after a night with too little sleep and too much purpose. Not sloppy. Not drunk. Just prepared for movement. Interesting. Raka’s entire lower group carried a different tension today.

"Why are you here," Mira asked.

Raka rested one hand on the front desk edge and answered plainly. "Master told us to come. He will be here soon."

Mira considered that.

Interesting again.

"Soon," she repeated.

"Yes."

She glanced beyond him toward the outer doors, then back again. "And the hundred men outside are all part of the morning decoration."