Inside the dimly lit chamber of Don Khan's private estate, the heavy silence was broken only by the rhythmic ticking of the antique clock perched ominously on the mantle. Thick cigar smoke coiled in the air like whispers of unspoken threats.
Don Khan sat behind a long, furnished table, his eyes dark and brooding beneath his signature crimson turban. Across from him, draped in shadow yet radiating lethal stillness, was the Swordsman.
Clad in a dark leather coat, his face partially obscured by the angle of the overhead light, he said nothing but his presence alone charged the room with electricity.
To his right stood Lyth, Don Khan's second-in-command. Loyal. Cunning. And, at the moment, visibly uneasy.
Don Khan leaned forward and slid a photo across the table. It stopped before the Swordsman like a final verdict.
"Her name is Kalisa," Khan said, his voice smooth but cold. "She's the one who took my wallet. I want it retrieved before she dies."
The Swordsman took the photo without a word, studying it in silence. His fingers, gloved and calloused, barely moved, but his eyes flicked across Kalisa's image like a hunter memorizing his prey.
"I have everything I need," he finally spoke, his voice deep, low, and oddly calm. "Her routine. Her contacts. Even her scent, if need be."
A subtle chill crept into the room at the precision of the statement.
Then the Swordsman looked up. "What's in the wallet?"
Don Khan's lips curved into a smirk, but his eyes remained deadly serious. "That," he said, tapping his fingers once on the table, "is not your concern."
"I need to know if the object inside can jeopardise the mission," the Swordsman replied.
Don Khan stood, slowly walking toward the window. His voice was calm, yet every word was a loaded gun. "You were not hired to question. You were hired to retrieve and eliminate threats. You are not to open that wallet. You are not to damage it. Do I make myself clear?"
The Swordsman inclined his head just slightly. "Crystal."
"Get the wallet and bring it back to me!" Don Khan instructed.
But before Don Khan could sit again, Lyth stepped forward, his voice strained with urgency. "Boss… I need to speak freely."
Don Khan turned slowly, giving him a gaze sharp enough to slice flesh.
"Go on."
Lyth hesitated. "Bringing in the Swordsman… It's going to stir up the dust. The wrong kind of dust. If he leaves a trail, or when he does leave a trail, it'll bring the cops. They're already watching. Caleb's watching. And you know Caleb is not an easy contender. And if Kalisa dies under mysterious circumstances, it'll all lead back to us."
The room went silent. Even the clock seemed to hesitate.
Don Khan's expression was unreadable, but when he spoke, there was iron behind every word.
"Everyone has failed me, Lyth. You. My spies. My enforcers. Kalisa has vanished with something I've protected for twenty years. She played all of you. And now," he said, turning to the Swordsman, "I am playing a new hand."
Lyth stepped back slightly, clearly seeing the finality in his boss's eyes. "But Boss—"
"I said enough."
Lyth lowered his head.
Don Khan walked back to his seat, swirling the glass of dark liquor he had barely touched. "Kalisa must not suspect until the final moment. You retrieve the wallet. Then you end her. Not before."
The Swordsman rose from his seat with the same lethal grace of a blade leaving its sheath. He turned to leave but paused just before the doorway.
"One question," he said without facing them. "If she runs?"
Don Khan's eyes gleamed with menace.
"Then make her bleed."
The Swordsman, still near the door, turned slowly toward Lyth, a subtle curl of disdain playing at the corner of his mouth. His voice was soft, almost courteous, but with an edge like honed steel:
"My blades are drawn for a purpose. If you step in the way, you will be caught in the swing."
Lyth's jaw clenched. The tension in his shoulders coiled like a spring. He had worked in shadows long before the Swordsman's name began to haunt whispers, and he wasn't about to be intimidated by a hired blade, no matter how feared.
He took a single step forward, closing the gap between them. "You think because Khan called you in, you get to walk around like you're untouchable? This isn't a warzone. This is a city crawling with law. You leave a trail of blood behind, and they'll follow it straight to his door."
The Swordsman chuckled, low, dark, unbothered. "Law?" he repeated as if the word itself were a joke. "The law fears people like me. Like him. Like you… sometimes." His gaze dropped slightly, as if sizing up whether Lyth was still worthy of that category.
"You want clean hands, Lyth? You shouldn't be working for a man who makes monsters when order fails."
Lyth's nostrils flared. He stepped in again, close enough that their shoulders brushed.
"You cross me, sword boy, and it won't be Kalisa's blood on the floor."
The Swordsman didn't flinch. In fact, he tilted his head slightly, a wolfish grin creeping across his face. "I've cut down generals who thought they were gods," he said softly. "I won't hesitate for a lieutenant who overestimates his rank."
Their energy crackled. It was like watching lightning build in a bottle, ready to shatter.
But then—
SLAM!
The sound of a hand coming down hard on the table snapped both men's attention to the centre of the room.
Don Khan had risen. Not quickly. Not with anger. But with authority. Pure, undiluted power.
"Enough."
His voice was quiet but carried a weight that stopped even the most venomous argument.
Lyth backed off a step. The Swordsman folded his arms behind his back, his smirk fading.
Don Khan's gaze moved between them, cold and unblinking.
"We are on the edge of something delicate. I don't need your egos drawing blood in my war room."
He looked at Lyth first. "You've had your chance. You failed. That doesn't make you worthless, but it means you listen now."
"But I wasn't--" before he could finish his sentence
"Lyth drop it!" Ordered Don Khan
Then to the Swordsman. "And you. You were brought in to clean this up, not to cut down my own. Get the job done, quietly."
A long, tense silence stretched out.
Then the Swordsman offered a small bow. "As you command."
Lyth, though still tight in the jaw, nodded once. "Understood."
Don Khan sat back down, slowly, picking up the glass he hadn't touched all evening.
"Good. Now let's all remember who the real enemy is."
Silence settled like thick smoke in the room, following the exit of the Swordsman. Only the low hum of the city beyond Don Khan's penthouse windows stirred, muffled car horns, distant sirens, the heartbeat of a city perpetually on edge.
Lyth waited a beat, then exhaled sharply and stepped closer to the table. "I still think this was a mistake," he muttered, pouring himself a glass of bourbon from the sideboard without asking.
Don Khan didn't flinch. His back remained straight, posture regal in the high-backed leather chair. One finger traced the rim of his untouched glass as his eyes followed the slow swirl of ice melting into his drink.
Lyth leaned against the edge of the table. "Kalisa is just a girl, Don," he said, more firmly now. "A street thief with pretty eyes and fast fingers. You're sending a monster after a child."
Don Khan finally looked up.
His gaze was like a scalpel, sharp, deliberate, clinical. "She's no child."
Lyth scoffed, half-laughing in disbelief. "You think she knows what that wallet really holds? You're assuming she's not just panicking. She might've already dumped it or sold it for spare change."
Don Khan leaned forward slowly, hands folding beneath his chin, his voice barely above a whisper.
"That wallet contains more than scraps and smudged credit cards. You know it. I know it. And if Kalisa had even a whiff of what she touched… she wouldn't have let it go."
Lyth frowned. "Still. You're gambling everything on a hunch."
Don Khan's eyes darkened. "This isn't a hunch."
He stood now, finally, and moved toward the massive floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out over the city. His reflection was a shadow over neon lights.
"You remember what that vault means, Lyth? You remember the contracts locked in there? The routes. The codes. The names."
He turned back to face him.
"New York and Texas are on a knife's edge. The old families are fractured. One move, just one, and we own it all."
Lyth nodded slowly. He knew the truth of those words. That wallet, the key inside it, and it wasn't just a symbol. It was leverage. Power. Whoever held the key controlled the vault, and whoever controlled the vault could rewrite the map of the American underworld.
Still, Lyth wasn't convinced.
"And you're certain she knows it's in the wallet?"
Don Khan's voice was quiet, but grim. "I'm not certain. But I think she suspects. That's enough."
He walked back to his seat and lowered himself with the grace of a man used to being feared, not questioned.
"Kalisa is smart. She's careful. Too careful. She's not trying to sell it. She's hiding it. That tells me she knows, at least enough to be dangerous."
Lyth took a slow sip, eyes still on Don Khan. "And if she's hiding it for someone else? Or worse, already given it to the police?"
Don Khan tilted his head. "Then we let the Swordsman do what he does best."
Silence again.
Lyth studied his boss. Don Khan's face was as unreadable as stone, but his eyes burned with the fire of obsession. This wasn't just business anymore. It was personal. And personal always came with consequences.
Still, he knew better than to push further. Don Khan had made his position known, though he felt it was a wrong move.
He set the glass down and spoke quietly. "I hope you're right. I really do. Because if you're not, we won't just lose the key."
Don Khan raised a brow.
Lyth continued. "We'll lose the war."