The capital city of Aethelgard never truly slept. It only learned to whisper.
Pale moonlight washed over marble towers and gilded spires, turning the skyline into a jagged crown of silver and shadow. High above the streets, the royal castle loomed like a clenched fist, its walls sheer and pale, its banners hanging limp in the motionless night. Torches burned along the battlements, their flames steady and disciplined, much like the men who guarded them.
One of those men never heard her coming.
She rose from the darkness behind him, silent as breath on cold glass. Her cloak was drawn tight, her hood low, her boots soundless against the stone. One gloved hand clamped over the guard’s mouth while the other slid a thin blade beneath his jaw.
She felt the instant surprise took him—the stiffening body, the shudder through his shoulders—then drove the knife in and across. Warm blood spilled over her fingers as she eased him down before his armor could clatter, propping him against the wall as if he had only sat to rest. His eyes stared at nothing.
She wiped the blade clean on his cloak and listened.
No footsteps. No shout. No alarm.
She gave a single hand signal.
From the shadows along the wall, five figures emerged, peeling themselves out of the dark. Men and women alike, cloaked and masked, moving with the same sharp economy of motion. This was no band of common cutthroats. This was a cell—a blade honed patiently over years.
The woman led them forward. Her name had been swallowed long ago by secrecy and necessity. Tonight, she was only Velvet.
She was not tall, nor especially imposing, and she wore none of the theatrical menace favored by lesser killers. Her power lay in what she withheld. Her cloak was a deep, lightless crimson, so dark it passed for black unless the light struck it just so. It was cut close to her body, denying the vanity of a dramatic sweep. Beneath it, leather and silk were layered with careful purpose, every seam designed to muffle sound, every fold placed so a blade could slide free without resistance.
Her mask was simple and unsettling: pale fabric pulled tight across the upper half of her face, unmarked except for faint stitching along the cheekbones. It erased expression without quite erasing humanity. Anyone who looked at it could not tell whether she smiled, frowned, or felt anything at all—and that uncertainty did more work than fear ever could.
Only her eyes were visible. Dark. Steady. Reflecting no light they did not choose to return.
Velvet had learned early that anonymity was the sharpest weapon in any war. Names invited legacy. Legacy invited myth. Myth invited attention. And attention, sooner or later, got people killed.
She had not been born Velvet. She had been someone else once. A daughter. A sister. A citizen of a city that no longer existed in any meaningful way. King Radavaar’s banners had first appeared above its walls beneath proclamations of unity and order. What followed was fire justified as necessity, executions renamed peacekeeping, and hunger dismissed as collateral.
Velvet survived not because she was stronger than the rest, but because she learned how to disappear when it mattered.
That talent had not gone unnoticed.
The cell she now commanded had not been built in haste. It was the product of patience, of shared belief sharpened through discipline. Each member had been chosen not merely for skill, but for restraint. No zealots. No glory-seekers. They were archivists of violence, collectors of small, precise changes. They did not topple thrones overnight. They removed keystones and let the structures collapse beneath their own weight.
Tonight, King Radavaar was the keystone.
He ruled through spectacle and terror in equal measure. He called it strength. Sometimes, destiny. Under his tyranny, dissent was treason, mercy was weakness, and obedience was the only reliable way to survive. He had broken councils, hollowed out ancient houses, and replaced law with loyalty enforced at swordpoint. He did not fear rebellion. He cultivated it, so he could crush it in public and remind the realm who owned its future.
Velvet and her assassins believed the world needed something different. Not another bloodthirsty tyrant wearing a new face beneath the same old crown. Not a clean victory, either. They were not fools. What they wanted was a fracture—a moment where inevitability faltered.
But infiltrating King Radavaar’s castle was not merely an assassination mission.
It was a theology.
The castle itself was a monument to fear, built atop older stone whose symbols had been chiseled away and replaced with Radavaar’s sigils. Its walls were thick, its corridors deliberately disorienting. Its guards were rotated not for efficiency, but to keep them mistrustful of one another. It was a place designed to exhaust resistance long before steel ever met flesh.
Velvet had spent years mapping it.
She knew which servants had lost sons to conscription. Which guards drank too much to sleep. Which stairwells echoed loudly enough to betray a footstep, and which swallowed sound whole. She knew the hours Radavaar prayed to gods he no longer believed in, the nights he slept alone, and the routines he trusted because they had never failed him.
That was the danger of tyranny, Velvet knew.
It grew complacent inside its own cruelty.
To her, King Radavaar was not truly a man, nor even much of a king. He was a pressure on the world, warping everything beneath him. Killing him would not heal the realm. She was not that naive. But it would prove something vital: that power was not immutable, that even the most fortified cruelty could be reached by human hands.
The memory came to her unbidden, like a knife sliding from its sheath.
The meeting had taken place beneath the old tannery where the river curved around the southern wall of Black Hollow. No sign marked the entrance. No lantern burned outside. Only those who had already killed for the Order knew how to find the forgotten cellar beneath the abandoned building.
Rotting vats still filled the upper floor, the stale stink of old leather and lye masking the damp stone below. It was a useful disguise. City guards rarely lingered near the place.
The chamber itself had once been a wine cellar. Centuries of smoke had stained the vaulted ceiling black. Maps covered one wall. Lists of names covered another. Some had neat lines drawn through them. Others remained untouched, waiting for someone brave—or foolish—enough to claim them.
Velvet remembered standing near the back, watching. She preferred to see everyone before they remembered to watch her.
Nearly thirty assassins had gathered that evening. Veterans with old scars carved into their faces, and young blades eager to earn names of their own. Poisoners. Archers. Masters of disguise. One woman whose reputation claimed she had strangled a duke with the embroidered cord from his own ceremonial cloak.
No one spoke above a murmur.
Then the leader entered.
Master Roshan.
Age had stolen the color from her hair, but not the strength from her posture. Her movements were measured and spare, as if decades had carved away every unnecessary gesture. In her hands, she carried a sealed tube of black oak.
The room fell silent as Master Roshan set it on the table.
“You all know why you’re here,” she said.
No one answered.
“The realm changes tonight.”
She broke the wax seal.
Inside was a rolled parchment. Not a contract—a map. When she spread it across the table, even the most disciplined among them drew in sharp breaths.
The royal palace.
Every tower. Every wall. Every courtyard. Every known entrance and servant’s corridor, all painstakingly inked in crimson.
Someone muttered a prayer to Isis, God of Shadow. Someone else gave a disbelieving laugh.
Roshan placed both hands on the map.
“Our employer wants only one death,” she said, her finger coming to rest on the central keep. “King Radavaar.”
For one long moment, silence held the room.
Then chaos broke loose.
“Impossible!”
“The Black Keep holds more than five hundred soldiers!”
“He never sleeps in the same chamber twice!”
“I’ve heard he uses doubles!”
“The Royal Guard would cut us down before we reached the second gate!”
“No purse is worth a suicide mission!”
Roshan waited.
She always waited.
People revealed themselves when given enough room to speak. Eventually the arguments began to thin. One of the assassins leaned over the map—a burly, broad-shouldered man named Gregor, gray-bearded and twice Velvet’s age.
“I’ll take the contract, Master,” he said.
Several heads turned.
Gregor folded his arms.
“I’ve breached castles of this size before.”
“You’ve breached keeps, you old bastard,” another voice said. “That isn’t the same thing.”
The speaker was Carissa: thin, elegant, and always smiling as though she knew something no one else did.
“There’s a difference, Gregor,” she added.
Gregor glared at her. “And you think I don’t know that?”
Carissa ignored him.
“I’ve spent three years inside noble courts posing as a musician,” she said, tapping the palace with one slender finger. “I can enter without ever drawing steel.”
Someone scoffed. “You can’t charm your way into the king’s bedchamber.”
“I wouldn’t need to.”
Then another voice joined in. Then another.
Within moments, every assassin in the room had the perfect plan. Poison. Crossbows from a distance. Disguises. Fire. Hidden tunnels. Servants. Mercenaries. Every proposal contradicted the last. Every speaker sounded certain, and every listener looked unimpressed.
Velvet stayed silent and watched.
She had learned long ago that people desperate to prove themselves usually talked until they proved the opposite.
Master Roshan listened too. At last, she raised one hand.
The room obeyed.
“This mission requires more than skill,” she said, her gaze moving slowly over them. “Above all else, it requires restraint.”
No one spoke.
“It requires patience.” Her eyes lingered on Gregor. “It requires someone who knows when not to kill.”
Now they looked confused.
Roshan continued.
“Most of you are exceptional murderers,” she said, and no one took offense. From her, it was almost praise. “But killing the king is not the difficult part.”
Her finger tapped the palace map once more.
“Escaping afterward is the trick. The realm will fall into chaos at once. The palace will seal itself. Every gate will close. Every road will be lined with soldiers. Every bridge will be crowded beneath the king’s crimson banners.”
Her eyes settled at the back of the room.
On Velvet.
“You,” Roshan said.
Every face turned.
“Velvet.”
At last, Velvet stepped forward.
“You will take this contract,” Master Roshan said.
For a heartbeat, there was only silence.
Then outrage.
“Her?” Gregor’s voice thundered through the cellar. “She’s barely half my age!”
Another assassin spat on the floor between Velvet’s feet. “This is madness, Master.”
Carissa laughed softly. “You would choose the quiet girl?”
Someone else folded his arms. “I’ve spilled more blood than she’s seen in her entire life.”
Master Roshan did not look at any of them.
Only Velvet.
“You understand why,” she said.
Velvet nodded once. “I do, Master.”
Gregor slammed his fist against the table.
“No,” he shouted. “No. Explain this to us.”
Roshan sighed. “You all mistake this assignment for a duel.” She glanced around the room. “It is not. You think strength wins kingdoms? You think speed alone wins battles?”
She shook her head.
“This task requires someone capable of disappearing into another life.”
Her gaze returned to Velvet.
“She has done it before.”
The room quieted as Roshan went on, never raising her voice.
“She has waited months before striking a target. She has abandoned contracts when children entered the room. She has changed plans without waiting for instruction. She has survived missions that every one of you would have died attempting.”
Roshan pointed from one assassin to the next.
“And most importantly, Velvet has never mistaken pride for competence.”
That struck harder than the rest.
Gregor looked away. Others did not.
The resentment in their eyes was immediate, but Velvet knew it was not hatred. It was something colder. Something closer to envy.
It settled over the room like fresh snow.
She had earned many things in the Order: respect, fear, reputation.
But tonight, she understood, she was earning something else.
Isolation.
When the meeting adjourned, conversation returned in low, tight clusters. Several assassins left without acknowledging her. Others watched openly as she gathered copies of the palace maps.
One passed close enough to mutter, “Let’s hope the king’s headsman is quicker than ours.”
Another smiled without warmth and breathed, “They’ll hang what’s left of you from the eastern gate.”
Only a few remained.
An elderly poison-maker named Mirelle pressed a small leather pouch into Velvet’s hand.
“You won’t need all of these,” she said, her lined face softening. “But one of them may save your life.”
A locksmith named Bram offered her a ring of carefully filed skeleton keys.
“I’ve never seen the palace,” he told her with a shrug. “But a lock is a lock.”
Finally, Rowan approached. He was young for an assassin, though still several years older than Velvet, with wind-darkened skin and a crooked nose that had never healed properly. He set a folded bundle of parchment beside her.
“I spent six months charting the palace supply routes.”
Velvet looked up. “You were saving these.”
“I was,” he said.
“And now?”
He managed a faint smile. “Now I think you’ll use them better than I ever could.”
For the first time that evening, the weight on Velvet’s shoulders eased, if only a little.
As the others vanished into the darkness above, Master Roshan stayed behind. She watched Velvet roll the maps together with slow, careful hands. When Velvet finished, Roshan spoke quietly enough that only she could hear.
“They’ll resent you for this.”
“I know,” Velvet said. “They already do.”
“They’ll call it favoritism.”
“I know.”
“And they’ll expect you to fail.”
Velvet met her eyes. “I know, Master.”
Roshan gave the smallest nod.
“Good.”
She extinguished the final lantern.
“They have underestimated you before, Velvet.”
Darkness swallowed the cellar.
“Do not let this be the last time.”
Now, as Velvet moved toward the castle’s inner shadow, every step was precise, almost reverent.
It was not hatred that drove her. It was conviction, sharpened into resolve. She did not dream of the world after King Radavaar. That was not her role.
She dreamed only of the moment certainty broke.
The moment the tyrant learned—too late—that fear was not loyalty.
That silence was not consent.
That even kings could be unmade by those they had taught to endure.
So yes, tonight she was Velvet.
And tonight, the world might change.
Not loudly. Not cleanly.
But irrevocably.
They slipped through the postern gate she had unlocked days earlier, where bribery and blackmail had succeeded where force never could.
Inside the outer ward, the castle breathed in silence. The courtyards were empty. Fountains murmured softly. Dew slicked the stone paths. Statues of long-dead kings watched them pass with blind, carved eyes.
Velvet’s pulse hammered in her ears.
This is for the innocents you slaughtered, she thought. For the streets you starved. For the men and women and children who screamed behind locked doors. For the one true king Crystarium deserves.
They split into pairs, each with a task.
Velvet and a broad-shouldered man called Bear took the eastern stairwell, climbing toward the inner keep.
Halfway up, voices echoed from above.
Velvet flattened herself against the wall and pulled Bear in close beside her.
Two guards descended, laughing quietly about wine, dice, and women.
Velvet struck first.
Fast and smooth, true to her name, she hurled a knife. It buried itself in one guard’s throat. Bear surged past her and slammed the other man against the stone, crushing his windpipe with a brutal twist.
The guard convulsed, boots scraping uselessly against the steps, then went limp.
Blood ran down the stairs in thin, dark streams.
Bear wiped his forearm on the edge of his cloak.
“Clean throw,” he muttered.
Velvet crouched beside the fallen guard and retrieved her knife with a practiced twist. The body sagged sideways as the blade came free, warm blood spilling over her gloved fingers before dripping onto the ancient stone.
She wiped the steel clean on the dead man’s surcoat.
One fluid motion. One steady breath. One heartbeat.
Then she sheathed it.
No celebration. No satisfaction.
Only necessity.
Bear watched her for a moment before turning to drag the bodies into a narrow alcove beneath the stairs. Despite his size, he moved carefully, arranging the corpses so they would not be seen by anyone climbing from below.
He always did that.
The little things.
The things other assassins ignored.
Despite the danger, Velvet felt herself smile.
It reminded her why she had insisted on Bear when the teams were chosen. Not because he was the strongest among them, though he was. Not because he could snap a man’s neck with his bare hands, though he could.
But because beneath all that strength, Bear had something far rarer.
Real kindness.
The memory returned as they continued climbing.
Three nights before the mission…
Rain hammered the hideout roof without pause.
The training hall stood nearly empty. Most of the Order had retired to sharpen blades or gamble away the evening over battered cards and cheap ale.
Velvet had stayed behind.
Again.
A wooden practice dummy hung from heavy chains in the center of the room. Its surface was carved nearly to ruin—knife marks, sword cuts, splintered limbs. It had endured years of punishment.
Tonight, it endured hers too.
Her dagger struck.
Thunk.
Again.
Thunk.
Each throw buried itself squarely in the dummy’s chest.
Perfect.
Again.
Thunk.
Again.
Thunk.
Perfect every time.
And yet each success only tightened the knife in her own chest.
With a sudden cry of frustration, she ripped all six blades free and hurled them in rapid succession.
They struck like silver rain.
Chest. Neck. Eye. Throat. Heart. Forehead.
Every one found its mark.
Velvet stared at the ruined dummy.
Then she kicked it so hard the chains rattled overhead.
“You’re going to break the poor thing,” said a voice behind her.
She turned, startled, and found Bear standing in the doorway. His massive shoulders nearly filled the frame. A steaming mug sat in one enormous hand, and his beard was still damp from the rain.
“I thought everyone was asleep,” Velvet said.
“They are.” He lifted the mug. “I wasn’t.”
Velvet sighed. “I’ll leave.”
“You don’t have to,” Bear said.
She reached for another knife anyway.
Bear watched her throw.
Perfect.
Again.
Perfect.
“You’ve missed exactly twice,” he said.
She frowned.
“I counted.”
“I wasn’t trying to miss.”
“No,” Bear said, smiling. “I don’t imagine you were. Honestly, I’m not sure you know how.”
She didn’t smile back.
Bear noticed. He always noticed. He stepped into the room and set his mug on the nearest bench.
“All right,” he said. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” she snapped.
“Hmm.” He folded his arms. “You’re a terrible liar, Velvet.”
She turned away and busied herself gathering her blades. “I said I’m fine.”
“You also nearly murdered a wooden dummy.”
“It deserved it.” She narrowed her eyes at him.
Bear chuckled. “I’ll be sure to tell the carpenter.”
Silence settled between them. Rain drummed steadily against the roof. At last, Bear spoke again.
“You’ve been avoiding everyone.”
“I’ve been training.”
“You’ve been hiding,” he said.
The words struck harder than she expected.
Velvet stopped.
Bear’s voice softened. “They aren’t the same thing.”
For a while, she said nothing. When she finally spoke, her voice was so quiet the rain almost swallowed it.
“It doesn’t matter what I do anyway.”
Bear stayed silent.
“I finish every assignment I’m given,” Velvet said. “I don’t complain. I don’t boast. I follow orders.” She let out a bitter laugh. “And still…” Her gaze dropped to the floor. “I’m the outsider.”
Bear leaned against one of the timber posts. “They’re jealous of what you can do.”
“No.” She shook her head. “They don’t trust me, Bear. That’s the difference. They all think Master Roshan favors me.”
“Because she does,” he admitted.
She shot him a fierce look. “You’re not helping.”
Bear grinned. “Just being honest.”
She sighed. “They’ll never accept me.”
“They accepted your sister.”
And there it was.
The wound she had tried so hard to keep covered.
Her shoulders sank.
“My sister…” she whispered.
Even now, the words carried equal parts love and pain.
“She could walk into a room and everyone would listen. She won people over without trying. Everyone admired her. Everyone laughed with her. Everyone followed her, Bear.” Velvet looked down at her hands. “I walk into a room, and the conversations stop.” She shook her head. “I’ve spent my whole life standing in the shadow she left behind.”
Bear didn’t interrupt. He only watched her, his expression heavy with concern.
“So many people remember her,” Velvet said. “And they compare me to her without even realizing they’re doing it.”
“Your sister would have smiled more,” Bear said quietly. “Your sister never hesitated. Your sister could do this flawlessly.”
“Fuck my sister,” Velvet snapped.
She hurled another knife, harder this time. Her voice cracked with the effort.
“I don’t want to replace her. I never could. I just…”
The words abandoned her.
Bear finished them gently. “You want to be seen as yourself.”
A tear slipped free before she could stop it.
She nodded.
“But I don’t know if I ever will be.”
Bear pushed away from the pillar. His heavy boots thudded across the floor until he stood beside her. He was nearly a head taller, broad enough to block the lantern light, but there was nothing threatening in his face.
Only understanding.
“Do you know why they call me Bear?”
Velvet blinked. “I assumed…” Her eyes moved over his enormous frame.
“That I fought like one?” he said, chuckling.
She nodded, and despite herself, laughed with him.
“They called me Bear because I slept through my first assignment.”
She stared at him. “You what?”
“I was nineteen,” he said. “I’d been marching for three days straight. I sat down beneath a tree for a moment and woke up after the target had already left town.”
Velvet couldn’t help it.
She laughed—loud and full and real.
Bear smiled.
“The name stuck,” he said. “They mocked me for years.”
“You?” she asked. “Mocked?”
“Oh, endlessly. I was the fool. The oaf. The sleepy idiot who let his target slip away.” He shrugged. “They weren’t entirely wrong.”
A faint smile tugged at her mouth. “What changed?”
“I stopped trying to prove them wrong,” he said. “I embraced it.”
She frowned.
“I kept doing the work I was given.” He looked directly into her eyes. “And eventually, they ran out of reasons to doubt me.”
He rested one enormous hand on her shoulder. It was gentle despite its size.
“You have nothing to prove to them, Velvet.”
“It doesn’t feel that way.”
“I know.” His grip tightened slightly, reassuring. “But listen to me. Master Roshan chose you. Not because you’re someone’s sister. Not because you’re young. Not because of luck. She would never have called on you for this if she didn’t believe you were ready. You earned it.”
Velvet looked away. “I can still hear them.”
“And you always will,” Bear said, his expression hardening with quiet certainty. “But soon, they’ll hear something else.”
She looked back at him.
“They’ll hear that King Radavaar is dead. And I’ll be right there beside you when you slit his throat and spill his blood across the floor.”
The words settled between them like prophecy.
“When that news reaches every tavern from here to Nyranthium, no one will be whispering about favoritism. They’ll be whispering about the assassin who walked into the most heavily guarded fortress in all of Crystarium and walked back out again with Radavaar’s head.”
He squeezed her shoulder once.
“The king’s head will silence every doubt they’ve ever spoken aloud.”
Velvet managed a small smile. “And if it doesn’t?”
Bear’s grin returned. “Then they’re stupider than I thought.”
She laughed again.
A real laugh this time.
The first in days.
Bear picked up his mug.
“Now come on,” he said, nudging the practice dummy with one boot. “I think you’ve frightened this poor fellow enough for one evening.”
The memory faded as Velvet and Bear reached the next landing of the castle stairs.
Ahead waited another corridor. Another door. Another step closer to the tyrant’s chambers.
Velvet glanced at the massive assassin beside her. Bear caught the look and gave the smallest nod.
No one spoke. No one had to.
In a fortress crawling with enemies, it was enough to know she wasn’t climbing these blood-soaked stairs alone.
Inside the keep, the air turned warmer, heavier. The corridors bent inward like veins, their walls draped in tapestries of conquest and glory. Velvet caught flashes of scenes she knew too well: burning cities, kneeling enemies, the king standing above them all—radiant, merciful, monstrous.
Ghosts of simpler days, she thought.
Then a scream rang out from somewhere below.
Not pain.
Alarm.
“Damn,” Velvet hissed. “Move.”
They ran.
A guard came around the corner too fast, steel already drawn. His blade bit into Bear’s shoulder before the big man slammed into him with a roar, driving him hard to the floor. Velvet was on him in an instant, knife rising and falling until he stopped moving and his blood spread dark across the runner beneath them.
Footsteps thundered behind them. Voices shouted through the keep.
They had been seen.
Velvet burst through a set of doors into a broad hall that led toward the royal wing. Two of their own were already dead—one pinned to the wall by a spear, the other facedown on the stone with his skull crushed in. The rest of the Resistance fell together by instinct, backs pressed close, weapons raised.
“For the people of Crystarium,” someone whispered.
Then they charged.
It became a slaughter almost immediately.
Guards poured in from side passages, shields locked, swords flashing in the torchlight. Velvet ducked under a wild swing and cut a man behind the knee. He screamed as he collapsed into her, his weight nearly taking her down. She shoved him away and opened another guard’s face from brow to cheek.
Bear fought beside her like a force of nature, blood streaming from his wounded shoulder as he split helmets and broke bones with brutal ease.
They gained inches. Only inches.
Over bodies. Through blood. Every step more costly than the last.
Then the horns sounded.
Deep.
Resonant.
Final.
The castle answered like a beast waking from sleep.
Crossbow bolts struck stone and flesh. One of Velvet’s companions jerked backward, a bolt jutting from her chest. Another fell clutching his leg, and the guards were on him at once, blades rising and falling until his cries ended in a wet, choking gasp.
Something crashed into the back of Velvet’s skull.
The world lurched.
She staggered, fighting to stay upright, but a mailed fist caught her across the jaw and sent her sprawling. Her knife skidded away across the blood-slick floor.
Boots closed in around her.
She tried to push herself up. A boot pinned her spine. Another came down on her wrist until something snapped, and fire shot up her arm. She screamed before she could stop herself, teeth bared, vision swimming.
Bear roared.
He tore free of two guards and charged toward her.
A spear punched through his gut.
He staggered, tried to raise his axe, and the guards cut him down.
After that, there was only silence.
Breathing.
Dripping blood.
Velvet lay flat on her stomach, cheek pressed to the cold stone, bitterness flooding her mouth. Shackles snapped around her wrists, biting deep. Hands hauled her upright. Someone tore the hood from her head, and torchlight stabbed at her eyes.
A guard captain stepped forward, his crested helm gleaming. His voice was calm, almost bored.
“You chose the wrong night to dream of change, assassin.”
Velvet spat blood at his boots and smiled through broken teeth.
“Real change is still coming, my friend,” she rasped.
Then they dragged her away through the torchlit halls, past the bodies of her fallen comrades and deeper into the belly of the castle.
Somewhere above, behind guarded doors, a king sat alive and untouched—unaware, or simply uncaring, how close death had come for him that night.
The Resistance had failed.
But someone had seen them.
And as the dungeon doors of the Black Keep slammed shut before her, Velvet knew that sometimes, being seen was enough to start a war.