It was such a pretty night.
     The night sky stretched above, stars shining like diamonds scattered across black velvet. The gardens stretched out in front of her, bathed in silvery moonlight where the warm pools of light from the bronze lampposts didn’t reach. Pausing in the shadows next to the building to let her eyes adjust from the bright lights in the ballroom, Liberty made her way to the stairs that led from the terrace down into the gardens.
    Taking up miles of land, the palace could be considered more a private park with the various residences and government buildings scattered throughout. The gardens were extensive and varied, crafted with the best artistry that the botanists in the Empire could achieve. It included all kinds of unique and breathtaking views. Gorgeous rose gardens with blooming trellises. Terraced gardens with rows and rows of cultivated flowers arranged to create exquisite artworks with their blooms. Elegant marble fountains and graceful statuary scattered throughout. Even a small wood with a curated clearing filled with rare wildflowers and herbs. 
    Liberty had spent hours in the past few weeks memorizing the layout while planning for tonight. The book had gone into great detail about the paths that Serena and the walking red flag had strolled down during their dates, but had been a bit sparser on identifying details for the scene that got it all started. The scene that brings the Crown Prince and Serena together, beginning their courtship. The moment when Serena discovers Melisande’s dead body. 
   This time, Liberty wouldn’t let it play out the same way. At this point, if they were still following the novel’s plot, Viscount Torrington would have gained control of the Baroness through a web of blackmail and addiction. 
In the novel, the Viscount had long been supplying exotic ‘entertainments’ to willing members of the aristocracy. Those entertainments included not just illegal substances, but also private gatherings where all manner of deviance and debauchery could be indulged in. He had long wanted to introduce a mistress to his amusements, leaving him free to indulge to his fill without the responsibility of hosting. When he first heard rumors of the beautiful widow taking the Capital by storm, he had decided that she would be perfect. A trophy worthy of him. Even learning of Melisande’s relatively upright and straightforward personality, he would not be deterred. If anything, it made him more determined that his hostess had to be her, and he began to plot.
    Soon, Melisande’s most recent companion left the Capital indefinitely for unknown reasons, leaving her in need of a new ‘protector’. She would find out later that this had, of course, all been orchestrated by the Viscount. He had approached her at a private party she had attended, using a mutual acquaintance to introduce them. After their introduction, he had behaved with strict courtesy and gentlemanly charm, lowering her guard somewhat. She had agreed to see the man on a probationary basis. His reputation and character had still given her pause, keeping her from agreeing to an arrangement with him immediately. He had taken that in stride, arranging to meet with her regularly, always behaving as a proper gentleman. When they met, she always left feeling lighter, a sense of euphoria spreading within her as she spent time with him. After weeks of meeting regularly, Melisande came to crave the Viscount’s company, believing that she was falling in love with him. She even felt listless and drained if she was unable to see him. He made her believe that his reputation may have been the result of youthful indiscretion and that he had perhaps matured. She even hosted a few small gatherings for him to help ‘rehabilitate his image’ with his newfound maturity. Little did she know that it was not love, but a growing addiction to the drugs that were being slipped to her, small dose by small dose, when they met. 
    When the Viscount suddenly cut off all contact for a week, the young widow had been reduced to a drawn, shivering mess. Feeling deeply ill, she knew that something was horribly wrong and immediately began to suspect Torrington. She had confronted him in his home, demanding to know what he had done to her and expecting to have to drag the truth from him. She had been shocked when all he had done was laugh at her, mocking her for a naivete that she never thought she possessed. He had freely admitted to drugging her many times. The smug man seemed to revel in telling her of his ‘brilliant’ plan. He had even used the gatherings that she had held for him to sell and distribute drugs, making her an unwitting accomplice. 
    Thus, the spider had drawn in the fly, with her shiny wings, to be his meal despite her caution and perceived worldliness. Those caught selling illicit drugs in the Empire were sentenced to death, and it was a punishment that would be carried out even more brutally if the offender were an aristocrat. This was how Torrington snapped a collar around Melisande’s neck and held her leash in his hands. She was forced to become the hostess for his debauched parties. He had made a critical miscalculation, though. The young widow had not survived this long by being a pushover. While she was known for being straightforward, she was also known for never letting a slight go. She lived by the adage ‘revenge is sweet and not fattening’. Now that she found herself in this situation, she would find a way out and crush this horrible arachnid, spinning his webs.
     Smug in his perceived victory, he began to indulge himself fully in his entertainments, giving her more and more access to his network and secrets. He moved her into his townhouse to feel that he had her firmly under his control. This was an opportunity she would never be foolish enough to overlook. She noted down information on every visitor that crossed the threshold, detailing the vices they indulged in and any crimes they committed. Every girl sold or coerced into prostitution. Every aristocrat blackmailed, and what depraved acts Torrington was holding over their heads. 
    She quickly learned that the Viscount was not the real head of his operations. There was a mastermind behind the scenes making use of the foolishly indulgent man. He wasn’t even the final recipient of the drugs he peddled, merely one of many, and a middleman of sorts. Periodically, he would receive gifts from mysterious sources. Some he would keep, and they would turn out to contain shipments of the illicit drugs. Some he would send on to others, adding a new layer of packaging to them to hide their origins. Melisande kept records of every detail about these ‘gifts’. Who they were supposedly received from. What they looked like when they arrived and what they looked like when they left, as well as who they were sent to. 
    She was able to collect quite a large amount of information and evidence against the Viscount this way. However, while the man’s overindulgence made him lax, something that he never relaxed his vigilance about was the identity of his master. He guarded that secret as if his very life depended on it, threatening Melisande with all manner of torture if she ever inquired too directly about it. Her frequent, discrete searches were unable to turn up much about this mysterious figure either. The most she had been able to find out was that Torrington would be meeting with them on the night of the Imperial Ball. 
    While the information she had gathered might clear her name and take the Viscount down, she did not like leaving it to chance. If she could also deliver the identity of the mastermind behind it all, that would put her in a much better position to bargain for her freedom with the authorities. That is, she had taken the risk to follow him to the meeting that was arranged for tonight. Unfortunately for her, something had given her away and the mastermind had not appeared before Torrington had dragged her from her hiding place, slit her throat, and sunk her body in the fountain for Serena to find a short time later. 
    Liberty had transmigrated into the novel shortly after the Baroness had met Torrington in the original story. Since one of the first things that Liberty had done once she had successfully recruited her was to explain the Viscount’s plans to her, Melisande had immediately cut off all contact with him. Unfortunately, she had been exposed to enough of his drugs to suffer some serious withdrawal symptoms. Looking for a way to treat her had helped lead to recruiting Gladys, which had been an unexpected stroke of luck. She had been passed over as heir to the chemical manufacturing company her father had founded in favor of a distant male cousin. Their family’s loss was the Patriot Guild’s gain, as the girl was a brilliant chemist. She and Winnie had become instant friends, collaborating seamlessly. The duo had provided results that had shocked everyone. 
     “Serena sat on the edge of the fountain, bathed in moonlight, while breathing in the clean air and trying to clear her mind from the overwhelming displays in the ballroom,” Liberty muttered to herself. That had been the most detailed that the author had been about the setting for the first pivotal scene of the story. She shook her head lightly and took a last glance around, making sure she was alone before stepping from the wide path lined with lampposts. She reached into one of her concealed pockets and withdrew a veil made of layers of sheer black fabric. She reached into one of her concealed pockets and withdrew a veil made of layers of sheer black fabric. After securing it in place, she slid on a pair of dark gloves, making adjustments to ensure that her pale face and light hair would not reveal her presence. Fading into the shadows cast by the sculpted shrubs and bushes that flanked the main pathways. 
    Despite the sparse details that the Author had given the scene, Liberty had been confident when Gwen had given her the map of the Palace grounds. That confidence had been shaken as soon as she had started to count the fountains marked on it. These gardens didn’t have just one or two fountains. They had fifteen. Fifteen. One -five. She had counted them twice to make sure. With the guards stationed throughout, as well as timed patrols, she wouldn’t be able to just wander from garden to garden, checking all the fountains until she found the right one. She was forced to narrow down the possibilities by piecing together what clues she could from what she could the scene from the novel. 
   Serena's 'drinking in the blessed silence of the night’ meant that the ball could not be heard from the fountain. It couldn’t be too close to the ballroom. ‘After dipping her fingers in the absentmindedly, she felt something brush against her fingertips and looked down expecting to see an ornamental fish’ meant that the fountain was large enough to completely submerge the body, and most likely also contained water plants and fish. This narrowed it down to three possible locations. All of them were far enough from the ball for any noise not to be heard, or at least be muffled enough not to be noticed, while still being connected by paths that would grant access along pathways near the terrace. They were all also large and known for containing either water lilies, fish, or both. 
    Liberty moved from shadow to shadow, timing her movements to avoid arousing the notice of the guards assigned to the garden. After checking the prime locations, she settled on the third fountain as the most likely scene of the crime. She didn’t believe that the fountain closest to the ballroom would be the one because it was directly in one of the guard's patrol paths, so she quickly verified that it wasn’t the correct one. This was a bubbling fountain, with a statue of a dancing goddess in the center, not one that cascaded water like described. The second one was also a bust. While wide enough, it was too shallow to submerge a body completely. Especially the body of a woman wearing the voluminous skirts of a ball gown. When she had approached the third one, not only did it check all of the boxes for size and distance from the ballroom, but it was also located in a square of shrubbery that had only one pathway leading in and out. That, and the eerie silence that enveloped her, had made her instincts prickle. 
     She slid deeper into the shadows beneath a nearby tree and settled in to wait. The book had described Serena hearing the bells of the city chime nine o’clock as she had left the ballroom, so Liberty had come out around eight to get in place before Torrington met with the hidden mastermind. Liberty hoped that even though Melisande had been snatched from his clutches, the Viscount would still be meeting with the mastermind tonight. 
    As the minutes ticked closer to the hour, ten minutes turned into twenty, then to forty, with no shadowy figures appearing, she started to fear that she was waiting in vain. Shifting position to loosen muscles that were beginning to stiffen, her gaze settled on the fountain for a moment. Just as she was about to settle into position again, she paused. Something about the fountain was setting off alarms in her head. When she had arrived, she hadn’t approached it, instead choosing to find her hiding spot and getting into position. At the time, nothing had seemed out of place, so she had put it out of her mind and focused her attention on watching the pathway leading to the fountain. Now she refocused on the fountain itself. After a moment of observation, she figured it out. 
Carved from pale marble, it seemed traced in silver in the moonlight. The figure of a young girl stood in the middle, pouring water out of an urn and onto rocks carved from the marble. The water made the musical tinkling described in the novel as it cascaded down the rocks into the basin, scattering droplets to shine like rubies in the moonlight. The water had turned red. 
    She left the deep shadows under the tree and cautiously made her way to the edge of the fountain, and looked down. Inhaling sharply, she had closed her eyes and cursed silently to herself. Then she quickly removed the veil and gloves, placing them back into her pockets. Then she took another deep inhale, looking into the dead eyes of Viscount Torrington, floating just below the surface of the fountain, and prepared a shriek that would bring the guards running.
     Just as she was about to let loose, a large hand clamped over her mouth, cutting off the sound as the bells began tolling the hour.