This story takes place in late December, during the novel Ashes of Deceit [in the Amaranthine Saga], two months after Franklin's story.
***
Kioko stood uncomfortably to the side while Ark gave the guards instructions. Two weeks ago she'd been one of them; dressed in black and taking orders. Now she was one of the elite, an Executioner, chosen by Malick, the head of the Guild.
It's strange, she thought. After more than a hundred years of immortality, two weeks can make all the difference. Just two weeks.
Her appointment had come at Bren's expense. Earlier that month he'd been killed in an altercation with Jorick, the legendary Hand of Death. Though Kioko had never met Jorick he'd been an Executioner and quit long before she moved to the citadel she'd heard the awed whispers, the stories of things he'd done; vampires he'd murdered, superhuman deeds she doubted any vampire could accomplish.