Chapter 27 Siege of Hollowvale
SIEGE OF HOLLOWVALE
SEBASTIAN
Viktor drove the armored SUV like he was born to it. Hands steady on the wheel. Eyes tracking the road with predatory focus. Every few seconds, lightning painted his profile in stark relief. All sharp angles and controlled violence.
Beautiful. Dangerous. Mine.
Dom sat beside me in the back, checking his rifle for the third time. “Still can't believe Adrian cracked it that fast.”
“He had incentive,” Viktor said. “And the files gave him everything he needed.”
The files. The evidence we'd stolen from Marcel's office. Financial records that had seemed like random transactions until Adrian's people started connecting them.
“Property purchases under shell companies,” I said, remembering the briefing from this morning. “All traced back to accounts Marcel controlled. Adrian's forensic team found the pattern in four hours.”
“Offshore holdings in three countries,” Dom added. “But only one with a manor house fortified like a military installation.”
Hollowvale Manor. Purchased six years ago under a company called Devereux Holdings International. Hidden in plain sight. Close enough to London to be convenient. Far enough to be private.
The perfect bolt-hole for a man who'd been planning his escape for years.
“The utility records gave it away,” Viktor said. “Manor supposedly empty. But power consumption suggested full staff. Security system drawing constant power. Adrian's people cross-referenced with satellite imagery. Saw the modifications. The fortifications.”
“And the fact that a 'medical supply convoy' delivered enough food and ammunition for a siege last week,” I finished. “Marcel knew we were coming. Just didn't know when.”
Dom's mouth curved. “Now he does.”
“Heat signatures everywhere,” Noah's voice crackled through the comm. He was monitoring from the mobile command center a mile back. Safe. Out of range. Exactly where Adrian had demanded he stay. “Looks like he bought himself an army.”
“How many?” Viktor asked. Voice flat. Professional.
“Fifteen. Maybe twenty. All armed. Moving in patrols.”
“Fuck,” Dom muttered.
“This ends tonight,” I said. Loading my bow. Feeling the familiar weight settle into my hands. The grip warm from my palm. My mother's necklace wound around it like a prayer.
Viktor glanced at me in the rearview mirror. Eyes finding mine. “You sure about that?”
“Not even slightly.” I grinned despite everything. “But when has that stopped me?”
His mouth twitched. Almost a smile. “Never.”
The moment stretched. Just us. The rain. The knowledge that we were about to walk into hell together.
“You two are disgustingly sweet,” Dom said. “Makes me want to vomit.”
“Shut up,” Viktor replied. No heat. Just affection.
“Make me.”
“Later. When I am not driving.”
I laughed. Couldn't help it. The sound came out wrong. Too high. Too sharp. Adrenaline already flooding my system.
We killed the lights a quarter mile out. Viktor navigated by memory and lightning flashes. The road turned from pavement to gravel to mud. Trees pressed in on both sides. Dense. Dark. Hiding us or trapping us, hard to tell which.
Hollowvale's gates appeared through the rain. Wrought iron. Twelve feet tall. Cameras mounted at every angle.
Viktor stopped the SUV. Dmitri and Troy pulled up beside us.
“Luka?” Viktor said into the comm.
“East perimeter secured. Two guards down. Clean.” Luka's voice carried the slight accent that thickened when he was working. “You're clear to breach.”
Dom pulled out a small device. EMP designed to fry the cameras without alerting the main system. Thirty seconds of darkness. That's all we'd get.
“Ready?” he asked.
I nocked an arrow. “Always.”
Dom triggered the device.
The cameras died. Lightning flashed. Thunder covered the sound of our doors opening.
We moved as one.
Dom hit the gate's electronic lock with a bypass. It clicked open. We poured through. Silent. Fluid. A well-oiled machine designed for violence.
The mansion rose ahead. Three stories of stolen opulence. Floodlights cutting through the storm. Windows glowing gold. Beautiful in the way poison sometimes was.
Marcel had built his kingdom on our blood.
Tonight we'd drown him in his own.
“Split here,” Dom said. Hand signals in the dark. “Luka and Troy, east wing. Dmitri, secure the exits. Viktor and Sebastian, main hall.”
Everyone nodded. No questions. We'd been over the plan a dozen times.
We scattered like ghosts.
Viktor and I approached the main entrance. Marble steps. Massive doors carved with the Devereux crest. All that nobility and grace built on murder.
Viktor tested the door. Locked. Of course.
I pulled a pick set from my belt. Worked the mechanism while Viktor covered me. Thirty seconds. The lock clicked.
We entered hell's foyer.
The interior was obscene. Chandeliers dripping crystal. Floors polished to mirrors. Blood-red carpet running down a hallway that looked like it belonged in a palace.
My palace.
He'd stolen this too. Taken everything that should've been ours and made it his.
“Two ahead,” Viktor whispered. “Ballroom entrance.”
I saw them. Guards in tactical gear. Professional. Alert.
Viktor moved left. I went right. We flanked them like we'd been doing this together for years instead of months.
The first guard never knew what hit him. Viktor's blade found his throat before he could raise his weapon. The man went down gurgling.
The second turned toward the sound. My arrow took him through the eye. He dropped like a puppet with cut strings.
We dragged the bodies behind a marble column. Kept moving.
The ballroom opened like a cathedral. Thirty-foot ceilings. More chandeliers. Windows tall enough to let in the lightning.
And mercenaries. Lots of them.
They saw us the same moment we saw them.
Everything exploded.
Gunfire erupted from three directions simultaneously.
Muzzle flashes strobed like dying stars.
The ballroom transformed into a killing floor in the space between heartbeats.
Bullets tore through air thick with chandelier crystal and ancient dust, chewing marble into powder, shredding priceless tapestries into confetti.
Viktor dove left behind an overturned banquet table. I went right, rolling behind a marble pillar as wide as my torso. Glass rained down in deadly cascades, each shard catching firelight and turning the air into a storm of daggers.
“Five on the balcony!” Dom's voice crackled through the comm, nearly drowned by gunfire.
“Four,” I corrected, my arrow already in flight.
The mercenary on the far left didn't even have time to register surprise. The obsidian tip punched through his throat, severing his carotid. Blood sprayed in an arterial arc as he tumbled over the ornate railing, still screaming through a ruined windpipe.
These weren't amateurs. These were professionals. Ex-military. Maybe Blackwater. Maybe worse. They moved with tactical precision, covering each other's angles, suppressing our position with disciplined fire.
Viktor was already moving. Two shots from his position. Two bodies dropped from the balcony. Professional. Clean. Beautiful in its brutal efficiency. But the remaining mercenaries adapted immediately, pulling back into cover, repositioning.
Smart. Dangerous.
I vaulted over a toppled table, came up behind a stone column. Drew. Aimed. Released.
My arrow caught a mercenary through the shoulder as he tried to flank Dom's position. Not a killing shot. He went down hard but was already crawling for cover, one arm useless, the other reaching for his sidearm.
Tough bastard.
“Twelve more incoming!” Dmitri's voice. “Basement level. They're flooding in!”
Fuck. Marcel had built this place like a fortress. Multiple entry points. Reinforcements staged throughout.
Movement to my left. A mercenary charging from behind a toppled statue, combat knife reversed in his grip. Big. Six-four at least. Built like he bench-pressed motorcycles for fun. Tattoos crawling up his neck. Serbian or Croatian, judging by the ink patterns.
His first swing came fast. Professional technique. I ducked, felt the blade whistle past my ear close enough to shave hair. He transitioned immediately into a backhand slash. No hesitation. No wasted movement.
I caught his wrist on the return. Twisted hard. But he was stronger than he looked. Absorbed the force, used my momentum against me. Drove his knee toward my ribs.
I barely got my elbow down in time. The impact still sent lightning through my arm. Numbed everything from shoulder to fingertips.
He grinned. Yellowed teeth. Broken nose that had healed crooked. The kind of face that had seen a thousand fights and won most of them.
“Little prince,” he said in accented English. “Marcel pays extra for your head.”
“He'll have to settle for my ass,” I shot back. Drove my boot into his knee.
He shifted. Took the impact on his thigh instead. Barely stumbled. Grabbed my jacket. Threw me like I weighed nothing.
I hit a marble pillar hard enough to crack it. Or maybe that was my ribs. Couldn't tell. Pain exploded through my back. Knocked the wind out of me.
He charged. Knife leading.
I rolled. His blade sparked off marble where my head had been. Chips of stone flew. One caught my cheek, drawing blood.
My hand found an arrow in my quiver. Not enough time to nock it. I came up swinging it like a short spear.
The obsidian tip caught him across the face. Split his eyebrow. Blood sheeted down into his eye.
He roared. Backhanded me across the jaw.
Stars exploded. The world tilted. I tasted copper.
But I'd been hit harder. By life. By grief. By eighteen years of guilt that weighed more than any fist.
I drove the arrow toward his throat.
He caught my wrist. Twisted. The arrow clattered away.
We grappled. Trading blows. His fists like hammers. My ribs screaming. My lungs burning. Every breath tasting like blood and failure.