Chapter 20 #2
“Oh, no, no.” Lana turned in her chair to face her directly. “Let me be more specific. What would you do if you discovered that someone you cared about—someone you’d made commitments to—was planning something that would hurt innocent people? Where would your loyalty lie then?”
The loaded question hung in the air between them.
She was talking about Raziel, obviously.
Nadi felt the weight of the serpent pendant against her throat, a reminder of the man who’d given it to her and what they were planning to do that day.
“I would try to understand their reasons first and then decide what I could live with. And if not… then, I would act.”
“What you could live with.” Lana repeated the phrase thoughtfully. “That’s interesting. Most people would say they’d try to stop them or report them to the authorities. But you’d consider their motivations.”
“People rarely do terrible things without believing they have good reasons. Or justified ones.” Nadi shrugged.
“That doesn’t make the things less terrible, it just makes things more complicated when you consider the person as a whole.
In our context, if we ousted everyone whose actions brought around anything other than perfectly pure ends, we’d be standing in a very lonely field of headstones. ”
Lana studied her for a long moment, then laughed—a sound like breaking crystal. “You know, Monica, I think I may have misjudged you. You’re far more sophisticated than I initially gave you credit for. I really do think you would be a perfect fit for our family. Regardless of where you’re from.”
Before Nadi could respond, a knock at the door interrupted them.
“Come in!” Lana’s call was so chipper it almost made Nadi sick.
The door opened to reveal the same seamstress Nadi had noticed the day before—the one she’d seen in Braen’s club. The fae. Or at least someone who had grown up in the Wild around the fae.
“Begging your pardon, my lady,” the seamstress said with a curtsy, “but there’s been a small issue with the train of your gown. Nothing serious, but it needs attention before the ceremony.”
“Of course it does.” Lana sighed dramatically. “Monica, would you mind? I should probably rest for a few minutes before the chaos truly begins, anyway.”
“Not at all.” Nadi headed for the door, grateful for an excuse to leave before Lana’s questions became more pointed.
As she passed the seamstress in the doorway, the woman’s hand brushed against hers—a contact that lasted a fraction of a second longer than necessary. In that brief touch, Nadi felt something pressed into her palm. A small piece of paper, folded tight.
Her heart hammered, but she kept her expression neutral as she continued down the hallway. Only when she was safely in a powder room with the door locked behind her did she unfold the paper.
The message was brief, written in the flowing script of the fae language—When the bells toll, escape while you can.
Nadi stared at the words, her mind racing. The fae were not only here to disrupt the wedding…
They knew what she was. Who she was.
That wasn’t possible. It wasn’t—how? How?
Ripping up the paper into tiny shreds, she quickly ran to the restroom and flushed it down the drain. As she stood there, watching the evidence disappear, she felt the weight of impossible choices settling on her shoulders.
No, no, no, no, no, no—
Raziel and his family were planning their own internal destruction. The fae were here and they knew who she was.
And she was caught in the middle, bound by conflicting loyalties and impossible promises.
The sound of bells chiming in the distance made her freeze. Wedding bells, calling guests to take their places for the ceremony.
When the bells toll, escape while you can.
Whatever was about to happen, it was starting now.
Nadi took a deep breath, straightened her shoulders, and walked back into the corridor. She had a wedding to attend, a family to help destroy, and her own people to face.
All while trying to keep the vampire she’d come to kill, that she’d grown to care for, alive.
The afternoon’s deceptive serenity was about to shatter completely.
And she still wasn’t sure which side she would choose when it did.
The bells continued to toll, their bronze voices carrying across the estate like a funeral dirge disguised as celebration. Guests began moving toward the garden pavilion where the ceremony would take place, their voices bright with anticipation.
Nadi moved with them, scanning faces for signs of recognition or threat. The seamstress had vanished, melted back into the crowd of servants and vendors who made such gatherings possible. But her message burned in Nadi’s memory like a brand.
She spotted Raziel near the main pavilion, speaking with Mael and several other family members. Even from a distance, she could see the tension in his posture, the way his eyes moved constantly, cataloging threats and opportunities.
Their gazes met across the crowd, and she saw him nod almost imperceptibly. He’d received some kind of signal too—whether from his own sources or simply from reading the atmosphere, she couldn’t tell.
But they were both ready.
An arm caught her wrist and jerked her around to face the scrutinizing face of Volencia Nostrom. “Get to your seat, girl. Before you make an ass of us all.” And with that, the matriarch pushed her forward with a dismissive gesture that held more strength to it than should have been possible.
Mother moon, she hated that woman. Fire seethed in her blood.
And if she had her way, the dusty old hag would not leave the wedding alive, no matter what Raziel had made her promise.
He had said they were only here to kill Mael, but if she saw an opportunity to take out Volencia or Lana—they were going to die. Especially the bitch of the old woman.
The bells fell silent, and in that sudden quiet, Nadi heard the rustle of fabric, the whisper of steel, the collective intake of breath that preceded violence.
And she still didn’t know if she was a soldier, a spy, or simply another casualty waiting to happen.
Raziel positioned himself near the main pavilion, his eyes constantly scanning the assembled guests while maintaining the appearance of casual conversation with the security detail.
The setting sun had nearly finished its journey below the horizon.
It cast long shadows across the manicured grounds, like hungry, grasping fingers.
He had a glass of wine in his hand, swirling it idly between his sips. It gave him something to do. He was told toying with his usual gold coins or smoking a cigarette was absolutely out of the question.
“Raziel.” Mael’s voice cut through his focus, drawing his attention to his brother’s approach. The massive vampire moved with surprising grace through the crowd, his golden eyes bright with what might have been anticipation. Or calculation. “I trust everything is in order?”
“As much as it can be with these many variables in play.” Raziel withdrew the leather-bound ledger from inside his jacket, noting how Mael’s gaze immediately fixed on it with hungry intensity. “The item you requested.”
Mael accepted the ledger with careful hands, as if it contained something far more precious than mere trafficking records. “Excellent. This will prove quite useful for our purposes.”
“Will it?” Raziel stepped closer, lowering his voice so their conversation wouldn’t carry to nearby guests.
“I’m curious, brother. What exactly do you plan to do with Braen’s client list?
Most of those names are already known to us—minor nobles with unsavory reputations, merchants seeking exotic pleasures. Hardly earth-shattering intelligence.”
“You’d be surprised what patterns emerge when you have the complete picture.” Mael’s smile was enigmatic as he tucked the ledger away. “Sometimes, the most valuable information isn’t what’s written down, but what connects the dots between seemingly unrelated events.”
Something in his brother’s tone set Raziel’s nerves on edge. There was a smugness there, a satisfaction that went beyond simply acquiring useful blackmail material. “Enlighten me.”
“Have you ever wondered,” Mael began, his voice taking on the cadence of someone settling in to tell a story, “about the deeper implications of fae trafficking? Not just the immediate horror of it, but the… ripple effects it creates in their communities? Or even why our kind desires to keep them as pets?”
Raziel’s hand stilled on his wine glass. “What exactly are you getting at?”
“Oh, just thinking about cause and effect. Actions and consequences.” Mael’s golden eyes gleamed with something that made Raziel’s skin crawl. “Tell me, do you remember every family you’ve destroyed over the years? Every life you’ve snuffed out in service to our mother’s ambitions?”
“Get to the point, Mael.” He rolled his eyes. “Unless you’re about to confess you have a personal taste for fae flesh, you’re boring me.”
“The point?” Mael chuckled, the sound carrying an edge of cruelty that Raziel recognized from their childhood.
His brother rarely brought it out in public.
“Very well. Once upon a time, long ago, there was a young fae girl who watched her whole family get murdered by a serpent. A tragedy, certainly, but hardly an uncommon one.”
Ice began forming in Raziel’s veins. He kept his expression carefully neutral, but internally, alarms were screaming.
“But this particular young girl,” Mael continued, his voice dropping to barely above a whisper, “was very special. A shapeshifter, you see. The Rosovs were in conversations with her family to buy her a long, long time ago, but she disappeared the moment her family died. You can imagine how useful a fae with the gift to become anyone would be, if she could be broken and tamed. That is, unless, she had instead decided to exact the most exquisite revenge on those who had wronged her.”