56. DILEMMA
alistair
The sun rises the same way it always does—soft at first, then slowly sets the darkened horizon on fire.
I keep my eyes fixed on the road leading back to the Triarch Dominion. Eventually, I decide to answer the calls, knowing damn well they have everything to do with me ditching the Dominion watch.
Now that Asher has the information and the location, I don’t particularly care what happens to me. If I end up dead the second I step into their territory, if someone decides to open crossfire, or if my body gets left on the side of this deserted stretch of the city like some roadkill—so be it.
Miraculously, none of it happens.
Everything is far too normal for my liking.
I reach the Dominion alive and in one piece, park my car in the usual spot, enter the PIN, and move through every security protocol almost too smoothly. The ease of it makes my skin crawl, but then again, I’ve never been here this early.
Organizations like these thrive in darkness. The deeper the night sinks its claws in, the more alive they become, only retreating when dawn begins swallowing the shadows.
This place is almost sober now.
Only a handful of workers move through the grounds, either cleaning up the remnants of the night or standing guard. Both are armed. Both are trained. Both would put a bullet through my skull without blinking if ordered to.
Even so, the silence unsettles me more than they do.
It carries the same hollow stillness as the day I last saw my mother. The day I walked into the kitchen and found her lying motionless on the floor, her body already too cold to touch.
I force the memory back where it belongs and continue toward my personal laboratory.
The guards greet me as they always do while I walk the corridors. Nothing unusual. Nothing out of place.
Until I stop in front of the door. Something tells me to be prepared for what I might encounter inside.
And that’s never a good sign.
My right hand slips behind my back, fingers closing around the suppressor tucked against my waistband, while my other hand slowly pushes the door open.
There’s only one man inside.
Dressed entirely in black, a cloak draped over his shoulders, he stands at the far end of the room, ahead of the decoy I strapped my Dominion watch to. Shit.
That’s when I notice the indentation of the shape of a door somewhere I never expected or didn’t notice before.
Figured.
I make the conscious decision to remove my hand from the suppressor and step inside, silently pulling the door shut behind me.
The second the lock clicks into place, his hand moves.
He presses a remote aimed at the massive television mounted above.
The opening notes of Phantom of the Opera flood the room.
Every muscle in my body locks. I hate that it happens—hearing just a handful of notes can still reach into my chest and squeeze.
“You seem to have made quite an impression at the Velmourne Club.”
The modulated voice is back in place, blending unnervingly well with the orchestra echoing through the laboratory.
He doesn’t turn to face me. He simply watches the television screen where Ariella is dancing with me, seamlessly matching my steps.
It’s a candid recording going viral on the internet.
Not going to lie, from the third point of view, we do look… good—the touch of white in a black pit of yin-yang.
“I was trying to earn her trust,” I answer evenly.
“Earn her trust,” he repeats, almost thoughtfully, and turns to face me. “Or lose yours?”
The question lands harder than any accusation.
His composure resets as though the outburst never existed.
“Why weren’t you wearing your Dominion watch?” he asks with terrifying calmness.
The wrist feels strangely exposed.
The watch has never simply been a watch. Its identification, surveillance, jurisdiction, and loyalty forged into polished black metal. I wear it during operations. I wear it while teaching. I wear it while sleeping.
There have even been nights I woke from nightmares and reached for it before remembering where I was.
Removing it isn’t against protocol. It’s rejecting it.
“I was testing whether the subject could mimic my operational patterns without technological guidance,” I explain. “If Ariella is reacting to behavioural stimulus rather than Dominion infrastructure, then—”
“Enough,” the single word detonates through the laboratory.
Had the security doors not been sealed, half the floor would’ve heard it.
The music continues playing in the background.
Somehow, that makes it worse.
“You breached Garden,” he says, taking one measured step toward me. “Without my authorization. You removed the one device that allows the Dominion to account for your position. Then you deliberately created a blind spot inside a system that was built to ensure blind spots never exist.”
His head tilts ever so slightly. “Do you have any understanding of what the other Triarchs would do if they discovered the only heir to this organization is testing his limits?”
I meet the dark hollows of the mask. “They won’t.”
He nods quietly. “I’m standing here before anyone else had the opportunity.”
I know what he’s not saying. Victor would classify this as a deviation. Luca would classify it as a liability. Both conclusions end the same way—the end of my existence.
“She’s becoming attached,” I reply. “The trust she places in me can still be redirected toward the Dominion.”
“And what about the trust you are placing in her? You‘re letting your feelings interfere with your calculations.”
The clinical statement should offend me. Instead, it unsettles me.
The absence of an answer lingers.
He walks past me and stops beside the decoy resting on the workbench.
“My best creation,” he takes off my Dominion watch from its wrist, then walks in my direction,” Do not force me to decide whether you are still one,” he slaps the watch on my chest.
My jaw clenches as I grab it before it falls on the floor.
When he speaks again, his voice carries the weight of a final authority. “You’ve six hours, starting now. You’ll bring Ariella Keinston here,” a pause. “Sedated and ready to initiate the conversion right away,” another pause. “Do not mistake my patience for weakness again.”
His covered eyes bore through me. “The next time you stand before me with an excuse instead of a result, I’ll not find an excuse to spare you, heir.”
The order settles over the laboratory like a death sentence.
I have to bring Ariella Keinston within six hours.
Six hours isn’t nearly as generous as it sounds.
The Triarch Dominion is buried deep within the Forest of Dean. A full round trip between here and Oxford would devour almost ninety percent of that time, and that is assuming nothing goes wrong.
My mind begins doing what it’s trained to do—it calculates.
Campus security rotations.
The probability of Adrian Keinston leaving or not her side.
The most efficient dosage for chemical restraint.
The least traumatic method of administration.
The thoughts arrive one after another with mechanical precision. I hate that they come so easily.
The Crown studies me in silence.
“Untouched. Entirely biological. No artificial modifications, no synthetic enhancements, no engineered replacements, and yet it continues to outperform creations specifically designed for efficiency. Your brain has never failed to amuse me, Hertley.”
His head tilts ever so slightly. “Sometimes I wonder whether nature accidentally perfected what science has spent decades trying to imitate.”
There’s something deeply unsettling about the observation.
He isn’t complimenting me. He’s studying me. The way a scientist studies a specimen that refuses to obey established laws.
“Prove that your assessment of the subject is correct,” he says with a slow exhale, as though he has finally reached a conclusion.
Not about her. About me.
“She’ll come,” I say.
“Oh, I know she will,” he scoffs with too much arrogance, too sure of himself. “I want you to know it too.”
I look at him.
He gives the slightest dip of his chin, expecting me to make the move on his watch.
I grit my teeth and slip my hand inside my overcoat, retrieving my phone.
Somewhere beneath that porcelain mask, I know he’s smiling. I don’t need to see it to know it’s there.
My gaze drops only long enough to unlock the screen and open the recent call log.
Ariella’s name sits at the top. The last time I called her was after she went looking for me at the Velmourne Club.
“Behind you,” my own voice echoes through my head.
She spins around too quickly, startled by my voice, and falls straight into my arms.
Instinct or calculation—I haven’t decided which. My hands naturally find her waist before she loses her balance.
Her small palms flatten against my chest, warm even through the black fabric of my shirt.
Ariella looks up at me with those impossible hazel eyes, the kind that never seemed content with one color. Gold around the pupils. Green at the edges. Flecks of brown scattered between them as though someone forgot to finish the painting.
She’s dressed entirely in white. A soft-looking skirt. A sweetheart neckline. Puffed sleeves. White boots that tried and failed to make up for the difference in our height.
Meanwhile, I’ve been wearing what I always wear—black, from head to toe.
From a distance, we must look ridiculously like a scene from some forgotten fairytale. A damsel standing exactly where she never should’ve been—the devil’s grip.
The music continues drifting through the laboratory. The melody loops through the speakers again and again, transforming it into a haunting background noise. Then suddenly it stops.
I look over at the live footage now playing, and for the second time in my life, my blood runs cold.
The video isn’t in HD—far from it, since it’s been zoomed in from at least a few miles away. But the message is clear.
Ariella is being tracked live. The ammunition sight is aimed right at the nape of her neck. Judging by the angle, it’s a tranquilizer. In the footage, she’s sleeping peacefully in her dimly lit bedroom. The same bed where I wrecked her just hours ago.
“If you don’t bring her here yourself, I promise you won’t like the outcome.”
A muscle ticks in my jaw, and the veins in my temple throb.
“One condition,” I grit out, not waiting for his approval. “Nobody touches her except me. And by that,” I look dead in his eyes, “I mean nobody, or else I end your best creation.”
He dares to scoff. “Bring her here, Alistair.”
“Do. I. Have. Your. Word?”
“You do. No one touches her.” He murmurs something else under his breath—some bullshit about how he never thought I’d be so obsessed with her.
As if it’s that simple. Little does he know, it’s not an obsession. It’s something far more dangerous than that vague word.
My thumb hovers over the screen. One touch is all it would take.
I could warn her.
I could tell her to disappear.
I could spend the next six hours running and guarantee both of our deaths instead.
Or I could do what I’ve always done—being nonchalant as usual.
I do none of what I should, but hit call and press it against my ear.
The call connects on the fourth ring. Soft, unguarded sound reaches me first—fabric shifting, sleepy breathing.
Then her voice, thick with sleep and exhaustion. “Professor?”
It’s too early for someone to be awake. Of course, she was sleeping.
Ariella thinks I was too drunk last night to remember any of what happened.
“I remember telling you to use my first name, haven’t I?”
“I—uhh… sorry, yes—hi… Al-Alistair.”
I don’t need to see her face to know she’s blushing.
My eyes lift to the Crown, who’s still watching me.
I decide to make this quick. The less I speak, the less of myself I’ve to betray.
“There has been a development with the archival project,” I say, my voice settling into the same calm tone I use during lectures. “I need access to the faculty records before the department opens. I could use another pair of eyes.”
A pause. I can almost picture her frowning into the darkness.
“At this hour?”
“The university network will be overloaded once classes begin. It will be easier to finish the work beforehand.”
“Uhh… okay, so where should I meet you?”
The Crown doesn’t waver his gaze from me. Which makes me understand what this is—he isn’t testing her, but me.
“Come to my faculty office,” I tell her. “The east wing will still be empty. Bring the notes you compiled last week. I think you were right about the inconsistencies in the data.”
She perks up immediately, all the sleepiness gone in an instant. “You actually checked them?”
“I wouldn’t have called if I hadn’t,” I try to smile.
Unexpectedly, it doesn’t come as naturally as it used to.
A quiet laugh escapes her. Sleep still clings to her voice.
“I’ll be there.”
“Alright,” I say quietly and end the call to stop pretending.
The Crown finally inclines his head. “No instructions to come alone?”
“There’s no need.”
The masked man studies me for a long moment.
“I was beginning to wonder whether she had made you forget what you truly are,” there’s a faint trace of satisfaction in his voice.
That’s something I wonder too. So I decide to not answer. I just stare blankly at him.
I’ve long since learned that the most dangerous lies are the ones a man tells himself.
And right now, I can’t possibly tell whether I called Ariella to save both of us… or because some dark, selfish part of me wanted to see her.