Chapter 14 The Law of Fate
THE LAW OF FATE
The tablet creaked beneath the pressure of my grip, the casing fracturing as my anger sharpened into something colder and more vicious. After which, I barely even registered the damage. Objects could be fixed with nothing but a thought.
My Siren could not.
Whoever had attached themself to her could be a threat.
One that I would soon eradicate. But for now, I replayed the footage again, slower this time, only stopping when I got to the part where a demon caught her scent.
The subtle change in its posture, the predatory turn of its head displaying an instinct that overrode restraint.
She hadn’t understood what was happening at first; that much was clear.
She’d frozen for half a breath too long, ignorance buying the demon time it never should have been afforded.
Because something in my club had pursued her.
Because she had been exposed, vulnerable, bleeding, in a space that bent entirely to my will.
A domain layered in wards, watched by this Enforcer who made his own rules.
Rules that were older than most of the creatures who drank and danced beneath my ceiling.
She should never have been prey here. Not even for a moment.
That was unforgivable.
My gaze lifted from the screen, the decision already made.
“Identify the demon,” I said, my voice low and lethal, leaving no room for delay.
“I know where he’ll likely be.” Torin’s jaw set, and he gave me a firm nod. Of course he did. As head of my security, he knew more about what went on in my club than even I did.
I handed him the broken tablet without looking at it again, the image of her standing alone burned too deeply into my mind to require repetition.
“Good,” I said, already turning away before adding,
“Because I intend to make an example out of him.”
Somewhere deep beneath restraint, my demon stirred in anticipation. The shift was immediate the moment I stepped onto the lower level.
Conversations died mid-sentence. Laughter was effectively cut short. The music didn’t stop, but it seemed to soften, muffled beneath the sudden weight of my presence. Fear bloomed, fast and ripe, spreading in instinctive waves as bodies turned, heads bowed, eyes averted far too late.
This fear was familiar.
It curled through me like smoke, dark and potent, sinking into my bones with a satisfaction I did not bother to deny.
My demon stirred fully now, uncoiling with approval, feeding on the tension that thickened the air with every step I took forward.
This was the type of fear I had earned. The fear I deserved.
Not like hers.
Torin moved at my side, silently, his gaze already scanning the room. I did not need him to point anything out. I could feel the disturbance like a bruise against my awareness. A knot of unease that did not belong to the crowd as a whole but clung to a single presence near the bar.
There.
My demon growled.
The effect rippled outward, a visible hesitation as the space around me cleared without instruction. No one needed to be told to move. They felt it.
They felt the darkness rise from my skin as it unfurled, feeding on the fear already thick in the room. I didn’t even need to nod to Torin before he made a cutting motion across his neck for the music to be silenced.
“The mortal girl,” I stated, my voice carrying easily over the space, over the few brave murmurs, and over the collective breath held too long.
“She is under my protection.” Silence fell hard then.
“She is not prey…” I continued, each word spoken like a ruling.
“She is not entertainment, and furthermore, she is not to be touched, followed, spoken to, or fed from.” I let the pause stretch, allowed the weight of it to settle into the bones of everyone present before I made my final point law…
“She is mine!”
The declaration landed like a verdict.
I felt it then, the spike of panic from the demon near the bar, sharp and sudden as recognition set in.
Too fucking late, asshole.
He tried to shrink into the background, to make himself smaller and forgettable. But fear had already betrayed him, bleeding through the crowd like ink through water.
Torin inclined his head slightly, and I bared my teeth, my fangs growing in anticipation as I moved.
The distance closed in a blink, my hand catching the demon by the throat before he could so much as scream.
Gasps rippled through the onlookers as I lifted him from the floor with effortless strength, his feet kicking uselessly as his hands scrabbled against my wrist.
“You thought that because she was mortal, that she was unclaimed,” I said quietly, leaning in close enough for only him to hear. His terror spiked, raw and choking, and I inhaled deeply, savoring it.
“I am correcting that mistake.” I did not tear him apart. That would have been too quick. Too merciful.
Instead, I let my power seep into him slowly, crushing, compressing, turning bone and muscle into something more pliable beneath my grip. His scream tore free then, echoing through the club as he collapsed inward, body folding under the weight of my judgment.
I released him only when he could no longer hold himself upright.
He hit the floor in a broken heap, alive but ruined, his agony a lesson that would be remembered far longer than his name.
“This is punishment for touching what is mine,” I told him after lowering enough to reach his ears over the sound of his own agony. Then I straightened, turning back to the room, my expression calm, controlled. My rule absolute.
“Let this stand as a warning,” I said evenly.
“To any who might be confused in future. Now, does anyone have any questions?”
No one spoke.
No one moved.
“No? Good. Then consider this fucking law!” Satisfied, I turned away, already done with them. The fear lingered behind me, thick and nourishing, and for the first time since leaving her, my demon was content.
But then my thoughts quickly shifted elsewhere.
Back to my office.
Back to her.
Which was no doubt why the walk back felt longer than it should have done. Not because the distance had changed, but because my awareness had narrowed to a single point ahead of me. One now fixed on the certainty that she would still be there when I returned.
Safe.
Protected.
My Captive.
Exactly where I had left her. The thought anchored me as I climbed the stairs, the lingering taste of fear and punishment fading beneath something far more urgent.
Mine.
I dismissed Torin at the door with a simple order.
“I am not to be disturbed.” The words were steady, yet beneath them something unfamiliar stirred.
Anticipation tightened through me with an undeniable pull that bordered dangerously close to excitement.
This, simply at the thought of seeing her again.
I pushed the door open before it could deepen into something less contained, yet the room greeted me with stillness.
For half a breath, nothing registered as wrong. The space was intact. The lights still low. The air warm with the faint echo of her presence, a trace of something softer lingering like an afterimage. My office remained exactly as I had left it, save for one thing missing.
The most important piece at that.
Then my gaze dropped to the floor and the book that now lay there, the sight hitting me like time had just been fractured.
I crossed the room in two strides, my senses flaring outward instinctively, power surging as I searched for her presence.
The wards hummed in response, intact and unbroken, with their song unaltered.
“No,” I muttered quietly.
The word was not denial. It was more like a calculation.
I scanned the room again, slower this time, methodical. The chair untouched. The desk undisturbed. No sign of struggle. No scent of panic. No blood. No rupture in the wards that would suggest forced exit.
She had not been taken.
She had fucking left!
The realization settled cold and heavy in my chest, followed swiftly by something far more volatile. Anger, yes, but threaded through it was something sharper, more dangerous.
Concern.
I crouched, lifting the book from the floor with care that surprised even me. Her fingers had been on it. I could feel the faint imprint of her presence clinging to the pages, as though the object itself remembered her touch.
She had also left behind the whisper of her magic.
Magic she shouldn’t have possessed.
My jaw clenched, the room darkening as my power responded to the shift in my mood, shadows stretching, tightening along the walls. My collection of books and artifacts vibrated in place as the shelves shook as if trembling in fear of my wrath.
“How?” I murmured, more to the wards than to myself.
They did not answer, of course, because they had not failed.
Which meant only one thing. I straightened slowly, my expression settling into something far calmer than the storm churning beneath it.
She had not escaped by chance. She had been helped.
Shielded. Guided. There was no other explanation for it.
The thought made my demon snarl, jealous and furious at the idea of another entity touching what we had already claimed. My demon and I. But beneath that fury was certainty.
I knew her name.
I knew where she worked.
And now, I knew that whatever had followed her into my domain was still with her. Still clinging on and refusing to retract its claws that had latched onto her very essence.
Well, not for fucking long!
I turned toward the door.
“Torin!” I called, my voice carrying enough that he was there instantly.
“She’s gone?” he said, with surprise, for he knew better than most how impossible that should have been for her to do.
“Yes,” I gritted out, my eyes still fixed on the space she had occupied.
“But that shouldn’t have been possible,” he commented, making me snarl,
“No, it should not.”
The book lay heavy in my hand as I slammed it shut.