CHAPTER 18
CHESTNUT HAIR CLINGS in short, uneven strands to a broad face, set above a stocky build that couldn’t be more different from my brother’s sinewy frame. His skin is sallow in the torchlight, nothing like Saul’s more rosy complexion.
There’s no trace of the charcoal hair we share either.
“That’s my name, yes.” He throws a quick glance over his shoulder. “You really picked the worst time to be so slow.”
How is this possible? Is it the herbal fog?
Starvation haze? A trick of the torchlight?
For a moment I wonder if I’ve finally snapped, if I’ve conjured Saul out of desperation, given some poor fledgling guard my brother’s voice just to cope.
It wouldn’t be the first time this place has warped my grip on reality, although it would be the most extreme yet.
But he moves like my brother. Speaks like him. Even if the body is all wrong. The wrong colors. The wrong shapes. None of it adds up.
“How?” I whisper. “You don’t even look like him.”
He exhales through his nose, pulling a small, corked vial from his pocket.
It glows a faint, sickly green. “Illusion potion,” he says.
“Cursed stuff. Smells like piss and pine needles. But it does the job.” He doesn’t wait for me to respond, just casts quick glances toward the doorway, every muscle suddenly tense.
“Now move, before Cain’s goons get suspicious and come sniffing. ”
With haste, I step out of the bath, wrapping the towel around me. “Mom is here, Saul. I saw her.”
“I know.” He tosses a bundle of clothes at me—a guard’s uniform.
They look used, but I don’t question what was done to the wearer, survival preceding.
His jaw ticks, eyes flicking to the ground for half a second, just long enough to betray the frustration he tries to bury. “They’re keeping her somewhere we can’t or don’t know how to get to.”
“You knew and you never thought to tell me?”
“Questions later,” he hisses, checking the corridor again.
I dress hastily, my fingers clumsy from the herbs.
The uniform is too large, but it’ll have to do.
The stiff fabric smells of something worn too long in the dark.
Matte black from collar to boot, it is streamlined for optimal motion.
The chest armor is heavy, molded and reinforced, probably resistant to tungsten blades and bullets.
It fits awkwardly over my ribs, too wide in the shoulders, but I tighten the clasps anyway.
Over my heart, I catch the faint impression of a sigil: a fang encircled by a ring of thorny vines. If I hadn’t turned just so, the dim light grazing it at the right angle, I wouldn’t have seen it.
Even the hood, when pulled up, casts a shade that entirely distorts the wearer’s features. It’s a uniform that hides its wearer, erases their identity, and turns them into part of something bigger.
Something built for assimilation.
Right outside the bathing chamber, another guard waits, moving with the same distinctive mannerisms as my brother.
I’m led through a series of narrow passages, different from the ones on the way here.
We pause at intersections, Saul signaling with quick hand gestures.
Left. Wait. Now right. At one junction, he pulls me into a shallow alcove as two vampires pass, their voices echoing.
“—is madness,” one says. “Why would we send half a patrol over a flickering tunnel?”
“Lord Cain has decided to treat every flicker like a breach, especially with what’s coming up. ”
Saul doesn’t react, but there’s a glint of satisfaction in his eyes, gone before it settles. When they’ve rounded the corner, he pulls me forward again. We eventually reach a crypt where two more figures wait.
One of them wears the face of Egon, one of the vampires that infiltrated Penn City through Viktor’s tunnels. Back then, he’d quaked at the mere mention of the Ravens, and now one of them has claimed his face. Poor Egon.
They surround me in formation as Saul leads us upward through more tunnels. The air grows cooler, fresher, as we near the surface.
Twice more we hide from patrols, pressed against cold stone until danger passes. Then, rounding another bend, a low voice calls out from the shadows.
“Who goes there?”
One of three guards steps forward, his silhouette blocking our path. “Identify yourselves.”
Saul doesn’t skip a beat. “Just a routine check,” he answers, his tone flat and rehearsed.
The guard doesn’t buy it. “Routine at this hour? And who is this?” His eyes flick to me, narrowing.
There’s a brief silence as the guard takes in my features, most likely my hair. My bad for not tucking them better into my hood. I can feel Saul’s pulse quicken under his calm exterior.
Recognition seems inevitable. “That’s the dhamp—”
Without warning, Saul’s hand darts out. His fingers find the guard’s throat, tightening with uncanny rigor.
In a fluid movement, he spins the man into the wall, his head snapping to the side with a sickening crack.
The other guard doesn’t even have time to react, already falling before he realizes what’s happening; Imposter Egon’s hands move like lightning as the guard’s arm is grabbed and twisted behind his back.
A quick flick of the wrist, and his neck gives way with a sharp snap, his body crumpling to the ground.
The third guard’s eyes widen in shock. He turns to speed off, but by the time he tries, his neck is already broken in a single, seamless movement, his body hitting the stone with a dull thud.
All three guards are down, their bodies sprawled in unnatural positions.
The silence is deafening, thick with the weight of what just transpired.
They’re not dead, but it must still hurt like hell to have your limbs abused like that.
At least I would’ve made sure they didn’t have to get back up.
Finally, we reach a heavy wooden door set into the rock, its surface scarred by time and weather. It groans as it swings open, the sound loud in the stillness.
Beyond lies a moonlit forest, bathed in silvery light that filters softly through swaying branches. I inhale deeply, savoring the scent of pine and damp earth, a fragrant reminder of life after days spent suffocating in dark underground chambers.
But the open sky feels less like freedom, knowing a new danger has found its way to me.
Without a word, we surge forward, the woodland blurring around us as we run faster than humanly possible.
The trees seem to part for us, the ground barely registering beneath our feet.
No one speaks until we’re well away from where I was held captive.
Even then, it’s only in whispers, as if the forest itself might betray us.
After what feels like hours, though I know it’s been mere minutes, we slow down. Our pace eases into something more human, our feet touching the ground again with the familiar weight of normalcy.
We come to a stop near a clearing.
One of them checks our surroundings, scanning the trees. It’s eerily quiet, and I feel the shift in the air before she speaks.
“Clear,” she announces, and we begin to walk again.
The forest stretches endlessly in every direction as we move deeper into it, the night feeling heavier as the trees close in around us.
There’s no transport to board, no sleek machine to take us farther, just the pull of the soil beneath our feet and the breeze of the wind through the leaves—a reminder that we’re alone in this silent expanse.
I can’t shake the feeling that we’re being led somewhere we’re not meant to go. But maybe that’s the intent. To lead us beyond the reach of anyone foolish enough to follow, to a place where no normal person would dare trespass.
What if this is all a fabrication, too? A painted forest meant to keep outsiders walking in circles until they forget where they were going. For a moment, the ground seems to shift beneath me, the trees breathing in and out like something alive.
My pulse slows. I’m imagining things—paranoia creeping in where exhaustion should be.
Even so, a thought takes root. Maybe this is how they did it back then: illusioned to look like Redmoore guards, slipping past every real one of them, every locked door during the massacre.
Not invisible. Just unseen. Disguised. I recall the confusion as supposedly dead guards rose and began attacking my father.
They weren’t zombies or possessed. It was much simpler than that, and more brilliant.
They were never human guards in the first place. They were Raven members.
“What were you thinking, going that far from home?” Saul turns to me, his disguised face unable to hide the familiar furrow of his brow.
“It was for a mission,” I say defensively, though exhaustion makes it hard to summon real indignation. “We were trying to capture Wraith to learn about sire bonds.”
They all stare at me blankly.
“Wraith?” the woman asks, her voice carrying the clear confusion of hearing a name that exists only in Redmoore’s files.
“The female Whiteshade that attacked Penn City the other day,” I clarify. “Clementine.”
“Whiteshade,” Imposter Egon snorts. “And what do they call you? Grayshade?”
A few snickers ripple through the group. Even Saul lets out a quiet huff of amusement before quickly masking it. The tension thins for a moment, stretched but not yet snapping.
It wasn’t that funny.
I feel the flicker of something sharp rise in my chest. An urge to snap back. But I swallow it down. In this moment, they are the lesser evil.
They helped me escape Cain.
“Dhampir,” I simply say, but the clipped tone in my voice gives me away.
“And how did that work out for you?” Saul asks, blatantly sarcastic. “Capturing a Noble on their own territory?”
I glare at him. “About as well as your disguise. You’re still an ass, even when you don’t look like yourself.”
Saul’s mouth twists into a wry smirk. “Only the best for my sister.”