Chapter Thirteen
The screaming stopped as fast as it started.
Ant’s consciousness reminded him of a shattered mirror - hundreds of pieces scattered in a storm - and yet, as the sound stopped, something else shifted.
The sensory noise suddenly dampened, as if someone had thrown a heavy blanket over a shrieking fire alarm.
The temperature of the vision changed. What had seemed cold and dark and endless now had warmth - solid warmth.
Viktor. His brain sighed. Ant felt his mate’s presence wrap around him like an invisible shield. Even the loop stopped, cutting off Ronald’s voice mid-word.
I’ve got you. Viktor’s mental voice was steady, unshakable. You’re safe. I’m here.
The relief was so intense that Ant’s awareness nearly splintered again, but Viktor’s presence tightened, holding him together.
The loop tried to restart - Claudius’s footsteps in the hallway, the door opening - but it was moving slowly now, almost sluggish, as if it was the magic that was trying to push through mud.
Feel me. I’m solid. Focus on me, not the loop.
Ant latched onto Viktor’s consciousness like a drowning man grabbing a rope. His mate’s presence was fierce and utterly focused, radiating protective fury and a solid determination that nothing - not wards, not ancient magic, not Claudius himself - would take Ant away from him.
The fragments of Ant’s awareness began to slowly piece back together.
He remembered who he was - Doctor Anthony Channon, who had a sister, Bridget, and a wonderful dog, Able.
He was a high-level mage, and an investigator for the Justiciary.
More importantly, he was the vampire known as Viktor’s fated mate. I’m fated, claimed, and loved.
Current status? He was conducting a scene reading at the Raven Estate, and had gotten stuck in a magical loop designed to erode his sense of self… But he wasn’t alone anymore.
Anchored by Viktor’s steady mental support, Ant stopped trying to escape the vicious loop and examined it instead.
The loop had been created by Claudius’s wards interacting with the scene of a traumatic death, amplifying and distorting the scene’s natural energies until it became a trap.
But now that Viktor had interrupted its momentum, Ant could see the structure underneath.
More importantly, he could manipulate it. Vik, he pushed through their bond, his mental voice still shaky but getting stronger. Stay with me. I need to push deeper.
Viktor’s presence radiated alarm. Babe, you nearly…
I know. Ant gathered his fractured awareness, pulling the pieces back together with Viktor’s warmth as his foundation. But I can control it now. You’re anchoring me. I can see the whole scene, not just the murder.
He felt Viktor’s reluctance, the instinctive need to pull Ant out of the vision entirely and never let him near anything more traumatic than a broken fingernail again.
But part of their connection was built on them knowing what each other needed, and after a moment, Viktor’s presence solidified further.
I’m not letting go.
I know. Please don’t.
Ant turned his attention back to the vision.
Instead of letting it play forward into Ronald’s death, he pushed backward, following the threads of magical residue to the hours before the murder.
It wasn’t anything he’d tried to do before, but then he’d never been as deep into a vision as he was in that moment.
The loop resisted - it was intent on having him relive poor Finch’s death over and over again - but with Viktor anchoring him, Ant had the strength to fight it.
The scene rewound. Ronald stood up from the chair, walking backward to the door. The guest room dissolved and was replaced by the estate’s marble hallway. Ant followed Ronald’s echo through the corridors, watching time run in reverse until he found what he needed.
The vision stabilized. Roughly eleven hours before the murder, Ronald Finch had crept through the manor’s east wing, constantly watching over his shoulder as he made his way down a hallway. His hands were shaking, and the man flinched at every creak of a floorboard, but Ronald seemed determined.
Ant watched as Ronald approached a door at the end of the hallway. He guessed it was Claudius’s private study, which would’ve been the same one Viktor had scouted while invisible. Viktor’s approval through their bond seemed to confirm that.
Ronald glanced over his shoulder, then pulled a small magical talisman from his pocket. It pulsed with detection-dampening enchantments, the kind used by investigators sometimes, and Ant wondered where he’d gotten it from.
Perhaps the fact that the murder happened in a coven wasn’t the only reason the Justiciary was called in.
Ronald pressed the talisman against the study door’s lock, whispered an unlocking charm, and within seconds, the door clicked open.
There, Ant thought. That’s how he accessed the records.
Ronald slipped inside, and Ant went with him.
The study was opulent in the way only centuries of accumulated wealth could create - leather-bound books, antique furniture, and more of those gothic-style portraits painted in oils.
Ronald ignored all of it, moving directly to a section of the wall behind Claudius’s desk.
His fingers traced the wood paneling until he found what he was looking for. He pressed three specific points in sequence, and a section of the wall fell into his hands, revealing the safe Viktor had mentioned. Heavy ward-magic shimmered across its surface, but the safe door stood open.
Ant couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Viktor had said the safe had been locked when he had found it. But this time… Claudius left it unlocked? Was he honestly that careless, or had Claudius left it that way deliberately? The planning behind Finch’s murder suddenly seemed so much more ominous.
Ronald pulled a camera from his jacket and began photographing the contents. Ant watched as page after page of ledgers appeared in the camera’s viewfinder. Names. Dates. Account numbers. Signatures on legal documents transferring property and fortunes to shell corporations.
But it was the smaller journal buried under those papers that made Ant’s breath catch.
It was filled with handwritten pages, done in a small, tight script.
Ronald photographed several pages, and Ant guessed the handwriting had to be Claudius’s.
If that was true, and it was Claudius’s, then the vampire had kept meticulous records of every vampiric trance he’d performed, noting which humans he’d enthralled, for how long, and which assets he’d convinced them to sign over while their minds were compromised.
That’s definitely premeditation, Ant realized. He documented his own crimes.
Ronald finished photographing the evidence and carefully returned everything to its original position. He closed the safe, reset the wall panel, and slipped back out of the study, using the talisman to lock the door behind him.
The scene shifted forward. Ant followed the timeline, watching as Ronald returned to his assigned guest room and backed up the photographs to a secure cloud server. He watched Ronald compose a message to whoever he was working for, explaining what he’d found and requesting immediate backup.
But Ronald never got to send that message...because of the dampening wards.
The vision jumped again, and Ant felt the fear as if it was real, even though he knew he was still in his vision state.
Claudius was standing in his study, staring at the safe, and as Ant watched, the vampire pulled out his phone and watched the recent security footage.
Every second of Ronald’s find had been caught on camera.
“Edmund,” Claudius called.
The younger vampire appeared in the doorway. “My lord?”
“The human accountant has seen the ledgers.” Claudius’s voice was emotionless. “He photographed the journals. We cannot allow him to leave this estate alive.”
“Should we retrieve his devices first? Destroy the evidence?”
“No.” Claudius turned, and his pale gray eyes glittered as his fangs dropped. “I’m feeling a little peckish and in the mood for a late-night snack. If we search his belongings, he’ll know we’re aware of his activities, and I might miss out, and we wouldn’t want that, now, would we?”
Edmund quickly shook his head. “When did you want to do this?”
“Tonight, after the household settles. We can set up the scene so that it appears perfectly natural. It’s just so sad that sometimes our younger visitors just lose control… Oh, dear, how sad. Accidents happen. We can let the household staff find his body in due course, call in the authorities…”
“That’s usually enough. They barely investigate anything, and at least that way no one else will come around snooping for a missing man.” Edward was nodding now.
“Exactly, but if for some reason the Justiciary gets involved, well…by the time they get around to finding an investigator, let alone sending one all the way out here, my wards and the magic around this estate will have already corrupted any energies someone might try to read from the scene.”
“You really do think of everything.”
“Watch and learn, Edward. Watch and learn.”
The scene shifted one final time. Ant watched Claudius and Edmund enter Ronald’s guest room that night, with one other vampire.
He watched Ronald look up from his financial documents, the surprise and fear flashing across his face.
He watched Claudius use vampiric trance to paralyze Ronald completely, then feed on him until Ronald’s heart couldn’t keep beating.
But this time, anchored by Viktor’s presence, Ant could observe and remember every little detail.
He noted the exact words Claudius spoke, and Edmund’s position by the door - watching with a hunger on his own face.
He saw that Ronald had been writing notes about Raven Industries’ shell corporation structure when interrupted, and that the pen he’d been holding was a distinctive fountain pen with a silver clip - not the cheap ballpoint that had been on the desk in the crime scene photographs.
They switched the pen, Ant realized. Removed evidence that must have been Ronald’s handwriting and notes about what he discovered, and replaced them with generic records which would’ve been of no interest to anyone.
As Ronald’s life drained away, Ant felt the ward-magic activate - fed by the energies surrounding a violent death.
Whether intentional or not, that act alone meant any future investigator would be trapped in an endless loop of trauma.
But Ant understood its structure now, and more importantly, he’d seen everything he needed to make a case and testify about it.
Carefully, deliberately, Ant began to sever his connection to the scene. The vision clung to him, and the wards were still trying to drag him back into the loop, but Viktor’s presence gave him the boost he needed.
Come back to me, Viktor urged through their bond. Follow my voice.
Ant pulled backward, away from Ronald’s death, away from Claudius’s cruelty, and more importantly, away from the grasping magical energies of the Raven Estate.
The vision grew distant, and with Viktor’s mental presence to guide him, Ant followed that anchor point back toward his own body and the promise of Viktor’s physical arms.
Pop. The vision released him all at once.
Ant collapsed backward, falling away from that cursed chair with its burgundy cushion, as his consciousness slammed back into his physical form with a lot more force than normal.
Taking stock of his physical condition, Ant realized his lungs were burning, his head was pounding, and as he reached up to touch his face, his fingertips were bloody again.
Ant felt warm fur press against his side, as Able realized he was back and his hands reached for that fur automatically. Viktor’s mental presence still wrapped around his awareness, but he was becoming more aware of his physical surroundings, and after a moment, he managed to open his eyes.
“Vik,” he managed, his voice hoarse. “I ache everywhere.”
“I’m right here.” Viktor’s physical voice still sounded anxious. “Don’t move. Just breathe.”
Ant turned his head and found Viktor crouched beside him, still maintaining the careful distance Ant had previously demanded. His mate’s eyes blazed red, his fangs were visible, and it was clear his vampiric side was hovering under the skin, just bursting to come out.
“I’m just going to say this once, babe, and then I promise I’ll shut up about it,” Viktor growled. “But there are times when your need to do the right thing by victims is an extreme pain in the ass.”
Able whined and licked Ant’s face, as Ant shook his head slowly and tried to smile. “Thank you,” he said softly. “Thank you for walking into hell to find me.”