18. Venetia
Venetia
T he morning air bites at my skin as I stride across the quad, my phone clutched in my hand like a weapon.
The freshly turned earth of the makeshift graveyard is a dark scar against the ancient stones, a reminder of what my presence here has cost. I retrieve the fallen necklace from the sodden, muddy ground.
Somehow, it still manages to look priceless even covered in dirt.
I grimace at it and wrap the chain around my hand, feeling the gold dig into the wounds made on my palms yesterday from both the pendant and the digging.
I’m aching from head to toe. I wanted nothing more than to stay in bed, stay asleep, where none of this horror has happened.
But here we are.
Here I am. On my feet, my back feeling broken, my arms and legs screaming in protest.
I need answers, and there’s only one person who has them.
I make my way to high ground. The clock tower.
My thumb hovers over Dad’s contact for a heartbeat before I press call.
He answers on the first ring, as if he’s been waiting. His face appears on my screen. “Venetia.”
“We need to talk,” I say without preamble. “And this time, you’re going to tell me the fucking truth.”
A pause.
“I take it you’ve found something.”
His voice is carefully neutral, but I know him too well. There’s resignation there, the weary tone of a man who’s been dreading this conversation for years.
I hold up the necklace so he can see it. “You could say that. Tell me about the Hale side of this family, Dad. Tell me about our real history.”
Another pause, longer this time. When he speaks again, his face has changed. Gone is the careful neutrality, replaced by something harder, older.
“Where did you find that?”
“In a Roman tomb beneath the academy. Along with a crown bearing our family crest and enough treasure to fund a small country.” I turn the pendant over in my palm, watching the light play across its surface.
“The same necklace you gave Mum for her thirtieth birthday. Except this one’s been sitting underground for centuries. ”
“Venetia—”
“No.” My voice echoes in the empty grounds, harsh and unforgiving. “No more deflection. No more half-truths. Those bastards slaughtered a bunch of heirs to get my attention, and they’re offering me a crown like I’m some long-lost fucking princess. So start talking.”
The silence stretches between us, filled with the weight of secrets and lies. When he finally speaks, his voice is heavy with something that might be regret.
“The Hale family were founding members.”
The words hit me like a tidal wave. “Founding members of what, exactly?”
“The organisation that became the Graduates. What they now call their trafficking network.” He takes a breath and rubs his face. “It goes back several hundred years, Venetia. Maybe more. The Hales weren’t just members—they were architects.”
“Architects of human trafficking.” The words taste like bile in my mouth.
“Architects of control. Order. They believed that chaos could be managed, that society could be perfected through the careful movement of resources and people.” His voice is clinical now, as if he’s discussing a historical text rather than our family’s legacy of horror.
“The trafficking was never the goal—it was the method. That obviously has devolved as time wore on.”
I close my eyes, trying to process this. “You’re saying that the Hale family who attached themselves to the Corbyn name through marriage, were a bunch of fucking arseholes.”
“Pretty much. They are also older and far more threatening than any family had a right to be.”
“So how come I’ve never heard of any Hales on their own?”
“They pivot.”
I inhale deeply. “I see.”
“Because my great-great-grandfather made a choice.” For the first time, there’s emotion in his voice—pride, fierce and unyielding.
“Edmund Corbyn looked at what his wife’s family had built and chose to burn it down rather than let it pass down through his sons.
He walked away from everything. Lost territory, lost power, lost the respect of every crime family in Europe. ”
“But not all of it burnt, did it? Some of it survived. Some of it was rebuilt.”
“As I said, the Hales were powerful. Cravenmoor, as you know it, was built on their funds. The Graduates are what crawled out of the ashes Edmund left behind. They’ve spent the last century trying to rebuild what Edmund destroyed, but they’ve always been missing the crucial element.”
“Which is?”
“The bloodline. The legitimacy. The Hale name carries weight in their world, Venetia. It always has. They see you as the prodigal daughter, the lost princess returning to claim her throne.”
I laugh, a harsh sound that echoes off the stone walls. “And you sent me here anyway. Knowing what they’d want, what they’d offer.”
“I sent you there to finish what Edmund started.”
His words stop me cold. I stare out over the grounds, past the wall, into the distance, and I feel the pieces clicking into place.
“You want me to destroy them by accepting their offer. By becoming their queen.”
“By using their structure against them. They’re handing you the keys to their kingdom, Venetia. With strings.”
“And what, pray tell, are those strings?” I spit out seeing Viper marching across the quad with a face like thunder. He spots me in the clock tower with a glare that could wither an ancient oak. But he sees I’m alive and kicking and waits, giving me the space I need.
“They want a dynasty. It’s the only way they can secure their future.”
“They don’t have a future,” I snarl, the fury so potent I can taste it. “I’m going to burn it to the fucking ground before it even begins.”
“And that’s why I have every faith you will finish what Edmund started. You are the only one, Venetia, to get close enough to them to choke them.”
“And if I fail? If I become exactly what they want me to be?”
“Then I’ll kill you myself.”
The words should shock me, but they don’t. This is who we are—who I am. A family that chooses duty over sentiment, justice over comfort. A family that understands sometimes love means being willing to destroy what you’ve created.
“How long do I have?”
“They’ll move soon. The siege won’t last—they can’t afford to let this drag out. Other families are watching, and other organisations are positioning themselves. They need your answer before their window closes.”
“I have to go. They’ll be looking for me.”
“Venetia.” His voice stops me as I’m about to end the call. “Whatever you choose, I’m proud of you. Edmund walked away from power because he was afraid of what it would cost. You’re walking towards it because you understand what it’s worth.”
“Goodbye, Dad.”
“Venetia, wait. The… referral scan. It’s set for next week. Don’t miss the appointment.”
That’s his way of saying don’t die before you get your breasts checked for cancer.
What a fucking fabulous fucking legacy. A cluster of trafficking fuckers on my dad’s side and bad breast genes on my mother’s.
Who picked this life for me? Whoever it was needs a kick up the arse, and I intend to deliver it before my final bell tolls.
Whether that be tomorrow or in ten years, or in fifty years.
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I snap and end the call.
I exhale slowly. I still don’t have all the answers. Why the tomb? Why the chest of gold and jewels? Why did Cravenmoor choose to seal it off? Unless… I gulp and stare at the necklace in my hand. Unless these priceless artefacts are the spoils of war, bloodstones.
“Fuck,” I mutter as bile rises in my throat, and I launch the necklace as far from me as I can. It lands at Viper’s feet with a thud, and he looks up with a raised eyebrow.
He doesn’t flinch. He just looks down at the muddy piece of filthy history at his feet, then back up at me. His expression is unreadable, a stone mask, but his navy eyes are turbulent, churning with a thousand questions I don’t have the fucking energy to answer.
My legs feel like lead as I make my way down the winding stone steps of the clock tower.
Each step is a descent back into the hell my life has become.
A queen. My father wants me to become a queen of monsters.
He wants me to wear their crown, accept their blood-soaked legacy, and then slit their throats while they sleep.
It’s the most Corbyn-Hale fucking plan I’ve ever heard.
It’s fucking insane. It’s fucking perfect.
Viper waits for me at the side of the quad, not moving, not speaking. He just watches me approach, his presence a solid wall I want to lean against, even as every instinct screams at me to stand on my own. He bends down, scoops up the necklace, and holds it out to me.
“Leave it,” I say, my voice raw.
“No,” he counters, his voice low and firm. “It’s a weapon. We use every weapon we have.” He shoves it into the pocket of his jeans. “Talk to me.”
“Later,” I choke out. “We all need to hear this.”
He just nods, falling into step beside me as we walk back towards Blake’s room. He doesn’t press, doesn’t demand answers. He just walks, a silent, lethal shadow at my side. A guard for a queen about to declare war.
We may not have all the answers yet. But we have more than we did. We have had our suspicions confirmed, and that will do. For now.