Back up in the rafters, Vivienne licked her cws , the lingering taste of Laiken's blood still sharp and satisfying. The mannequin beside her remained ever vigint, its motionless form perched in the shadows with eerie stillness. Renzia had no eyes, only a etal stitch running down the ter of her face, but Viviee like the mannequin's silent gaze could see straight through her, its presen odd fort in the darkness.

  Laiken had been a potent meal, filled with aether. Perhaps not as much as aherbeast—those terrifying creatures that roamed the wilderness—but far superior to the weak mert she’d ed earlier that night. It was a hunger sated, but Viviehoughts remained sharp, as they always were after feeding. There was still much to be done.

  “Should I try finding this ‘uy’ first or should I go report to Narek and ask for dires?” Vivienne asked, her voice a low murmur in the silence. She leaned slightly forward, her gaze drifting toward the flickering ntern below.

  Renzia didn’t respond, her head tilting to one side in a subtle, jerky motion. The mannequin’s face, bnk and unseeing, gave no indication of uanding, yet the way she moved suggested her plete attentiveness. There was something ulingly unwavering in Renzia’s silence, as if the mannequin’s presence alone held some sort of meaning Vivienne couldn’t quite articute.

  Vivienne exhaled softly, a faint smile tugging at the ers of her lips. “You’re right,” she tinued, her tone lightly mog. “I should be a good little operative a to Narek. Wouldn’t want to go too far and leave him an unsatisfied er.”

  Vivienne rose from her per the rafters, her movements graceful despite the blood spattering her dress. She gnced down at Renzia, who had not moved an inch, the mannequin’s face eerily bnk as always. Vivieilted her head slightly, as if sidering some silent versation with herself, then made her way back down the dder with silent steps, avoiding the creaks of the old wood beh her feet.

  The warehouse was eerily quiet as she slipped out, the weight of Laiken’s corpse still hanging in her mind, even as the remnants of her meal were nothing more than a distant hunger satisfied. She carefully navigated through the streets, taking back alleys and keeping to the shadows, wary of any attention her bloodied appearance might draw. The streets of Serkoth, though mostly empty at this hour, could still hold unwanted eyes. Her dress, now more red than brown, g to her skin, every inch soaked in blood, a trail of it marking her path. The sharp, metallic st would make any creature with a keen nose aware of her presence—she o move fast.

  Vivienne and Renzia reached the Serkoth hall with ease, a structure both imposing and grand, rising above the other buildings with its high stone walls and the heavy air of authority surrounding it. She didn’t o knock, didn’t o announce herself—after all, Narek had given her free rein. Her only goal now was to keep her bloodstained form out of sight until she could get to his private quarters.

  Ihe hall was still, most of the ’s members either asleep or scattered across the city. Vivienne moved quickly, heading up the grand staircase to Narek’s chambers. Her steps were deliberate, careful. She didn’t want t attention to herself—not in this state. She pushed open the door to his bedroom as quietly as possible, the hinges barely creaking.

  Narek was asleep, his figure illuminated by the soft flicker of a dle by his bedside. The covers were pulled up to his chest, and for a moment, Vivien almost an odd sense of calm, watg him as he y there, unaware of the storm that had already passed through Serkoth.

  She moved toward the bed, her feet soundless against the cold stone floor. It wasn’t until she was standing beside him, h just over the edge of the sheets, that she spoke.

  “Narek,” she whispered, her voice sharp iillness.

  Narek jerked awake, his breath catg as the sharp sound of movement snapped him from sleep. For a moment, his eyes remained blurry with the fog of slumber, his mind struggling to piece together what had roused him. Then, as his gaze focused, he froze. Vivieood before him, her form bathed in a sickly sheen of blood, her dress shredded and ging to her skin like a sed yer. The dark fluid pooled around her feet, staining the stone floor, while her expression remained eerily calm, as though this were all nothing more than a casual affair. The stillness of her demeanor only heightehe grotesque trast of her state—she looked less like a person and more like somethiurned from a hunt.

  “Narek,” Vivienne spoke again, her voice smooth and unbothered, her lips curving into a small, predatory smile. She tilted her head slightly, her eyes gleaming with a dangerous satisfa. “I’ve pleted the task. Laiken is no longer a problem.”

  Narek’s body jerked upright, his hand instinctively reag for the dagger lying beside him on the bed, his pulse quiing. His mind raced with fusion, disbelief, and something darker creeping in. His eyes searched her form, taking in the grim sight of her, trying to prehend. When he spoke, his voice was rough, ced with both anger and arm. “What in the gods’ names happeo you? And who the hell is Laiken?”

  Vivienne chuckled softly, the sound dark and almost soothing, like the rustle of leaves before a storm. She stepped closer, the blood on her skin making the fai squelg sound as her feet shifted. “Laiken,” she begaone cool, as though discussing something trivial, “was a ckey for Skoll Rathik. She was also tied to Drevaris. Or, I should say, ‘she worked for him’.”

  Vivienne’s voice carried a soft edge of mockery, the way she lingered on Drevaris’ name sending a ripple of uhrough the air betweehe self hung in the dim light of the room, a ghost of something far darker than the present moment. Its implications stretched like shadowed tendrils, curling through the space between them and tightening with each passing sed.

  Narek’s grip tightened around the dagger hilt, his knuckles white as he studied her—his eyes shiftiween her blood-soaked form and her eerily posed expression. The sense of something wrong, something unseen in her, made his heart race. The blood, the casual way she spoke of death—it wasn’t the Vivienne he knew, and that realization made him pause, his instincts prig with unease.

  He swallowed, trying to force his voice steady despite the knot that had formed in his throat. "What did you do?" His words were quieter now, ced with something he couldn’t name—a mix of dread and disbelief, the kind that came when a door to something else had been opened. Something beyond what he could uand.

  Vivienne leaned slightly forward, her gaze fixed on him with uling crity, as though she were studying the very way his mind was w, peeling back his yers. She shrugged with a casualhat only seemed to highlight the differeween them—his uainty, her plete detat. “I vinced both of them to give me some information,” she said lightly, her voice almost airy, as though discussing nothing more than a mundane versation.

  The way she spoke left him with a pit in his stomach. The deliberate nonce. Her total ck of remorse. His hand remained ched around the dagger, but the weight of his question sat heavy on his chest.

  “What information?” he asked, voice low, though his mind was rag. The fact that she’d succeeded irag anything from them was enough to make him wary, but the way she hahe sequences in a single night so effortlessly—too effortlessly—made his skin crawl. He had expected her to take days at the very least.

  “The name of their employer, Skoll Rathik, and that he is very much tied to aegis. Also that he is currently in the uy.” Said Vivienne.

  Narek clicked his tongue in annoyance, his lupine ears twitg slightly in agitation as he processed Vivienne’s words. “The uy... expansive, nearly impossible to guard or patrol,” he muttered under his breath, as if trying to make sense of the information she had given him. His eyes never left her, studying her as he tried to recile what she had told him with the gravity of the situation. “Serkoth doesn’t have much crime, but all of it, it seems, festers down there. A pce where the worst things happen—hidden from the light.”

  Vivienne remained silent, her body still, her eyes gleaming with a cold iy. She didn’t o speak again—her presen the room was enough. Her blood-slicked dress and serene demeanor trasted sharply with the rawness of the revetion. She wasn’t here to indulge in pleasantries. Her mission was singur, and she would get what she wanted, no matter the cost.

  Narek’s sharp gaze narrowed as his mind raced to keep up. “Are you sure it was Skoll Rathik?” he asked, his voice thick with skepticism. “The Rathiks are a respected family here. Powerful. Iial.” His hands tightened briefly around the dagger, his body still on edge. “They’ve been ardent supporters in the war. They have more sway than you think. Why would someone like him be down there?”

  Vivie out a soft, knowing chuckle, as if the answer were so obvious it didn’t o be spoken. “I’m sure,” she replied, her voice ced with a hint of amusement. “I have ways of knowing. Skoll Rathik is tied to Aegis as well—a e deeper than you might realize.”

  Narek’s grip on his dagger loosened slightly, though he didn’t let it go. He doubted it would do much to this creature, but the familiar weight of the bde in his hand was a small fort. “I hope, for the sake of the rger families, that he’s the only oied to the Snty,” he said, his voice steady but ced with caution. “As for dires, I know of a few entrances, but the uy is a byrinth. I ’t help you beyond that.”

  Vivienne waved him off dismissively. “That’s fine. I avigate once I’m inside. I just wao report in, give you an update, and the some dires,” she said, her tone light. Then, as if remembering something, she paused and patted her tattered dress with exaggerated surprise. “Ah, right! I have some dots for you too.”

  She pulled out a ledger and a handful of handwritteers, ea varying states of disarray, thanks to the blood she had iently spttered on them. She set them oable, her movements slow and deliberate, the bloodstains almost adding to the air of gravitas she exuded. “All of this is from Drevaris,” Vivienne said, her voice quiet but firm. “These papers tie him to some iing dealings—ohat ect him directly to the Aegis Snty.”

  Narek gingerly grabbed one of the letters, carefully avoiding the bloodstains, though he couldirely dismiss the smell of iron that g to the pages. His golden eyes sed the words quickly, his sharp mind already pieg together the fragments of information Vivienne had presehere was a sense en his movements as he read, the faint tension still lingering in his posture as he absorbed the tent.

  "This... this is damning," he muttered, his voice low and filled with an edge of . "Drevaris was more deeply involved thahought. These transas... they ect him directly to the Snty, not just in in a. And the families—" He stopped mid-sentence, his fiight around the paper as he processed the implications. "He nning something, wasn't he? And it involved far more than just money."

  Vivienne didn’t respond immediately. Instead, she watched him, her expression unreadable. She could feel the weight of the situation shifting. She had done her part, gathered the pieces, and now the ball was in Narek’s court. His rea was important—it would determihe steps.

  “You’re well-informed for someone just learning the ropes,” Narek ented without looking up, his voice a mix of admiration and wariness. He reached for another letter, careful not to smudge any further blood across the text. “These hey speak of a work—covert dealings, hidden shipments, alliances. If Drevaris was only a small part of this, I only imagine how deep the rot runs.”

  Vivienne smirked, her tone casual as if discussing something insequential. “Well, I’m resourceful. You never know what you’ll find when you start pulling on threads.” She gave a small shrug, as though unc dark truths was just another day’s work.

  Narek set the papers down carefully, his movements deliberate as he absorbed the gravity of the situation. He looked up at Vivienne, his expression a blend of ption aant respect. “And now, you’re pnning to go into the uy? To front Rathik’s es? What are you going to do?” His gaze lingered on her for a moment, searg for something—perhaps a hint of vulnerability or doubt. But the question came out more as a statement than a query, as if he already khe answer.

  Vivienne’s lips curled into a wide, wicked grieeth fshing in the dim light. “Do you really want to know the ao that, Narek?” she asked, her tone dripping with ockery, her eyes gleaming with something dangerous.

  Narek hesitated, his eyes flig briefly to the dagger at his side before he exhaled sharply, his shoulders sagging in resignation. “I suppose I don’t,” he muttered, his voice tinged with frustration. “I just want this rot cut out from the . Ond for all.”

  Vivienne ined her head with a slow, deliberate gesture. “Then sider it done.” Her voice was light, almost pyful, but her eyes were unyielding. “You’re paying me for this, yes?” She paused for a moment, a mischievous glint dang in her eyes as she tilted her head in feigned curiosity. “Well, I hope so. I actually don’t know the value of what you paid me!”

  She giggled softly, a sound that seemed almost mog in the text of the blood still dripping from her tattered dress. It was a chilling, dissonant ugh, as if she found the chaos she had wrought to be somehow amusing. The mockery iohe way she seemed to revel in the absurdity of the situation, only served to heighten the unnerving presence she exuded.

  Her eyes, gleaming with something predatory, flicked toward Narek, a question lingering in her gaze as she wiped a stray drop of blood from her cheek with the back of her hand. “So, where is arance?” she asked, her voice casual, as though discussing a simple errand rather than a dest into a byrinthine underworld.

  ook a moment, his eyes narrowing as he processed the question. His gaze shifted to the floor, his mind evidently retrag the details of the city’s yout. “The closest one I know of…” He trailed off, clearly weighing the risk. “Several buildings dowreet. There’s an abandoned bakery. Old, long-fotten. But there’s a hidderanside, beh the floorboards.”

  Vivienne’s smirk deepened, her lips curling at the thought of yet another voluted maze to navigate, the thrill of it all clear in her expression. She allowed the sileo stretch for a moment before she let out another soft chuckle, like a dark little secret she leased to keep. "Well, then,” she said, her tone light but edged with something darker. “I’m off to go hunt some more rats. Tata, darling.” The words were sweet, almost like a pyful farewell, but the lethal i beh them was unmistakable.

  Her eyes flicked once more to Narek, a fsh of something dangerous crossing her face, and for just a brief moment, the room felt colder, as if the air itself held its breath. Then, with a final wave of her bloodstained hand, she turned and walked out of the room, the sound of her footsteps oddly soft oone floor, as if she were more shadow than substance.

  As she disappeared into the night, the echo of her giggle lingered in the air, the uling sound fading into the distance, like a whisper from a predator that was already far out of reach.

  SupernovaSymphony