02:32. Sub-Level 5 smelled like paper and rust and old blood. The Grand Obsidian was built on top of a morgue in 1898. We never moved the bones. We just built over them. Neutrality meant not asking what was under the foundation. My boots didn’t make a sound. The vault door was open. 18 inches of steel, cracked biometric seal. My codes. Someone had used my codes. Inside, the air was colder. The shelves went up 30 feet. Ledgers. Contracts. Death certificates. Council transcripts. And in the center, at the reading table, a single lamp. And under it, a girl. Elspeth. She shouldn’t have been here. Alistair’s men had taken her 60 seconds ago. Unless they hadn’t. Unless she’d run. Unless the collar burning had done more than turn to ash. She didn’t look up when I entered. Her hands were shaking. In them was a book. Small. Black leather. The corners worn down. My brother’s journal. 02:33. The world went quiet. Not the hotel-quiet. The grave-quiet. That book was supposed to be ash. Mother ordered it burned the night Julian died. “Sentiment is rot,” she’d said. “We don’t keep his things.” I’d kept one. Hidden here. In Vault 3. Behind a false wall. Because I’m a hypocrite. Because I’m a coward. Because some nights I still needed to hear his voice. Elspeth’s finger was on a page. She was reading. “What are you doing,” I said. She jolted. Looked up. No fear. Just that same furious, wet shine in her eyes. “I didn’t—” she started. “Give it to me.” My voice was wrong. It wasn’t CEO. It wasn’t cold. It was raw. She stood. Backed up a step. “I was looking for—” “Give. Me. The book.” She hesitated. Then held it out. I snatched it. The leather was warm from her hands. I knew every inch of it. The water stain on the back from the night he got caught in rain. The scratch on the spine from when he threw it at me when we were 80 and 19 and fighting about music. I flipped it open. His handwriting. Messy. Hurried. And drawings. Page after page of the Juilliard crest. The one from New York. The one human musicians got on a pin when they graduated. Notes in the margins. _“Stolen magic. They make it from nothing. From air and wood and breath. No blood required.”_ _“If I could learn it, I wouldn’t need to feed on fear anymore. I could feed on sound.”_ _“Damian would hate this. Mother would kill me. But I have to try.”_ My hands started to shake. “Elspeth,” I said. “What?” “What are you doing in my archives?” “I followed you,” she said. “When Alistair’s men took me to the elevator, I... I pushed. Like with the collar. And the doors opened and I ran down the stairs. I didn’t know where you were going. I just—” “You just what?” I slammed the book shut. “You just decided to dig through my brother’s corpse?” Her face went white. “I wasn’t—” “You were.” I stepped closer. I could smell her. Rosin. Rain. Fear. “You have no idea what this is,” I said. Holding the book up. “You have no idea what it cost me.” “Then tell me,” she said. “You want to know?” The laugh that came out of me was ugly. “Fine. Let’s talk about Julian.” I opened the book again. Shoved it in her face. “See this? Juilliard. He wanted to go. A vampire. At Juilliard. Can you imagine it? Mother found out. She said it was treason. That if word got out, the Council would think we were weak. That we were diluting the bloodline with human art.” Elspeth was staring at the page. At the crest. “So I did what I had to do,” I said. “I killed him. Quick. In the ballroom. One knife. So Mother wouldn’t make it slow.” The words hung there. For 100 years I hadn’t said them out loud. Saying them to her felt like cutting myself open. “You exploited it,” I said. Quieter now. “You. His daughter. You show up with his fire and his music and you waltz into my hotel and you make me feel—” I stopped. Because I couldn’t say it. Make me feel alive. “You’re using his death,” I said instead. “You’re using his tragedy to get to me. To get free. Did he tell you about me? Did he tell you I’d be weak for it?” Elspeth didn’t answer. She was looking at the book. At the page I’d forced her to see. Then she looked up at me. And she didn’t flinch. Not from my face. Not from the fangs I wasn’t hiding anymore. She just reached out. And turned the page. 02:37. The paper was thin. Old. And there, in Julian’s hand, under a sketch of the Juilliard crest, was one line. _“I’m not doing this for me. I’m doing this for Damian. So he can remember what it feels like to have a heart.”_ My breath caught. “No,” I said. Elspeth pointed. Her finger didn’t shake. “Read it,” she said. “I don’t—” “Read it, Damian.” I read it. And again. And the cold facade I’d spent a century building cracked. Right down the middle. Because he was right. I was 19 when he died. I hadn’t felt anything since. Not until a 16-year-old girl took my hand in a warehouse and asked for three hours. Not until she burned a collar with a glare. Not until now. “I didn’t know,” I whispered. “You weren’t supposed to,” Elspeth said. “He hid it. From you. From your mother. He said if you ever found it, you’d blame yourself more.” “I do,” I said. “I blame myself every day.” “I know.” She stepped closer. “Damian,” she said. “Your brother didn’t die for your hotel.” “Don’t—” “He died trying to reach Juilliard, too.” The words hit me like the wall in the alley. Harder. Because she was right. He wasn’t trying to save the Kade name. He was trying to save me. From becoming Mother. From becoming this. The lamp flickered. From above, through 47 floors of stone, I heard it. Shouting. Alistair’s voice. “SEARCH THE SUB-LEVELS.” Boots on stairs. They’d found out she was missing. Again. Elspeth looked at the door. Then back at me. “Give me the book,” she said. “No.” “Damian, please. If they find it on me, they’ll know. They’ll know what he was planning. They’ll burn everything.” She was right. If Alistair saw this, he’d know Julian was a traitor. He’d know Elspeth was proof. He’d kill her. And he’d kill me for hiding it. I looked at the journal. At my brother’s handwriting. _“So he can remember what it feels like to have a heart.”_ My heart gave that thud again. Stupid. Dead. Traitorous. I shoved the book into her hands. “Hide it,” I said. “In your sweater. Under your skin if you have to.” She did. Quick. The footsteps were closer now. On the stairs to sub-level 5. “Run,” I said. “There’s a service tunnel behind the shelves. Third one on the left. It leads to the warehouse.” “What about you?” “I’ll hold them.” “Damian—” “Go!” She went. I heard the shelf slide. Heard her slip through. Then the vault door filled with men. Alistair in front. His eyes went to me. To my empty hands. To the table. “Where is she?” he asked. I spread my hands. “Gone,” I said. “Ran. While you were busy yelling at me in my penthouse.” Alistair’s jaw ticked. “Search him.” Two men grabbed me. Patted me down. Nothing. The book was gone. Alistair walked to the table. Saw the lamp. Saw the dust where the book had been. “Who was here?” “I was,” I said. “Mourning. Alone. Like I do every year on the anniversary.” It was a lie. But it was the right lie. Alistair stared at me for a long time. Then he turned. “Tear the place apart. Find her.” The men scattered. Alistair stayed. “You’re lying,” he said. “Probably,” I said. “If I find out you’re helping her—” “You’ll what? Take my hotel? You can try.” He left. 02:41. Alone again. I sank to my knees on the floor. The dust was still there. From the collar. And on the table, under the lamp, a single page had torn off the journal. I must have done it when I grabbed it. I picked it up. Another drawing. Juilliard. And under it, in Julian’s hand: _“Tell him I’m sorry I didn’t teach him the music.”_ I pressed it to my forehead. For the first time in 100 years, Damian Kade cried. No sound. Just one hot tear on ash. From above, the shouting continued. And from somewhere far below, I heard music. Faint. Violin. Elspeth. She’d made it to the tunnel. She was playing. And I had no idea if I’d just saved her, or signed both our death warrants. Elspeth doesn't flinch from his fangs; instead, she points to a page: 'Your brother didn't die for your hotel, Damian. He died trying to reach Juilliard, too.'

Chapter 12: Vault 3