Cressa’s sneer faded as the manor’s emergency lights flickered, then died, plunging the scullery into absolute blackness. The air, already thick with the scent of almond pastries, turned cold, heavy, and silent. One moment, Kestian’s hand was a firm grip on Cressa’s arm; the next, he was a phantom beside Neva, his presence felt rather than seen. The guards’ footsteps receded with Cressa’s sputtering protests, swallowed by the sudden void.
Then, a new sound. Distinct and chilling. The deliberate, brass-shod clatter of heavy boots striking stone echoed from the main corridor, drawing closer. Each reverberation was a hammer blow against the fragile peace of the kitchen.
A blinding smile and feigned cluelessness had shielded Neva since the day the Relladon name became ash. Yet as the heavy boots neared, something inside her shifted. The airhead act, the toxic positivity, felt like a flimsy paper doll against the encroaching darkness. Kestian was here. Barnaby was hidden. And someone was *inside*.
This wasn't about hiding anymore. This was about *doing*. Air scraped her throat in a sharp intake. Burnt sugar and almond rind hung cold against the bricks.
“Master Kestian,” she whispered, her voice surprisingly steady in the oppressive silence. “We need to move. Now.”
She didn’t wait for a response. Her fingers, guided by instinct honed through years of clandestine exploration in her own sprawling, ancestral home riddled with hidden hollows, brushed against a concealed latch beneath the counter. It was a common feature in old aristocratic estates, a network of servant passages that mirrored the public hallways. She’d observed the manor’s architecture, drawn mental maps, and knew the back-of-house like the lines on her own palm.
The latch clicked. A narrow, wooden panel swung inward, revealing a gap barely wide enough for one person. It smelled of dust and disuse, a musty counterpoint to the kitchen’s lingering warmth.
“This way,” she urged, her voice low. “It’s a shortcut… a lucky guess. Leads to the old larder, then the cellar.”
Kestian hesitated for only a fraction of a second. She felt his arm brush hers as he moved, a ghost in the dark, trusting her. He went first, his broad shoulders squeezing through the opening. Neva followed, Barnaby trembling against her ribs, tucked tight beneath her arm. Blackness wrapped the tunnel wall to wall, but Neva tracked every angle by memory. Her fingers trailed along the rough-hewn stone, remembering the precise angles.
The iron-heeled pacing outside bypassed the scullery door and continued down the corridor. They were being hunted.
“Left here,” Neva murmured, guiding Kestian’s hand to a sharp turn. “Then straight, through a narrow arch. It'll be tight.”
He navigated the unseen path with an unnerving grace, his large frame somehow silent in the confined space. “How do you know this route exists?” Kestian’s voice was a low rumble, devoid of its usual sharpness, tinged with a raw curiosity.
“Oh, you know,” Neva chirped, the airhead persona slipping back, a desperate shield against the rising dread. “Just a feeling! I’ve got really good hunches about old buildings.” The lie tasted bitter on her tongue, but she needed him to focus on survival, not her past.
They stepped into the musty chill of the old larder, surrounded by ancient, unlabeled jars and dry bay leaf. Before Neva could guide them further, a harsh clang rang from the far doorway. A thick, reinforced cellar door, usually locked and bolted from the outside, swung inward with a groan.
A figure stood silhouetted against the faint, emergency light from the manor’s core. Oryn Vespera. He was not a phantom. He was terrifyingly real, his face streaked with tears that caught the dim light, making his features appear grotesque. In his hands, he clutched a heavy, industrial nail gun, the gray casing catching the weak flare.
“Dastran,” Oryn’s voice was a guttural sob, thick with anguish. “You’ll confess. You’ll finally confess.”
He took a step forward, the nail gun raising slightly. The air took on the bitter tang of engine soot. Neva felt Kestian tense beside her, his lungs seizing.
“Confess to what, Vespera?” Kestian’s voice was a low, dangerous growl, but Neva felt the tremor in his shoulders.
“To what you did!” Oryn wailed, tears streaming faster. “To my daughter! Paralyzed! Because of you! Tell me you did it, you monster! Tell me you killed your own family, and mine too!”
Kestian’s shoulders slumped. The air left him in a ragged sigh. He looked utterly broken, defeated. Without a word, he slowly, deliberately, sank to his knees on the cold flagstones, his gaze fixed on the ground in total surrender. He prepared to die. Neva dug her fingers into the seam of her apron.
But as Oryn’s hand trembled around the grip of the nail gun, Neva’s gaze darted, frantic, desperate, for anything, any detail. And then she saw it. Clutched in Oryn’s left hand, almost hidden by his weeping fingers, was a small, dark object. A piece of rubber tubing. But it wasn’t just any tubing. It was a modified brake line, crudely cut, with a small, glinting metal valve inserted, designed to bleed pressure. It was the exact, tell-tale sign of sabotage.
Oryn’s finger tightened on the trigger. A deafening pneumatic discharge erupted into a sharp crack. A nail rocketed past Kestian’s head, grazing his temple, leaving a crimson smear and a faint hiss of steam on the stone wall behind him. Scorched ozone hung dense between the stone shelves.
“Say it!” Oryn screamed, his voice cracking with agony. “Say you caused the crash!”
Kestian closed his eyes, his head bowing lower. He was going to let it happen. He was going to die.
Without thinking, driven by a primal need to protect him, to protect the last fragile connection to her past life, to the family she’d lost, Neva launched herself forward, a blur of motion, throwing herself between Kestian and Oryn. Barnaby let out a frantic squeak as he was jostled against her.
“Stop!” Neva shrieked, her voice echoing in the confined space, raw and unpracticed without the sweet facade. “My name is Neva Relladon! And you’re making a mistake!”