Each step was heavy—each breath taut with the weight of a choice.
To confront.
Or to flee.
My heart was a storm—thunderous, erratic, betraying my every doubt.
I reached the threshold of his study.
The familiar scent of aged leather, scorched tobacco, and old mahogany enveloped me, pulling me back into old rhythms—of obedience, of fear.
Then—
A voice.Not his.Piercing.Otherworldly.
“Do you know who I am?”
The words sliced through the stillness like a blade.
My pulse kicked.A jolt of alarm surged through me.
It wasn’t my father.
Inside, his brittle reply echoed—defiant, shaking.
“No.Should I?Why the fuck should I know you?”
That rasp—arrogant on the surface, but I heard the fear buried beneath.
And then, the name dropped like a guillotine.
“My name is Salvatore.I am your master.Mathias reports to me.Where did you get the Noctyss poison?”
Every syllable was a poisoned barb.
Salvatore.
Amir’s warning hit me hard—a memory laced with dread, cold and unforgiving.It struck like lightning, illuminating the shadows I thought I’d buried.
I tried to face him once before.
Tried to stand against him...and I failed.
The memory clawed its way back—Salvatore’s eyes burning into mine, the weight of his power pressing down until I could barely breathe.The vial in my hand.The fear.The recklessness.The consequences.
And now?—
Here he was again.
I froze, breath caught in my throat, my limbs heavy and unwilling to move—pinned by the gravity of his authority, the terror of his voice.
Inside, silence.
My heart a drumbeat of panic.
Then—
My father’s voice cracked through the stillness like thin ice beneath a heavy step.
