The second black rose was still fresh when Viktor crushed it under his boot.
Selene watched the petals darken against the stone steps of the tower, her wounded arm throbbing beneath the fresh bandage.
The mate bond between them thrummed with shared fury and something colder, calculation.
Whoever had left the rose had walked these halls after Irina’s escape.
The traitor was still inside.
Still close.
“Double the blood wards on every entrance,” Viktor ordered Darius, voice low and lethal.
No one leaves the estate.
No one enters.
I want the staff sequestered and questioned again, individually.
Start with anyone who had access to the east wing or the tower stairs after midnight.
Darius inclined his head.
And Lady Irina?
“She will not get far.” Viktor’s eyes glowed faintly in the pre-dawn gloom.
But she is no longer the only knife at our backs.
Selene touched the sealed cut on her arm.
The silver burn still ached.
They want me isolated.
The note said I die before the next full moon.
Irina tried to make that happen tonight.
Someone else is waiting for the next opening.
Viktor turned to her, cupping her face with both hands.
His thumbs brushed her cheekbones with surprising gentleness.
There will be no next opening.
You do not leave my side until this is finished.
She met his gaze steadily.
Then we finish it together.
They did not sleep.
Instead, they moved through the estate like shadows, reviewing every rotation log, every ward fluctuation, every servant’s statement.
The bond kept Selene hyper-aware of Viktor’s presence, his controlled rage, the way his attention never fully left her even while issuing orders.
When they paused in a narrow service corridor between interviews, he pressed her briefly against the wall, forehead to hers, breathing her in as if to remind himself she was still whole.
I felt the blade on your skin, he murmured.
Through the bond.
I will not feel that again.
Selene gripped the front of his shirt.
Then help me make sure of it.
By midmorning the first real lead surfaced.
A junior steward named Tomas, quiet, efficient, previously unremarkable, had been seen near the tower stairs in the hour after Irina’s escape.
When questioned, his answers were too smooth.
His pulse, when Viktor’s hand closed around his wrist, raced for all the wrong reasons.
They took him to the old interrogation chamber beneath the east wing.
Stone walls.
No windows.
A single iron chair bolted to the floor.
Tomas sat with forced calm until Viktor placed both hands on the arms of the chair and leaned in.
Who paid you?
Tomas swallowed.
I don’t know what you…
Viktor’s voice dropped into something ancient and final.
Lie to me again and I will take the answer from your blood.
The steward broke faster than expected.
“A woman.
Not Irina.
She never showed her face.
Left messages in the old cistern tunnel.
Payment in unmarked coin and a promise that the new order would elevate those who helped remove the human queen.
She said the Volkov remnants still have friends inside the higher bloodlines.
Friends who believe a mortal mate weakens the Draven claim.”
Selene stepped closer.
Name them.
Tomas shook his head, terrified.
I never saw them.
Only the messages.
The last one came this morning, before the rose.
It said the queen would be moved soon, and when she was, the path would be cleared.
Viktor’s gaze flicked to Darius.
Seal every exit except the one we use.
We go now.
They moved in a tight unit: Viktor, Selene, Darius, and four of the most trusted guard.
The cistern tunnel was older than the main estate, a damp artery of stone that connected the cellars to the outer cliffs.
The air smelled of wet earth and old iron.
Selene’s senses, sharpened by the bond, caught the faint metallic note of recent blood long before the others.
They found the drop point in a hollow behind a collapsed support beam.
Another black rose.
Another note, this one shorter:
She will leave the tower by nightfall.
Be ready.
Viktor’s hand found the small of Selene’s back.
They still believe they can force an opening.
A soft scrape echoed farther down the tunnel.
Everyone froze.
Darius signaled two guards forward.
They had taken only three steps when the first crossbow bolt took one in the throat.
Silver-tipped.
He dropped without a sound.
The second bolt grazed Darius’s shoulder and sparked against stone.
Ambush.
Figures detached from the darkness ahead, four, then six.
Not full Volkov elite, but skilled enough.
Mercenaries and turned humans armed with silver.
The narrow tunnel became a slaughterhouse of close combat.
Viktor moved like a storm given form, claws and fangs ending lives in seconds.
Selene stayed at his back, blades drawn.
She caught one attacker across the tendons of the wrist, then drove her second knife up under the chin when he staggered.
A seventh figure tried to flank them from a side passage.
Selene spun, met the blade with her own, and felt the jarring impact travel up her arms.
The attacker’s hood fell back.
She knew the face.
One of the junior council aides.
A quiet young vampire named Elias who had served at the war table only two nights earlier, taking notes with careful, obedient hands.
Betrayal, again.
Elias snarled, fangs bared.
You should have died the night you arrived, mortal.
The old blood will never accept you.
Selene did not waste words.
She feinted high, dropped low, and opened his thigh to the bone.
When he staggered, Viktor finished him with a single, brutal twist of the neck.
Ash scattered across the wet stone.
The remaining attackers broke and fled toward the cliff exit.
Darius and the surviving guards pursued.
Viktor caught Selene’s wrist, checking her for new injuries with rapid, practiced hands.
I’m fine, she said, though her heart hammered.
Elias.
He sat three seats from us at the strategy table.
I know.
Viktor’s voice was flat.
The infection runs deeper than Irina.
They sealed the tunnel behind them and returned to the surface under heavier guard.
By the time they reached the main hall, word of the second traitor had already spread.
The remaining council members stood in uneasy silence as Viktor addressed them.
Any further betrayal will be answered with ash, he said quietly.
There will be no trial.
No exile.
Only the end.
No one spoke.
That night Viktor refused to return Selene to the tower.
Instead he moved them both into the old war room itself, central, heavily warded, with only one entrance and a full contingent of guards outside.
Maps still covered the table.
The air still smelled of ink and cold iron.
Selene crossed to him, sliding her arms around his waist from behind.
We’re still standing, she said against his back.
He turned, gathered her up, and sat with her straddling his lap in the heavy chair at the head of the table.
His hands framed her face.
They will keep coming until the root is cut, he said.
“Irina is still out there.
The secondary force is real.
And someone higher than Elias and Tomas is coordinating from inside or very near the court.”
Selene rested her forehead against his.
Then we stop reacting.
We set a trap of our own.
A slow, dark smile curved Viktor’s mouth.
What do you have in mind, my queen?..
“Use me.” She felt him tense and continued before he could refuse.
They want me isolated.
So we give them the appearance of isolation.
Move me under heavy but visible guard to a secondary location, somewhere we control.
When they take the bait, we close the net.
Irina wants me dead before the next full moon.
Let’s force her to move on our schedule.
Viktor was silent for a long moment.
The bond carried his fear, his rage, and finally a reluctant, fierce pride.
You would risk yourself as bait.
I would risk myself to end this, she answered.
I didn’t survive everything just to wait for the next knife in the dark.
He kissed her then, deep, claiming, edged with the same fear that still lived under his skin.
When he pulled back, his eyes were resolute.
We do it.
But on my terms.
Full containment.
Immediate extraction routes.
And if the trap springs, you stay behind me.
Selene nodded.
They spent the next two hours refining the plan with Darius.
A decoy transfer was scheduled for the following night, Selene moved under guard to the old hunting lodge on the western edge of the estate grounds, a location with limited approaches and strong natural defenses.
Word would be allowed to leak through carefully chosen channels.
The real strike team would already be in position.
When the final details were set, Darius left them alone once more.
Viktor locked the war room door and leaned back against it, watching her.
The weight of the last two days sat heavy on both of them, but the bond still burned hot and insistent.
Come here, he said quietly.
Selene went.
He undressed her with deliberate care this time, mapping every bruise and healing cut with his mouth.
When he finally lifted her onto the war table, clearing maps with one sweep of his arm, there was no gentleness left, only need.
He entered her in a single deep thrust, burying himself to the hilt while her legs locked around him.
Each movement was a reaffirmation.
Alive.
Together.
Still fighting.
Selene arched beneath him, fingers buried in his hair, meeting every stroke.
When she came, it was with his name on her lips.
Viktor followed hard, face pressed to her throat, the bond flaring white-hot between them.
Afterward he remained inside her, bracing his weight on his forearms, forehead against hers.
Tomorrow night we set the trap, he murmured.
And when it is over, I am taking you far from this estate for a time.
Somewhere no one knows your name or mine.
Selene traced the line of his jaw.
Promise me we both live to see it.
I promise.
Outside the war room, the estate remained under lockdown.
In the mountains beyond the northern ridges, unseen watchers noted the increased patrols and began to move their own pieces into place.
And in a darkened chamber miles away, Lady Irina received the latest report and smiled with bloodless lips.
The queen would be moved tomorrow night.
The second rose had done its work.
The real harvest was about to begin.