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NAIRA

Orthani is a beast with a thousand blackened teeth, each alley a gaping maw, each noble house a festering wound in the rotting flesh of this city. I prowl its veins like a sickness, slithering through shadowed streets where the stink of desperation clings to the atmosphere.

But tonight, I’m not just a sickness. I am a plague.

The estate of House Zacria looms ahead, a temple to excess and cruelty. The Dark Elves build their palaces like they build their lives—ornate, oppressive, designed to make those below them feel like insects crawling underfoot.

Even from here, I can see the gilded windows, the elegant spires, the sweeping balconies where nobles drink blood-red wine and whisper about who they’ll ruin next.

I clutch my dagger tighter.

For weeks, I’ve been planning this job, pouring over stolen blueprints, watching the guards’ movements from the ruins below. House Zacria hoards wealth like a dragon nesting on bones, and tonight, I intend to bleed them dry.

I slip past the outer walls with ease, my body a shadow against the night. The guards are lazy this late—arrogant fuckers, fat off their own corruption. My boots barely make a whisper against the stone, my breath steady as I navigate the courtyard. The aroma of orchids and burning resin clogs my nose.

One step inside, and I’m moving like liquid through the halls, pressing myself into alcoves whenever the heavy tread of armored boots echoes too close. This isn’t the first time I’ve broken into a noble’s treasury, and it won’t be the last.

Third door on the right. Down the corridor. Left at the tapestry of the conquered humans kneeling.

I find the vault exactly where I expected it to be. Ornate, towering, carved with sigils meant to keep out thieves like me. Too bad for them—I’m not just any thief. I kneel, pulling the tools from my belt, slipping a thin metal pick into the lock.

I barely get the first pin up before a voice slices through the darkness like a jagged blade.

“You’re either incredibly bold or incredibly stupid, little human.”

Fuck.

I freeze. The timbre of that voice—it isn’t the bark of a guard, the bored drawl of a noble too lazy to protect his own riches. No, this voice is silk laced with steel, cool and cruel, wrapping around me like a noose.

I turn, slow, my heart pounding like a war drum.

He stands in the dim light of the corridor, his presence a stormcloud smothering the atmosphere. Lord Zephiran Zacria. The feared and fabled son of a monster.

I’ve heard the stories. The noble who kills with a whisper, who bathes in shadows and wields secrets like knives. The one no other Dark Elf dares cross, because even they fear what he’s capable of.

And fuck me, he’s beautiful in the way death is beautiful—terrifying, intoxicating, impossible to look away from.

Moonlight slicks across his sharp features, the deep violet of his skin nearly black in the dim glow. His white hair is unbound, tumbling past his shoulders, a stark contrast to the gleaming gold rings on his fingers, the chains at his throat, the obsidian hilt of the sword resting at his hip.

His eyes—fuck.

I’ve seen a lot of cruel men. I’ve seen Dark Elves who smile as they carve flesh from bone, who gut humans like pigs just to watch the way they twitch.

But Zephiran eyes are a different kind of cruelty. Deep red, like the last smear of blood on a rusted blade.

They’re locked on me with something dangerous.

I rise to my feet, keeping my dagger loose in my grip. My fingers itch for the pressure of a kill, for the slide of steel through silk and skin. But Zephiran doesn’t move, doesn’t lunge. He just watches, head tilted, as if he’s already predicted every fucking move I could make.

I bare my teeth in a grin. “You should’ve stayed in bed, my lord.”

His lips twitch at that. Not quite a smirk, not quite amusement. “And you should’ve chosen a lesser house to rob.”

I throw the dagger but he catches it midair like it’s nothing.

There's no time to register the movement before he’s on me.