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ELIAS

T he Order’s compound looks different at night.

Not cleaner. Not softer. Just quieter.

Quieter, like death waiting to breathe.

I crouch on the edge of the broken bell tower, the stone cold beneath my palms, eyes trained on the eastern wing—what they call Central R&D. On the surface, it's all pristine walkways and mirrored glass, polished steel and perfectly-aligned protocols. But I know better.

I know what’s buried beneath that clinical bullshit and reinforced concrete.

The Vault.

There’s no record of it in the Order’s files.

No names. Just rumors whispered between the condemned.

Supernaturals yanked off the streets, stripped of their magic, sanity, humanity—and dumped into cages deep underground.

No rights. No trial. Just experiments, dissection, reprogramming. All in the name of “protection.”

They say it's for the greater good.

Fuck that.

I know it’s real, because I’ve been there. I know what it smells like, the sour stench of fear and rot, of magic burning where it shouldn’t. I know what it sounds like when someone’s pushed past the brink and finally breaks. I know, because I almost did.

And I made a promise the night I escaped.

Every single one of these fucking labs would burn.

And tonight?

Tonight, I make good on that promise.

The Vault beneath Central R&D is the largest I've found. I’ve spent two weeks in the shadows, watching, learning, marking their rotations and memorizing weak points like scripture.

I snuck in through sewer lines and cursed tunnels, rigged collapse glyphs in the sub-basement conduits.

Every rune calibrated. Every pressure point exact.

One push, and it all comes down.

One push, and maybe I can finally sleep without hearing the screams of people the world forgot.

But that last assault, the one I watched earlier this week? That did it.

That poor hybrid. Young. Probably barely out of his first shift. Screaming as they pinned him down with silver restraints and pulsed electricity through his veins like it was training.

It wasn’t research.

It was cruelty.

And it ends tonight.

The plan was clean. Precise.

Until she shows up.

Kaia.

She steps into the corridor like a storm I didn’t see coming.

Tactical braid. Clean black gear fitted to that lean, lethal frame.

Her golden-amber eyes are focused on a tablet, frowning slightly at whatever she’s reading.

There are two soldiers flanking her. She looks like she’s briefing them—but not leading. Following a protocol.

My stomach lurches.

What the fuck is she doing in that wing?

She’s never been there before. Not once in the weeks I’ve been watching. That area is usually restricted to high-clearance scientists, enforcers, and whatever the hell they call the fuckers who sign off on torture.

Kaia isn’t one of them.

Unless she doesn’t know.

Unless this is just some random reassignment. Some screwed-up coincidence.

But Kaia Draven doesn’t get reassignments by accident. She’s her father’s daughter. She is protocol.

Still... her eyes. She’s not at ease. Her gait is stiff, her shoulders tight. Her fingers twitch too fast across the screen like she’s trying to make sense of something that isn’t making sense.

She’s suspicious. Or at least confused.

Which means maybe she doesn’t know what’s under her feet.

And gods help me, that’s worse.

Because now, if I blow the Vault, she’s collateral damage.

And I’ve seen what collapse glyphs do when they trigger properly. Bones don’t break, they powder. Blood boils inside the body. Skin peels in layers.

It’s not quick.

It’s not fucking clean.

My fingers curl tighter around the detonator rune, the slick obsidian edges digging into my palm.

I stare at her, willing her to turn around. To leave. To walk out of frame and out of the fucking kill zone. My pulse pounds in my throat.

Go, Kaia. Get out.

But she doesn’t. She walks deeper in. Down the corridor that leads directly over the main chamber. Her shadow falls across the exit ramp.

My jaw locks. My heart sinks.

This complicates things.

No, this screws everything.

But if I don’t do it now… I may never get another shot. They’re moving the captives next week. I overheard a comms whisper—Project Rebirth goes mobile. Once the Vault disappears, we’ll never find it again. Those people, those lives—they’ll vanish forever.

They’ll suffer worse than death.

This isn’t just revenge. This is the only chance.

The only goddamn chance.

So I stare at her.

At her hesitation.

At the frown between her brows that says maybe she feels something wrong.

Teeth grinding, I mutter under my breath. “You’re not supposed to be here. Not tonight.”

She stops near one of the stairwells. Tilts her head toward one of the guards and points something out on the screen.

I can’t hear her, but I see the tension in her jaw. The suspicion.

She knows. On some level. She knows.

I close my eyes.

“Shit.”

I whisper it like a prayer. Like an apology. Because this isn’t just war anymore. This is choice.

And I choose.

I open my eyes, blood humming in my ears, and press the rune.

The glyph ignites.

And the world, well…

The world erupts.