AI The third deadbolt slid back with a grating shriek that set her teeth on edge.
“Finally. I was about to order another curry, you know how Ptolemy gets when he smells lamb vindaloo…” Eva’s voice trailed off as Aurora swung the door inwards, a half-eaten bag of crisps in her hand.
It wasn't Eva.
Lucien Moreau leaned against the doorframe, a picture of insufferable perfection. His platinum blond hair was slicked back without a single strand out of place. The charcoal of his tailored suit seemed to absorb the dim, curry-scented light of the hallway. One of his strange, mismatched eyes, the colour of warm amber, crinkled at the corner. The other, a flat, depthless black, remained impassive.
“Carter.” He straightened, his voice a low, smooth melody that always sounded like a secret and a threat rolled into one. “You are a difficult woman to find.”
Aurora ’s grip tightened on the crisp packet, the plastic crinkling in the sudden silence . She took a half-step back, creating a barrier of stale air and old books. “That was the point, Moreau.”
“A pity.” He took a step over the threshold, his polished shoes silent on the worn floorboards. He moved with a liquid grace that always unnerved her, his ivory-handled cane tapping once, a sharp counterpoint to the quiet. His gaze swept the cramped flat, taking in the towers of books, the scrolls pinned to the walls, the half-empty mugs of tea. A fat tabby cat, Ptolemy, blinked slowly at him from atop a precarious stack of occult histories before pointedly turning his back.
“Charming.” Lucien’s lips curved, but the smile never reached his eyes. “Very… academic.”
“It’s not my flat. What do you want?”
He stopped near the small, cluttered kitchen table, trailing a gloved finger along a dusty tome. The title was in a language she didn’t recognise. “Direct, as always. No pleasantries? Not even an offer of whatever is festering in that teapot?”
“We’re not friends, Lucien. We’re not anything.” The words came out sharper than she intended, a brittle edge she couldn't sand down. The small crescent-shaped scar on her wrist tingled, a phantom itch from a past she fought daily to forget.
“Aren’t we?” The question hung in the air, thick and cloying. He turned to face her fully, the cramped space shrinking until it felt like all the air had been sucked out. His scent filled her senses, a mix of expensive cologne, old paper, and something else, something metallic and sharp, like ozone after a lightning strike. “I seem to recall us being a great many things, *Aurora *.”
He used her full name like a weapon, the syllables curling from his tongue to wrap around her throat. She hated it. She hated the way it made her remember the whisper of it in the dark.
“That was a mistake.” She tossed the crisp packet onto the counter. “One I’m not repeating. So unless you’re lost, the door is right there.”
His amber eye gleamed. “But I am lost, in a manner of speaking. Which is why I’ve come to you. I require a finder.”
She gave a short, humourless laugh. “I deliver takeaways for the Golden Empress, not track down your dodgy contraband. Ask Silas. Ask anyone else.”
“I cannot ask anyone else.” He moved closer, his pace deliberate, predatory. He stopped just an arm’s length away, forcing her to tilt her head back to meet his gaze. A loose strand of her black hair fell across her face, and she fought the urge to brush it away, to show any sign of weakness. “Silas deals in spirits, both bottled and spectral . I am not seeking a ghost. And my ‘dodgy contraband’, as you so elegantly put it, is of a far more... delicate nature this time.”
“Not my problem.”
“It becomes your problem when its absence threatens to unravel the fragile peace we all so enjoy in this city.” His voice dropped, losing its playful edge and taking on the hard, cold weight of steel. “Someone has taken something from me. Something irreplaceable.”
“Aww. Did you lose your favourite cufflink?”
His face was a mask of calm, but a muscle jumped in his jaw. “They took a person.”
The air thickened. Aurora felt a cold knot form in her stomach . This was why she’d left. This was the dark, swirling current she had fought to escape, the undertow that had almost pulled her under for good. People didn’t just go missing in Lucien’s world. They were erased .
“Then call the police,” she said, her own voice betraying a tremor .
Lucien’s laugh was a dry, rasping sound. “And tell them what? That a Fae courier carrying a vital message for the Unseelie Court has vanished somewhere between here and the Isle of Dogs? I suspect they would be less than helpful.”
She closed her eyes for a second. Fae. Courts. It was all rushing back, the jargon of the London supernatural underworld she had tried so hard to purge from her memory. “No. Absolutely not.”
“You are the best, Rory.” He switched to her nickname, the sound softer, more intimate. It was a calculated move, and they both knew it. “You see patterns others miss. You don’t just follow clues, you anticipate them. You think sideways. It is the one gift your barrister father gave you that you cannot run from.”
“Leave my father out of this.”
“I need you.” The words were simple, stripped of all artifice. They struck her with more force than any threat. In the entire time she had known him, through all the deals and dangers, Lucien Moreau had never needed anyone. He was the fixer, the broker, the one who held all the cards.
“The answer is no.” She turned away, needing to put space between them, and began rearranging a stack of books that needed no rearranging. The spines were cool and solid beneath her trembling fingers.
“Her name is Laila.”
Aurora froze.
“She’s young,” Lucien continued, his voice now directly behind her. She could feel the heat radiating from his body, could almost picture the expression on his face. “Foolish. Thought she was untouchable. She was carrying a truce offering. A silver locket. Its disappearance will be seen as a deliberate insult. Hostilities will resume. The last time the Courts went to war... I’m sure you remember the fires.”
She remembered. She remembered the acrid smoke that had choked the city for a week, the whispers of unexplained disappearances in the news, the cold terror that had lived in the back of her throat.
“This isn’t my fight.”
“Isn’t it?” His gloved hand settled on her shoulder. It wasn’t heavy, but the weight was immense, pinning her in place. “You live in this city. You breathe its air. You benefit from the quiet accords and hidden treaties that men like me bleed to maintain. You don't get to simply opt out when it becomes inconvenient.” His fingers tightened slightly . “Besides, they know you worked for me once. When they start looking for leverage against me, when they start hunting for my assets, my contacts, my… weaknesses… where do you think they will look?”
The unspoken threat was clear. He wasn’t just asking for her help. He was telling her she was already in danger. He had brought the wolves to her door.
Her shoulders slumped in defeat. She spun around to face him, anger flashing in her bright blue eyes. “You bastard. You did this on purpose. You led them right to me.”
“I protect what is mine,” he said, his voice dropping to a husky whisper . His gaze fell to her lips, and for a terrifying second, she thought he would lean in. The space between them crackled with a history of unspoken things, of a night filled with rain and bad decisions. “I came to collect.”
“I am not yours.”
His amber eye flared with some unreadable emotion. “A debate for another time. For now, you will help me find Laila.” It wasn't a request.
He reached into the inner pocket of his suit jacket and withdrew a small, folded piece of parchment, holding it between two fingers. It looked ancient, the edges frayed and yellowed.
“This was all she left behind,” he said.
Aurora took it from him, her fingers brushing his glove. A jolt, like static electricity, shot up her arm. She unfolded the parchment. It was a map, but a strange one, the streets of London twisted into unfamiliar, spiralling patterns. In the centre, where the Thames should be, was a single, crudely drawn symbol. A thorny rose, its petals dripping what looked like ink, or blood . She had seen it before, in one of Eva's forbidden books. It was a sigil. A summons.
A floorboard creaked in the hallway outside the flat.
Lucien’s head snapped towards the door. His entire posture changed in an instant, the lazy grace replaced by a coiled, lethal tension . His hand went to the ivory handle of his cane.
“You said you were difficult to find,” he murmured, his black eye fixed on the door, unblinking.
“I was,” Aurora whispered, her gaze locked on the sigil.
The sound came again, closer this time. The slow, heavy scrape of something being dragged along the floor, followed by a low, guttural snarl that was not human.
Three deadbolts suddenly seemed like nowhere near enough.