Run: 2026-02-19-01KHTY3YNCH2R1KX0D6X5YGPYF

The knock came at half past eleven, three sharp raps that cut through the silence of Eva's flat like gunshots. Ptolemy lifted his head from his perch on a stack of medieval grimoires, ears swiveling toward the door. Rory set down her mug of cold tea and reached for the cricket bat Eva kept propped against the bookshelf. Three deadbolts. Eva had installed three deadbolts for a reason, and that reason wasn't the curry house downstairs. She pressed her eye to the peephole and felt her stomach drop through the floor. Lucien Moreau stood in the narrow hallway, platinum hair gleaming under the flickering bulb, one hand resting on that ridiculous ivory-handled cane. He looked exactly as she remembered — impeccable charcoal suit, sharp jaw, the kind of face that belonged on Renaissance paintings of fallen angels. His mismatched eyes, one amber and one black as a moonless night, stared directly at the peephole as if he could see her through it. Knowing him, he probably could. "I know you're there, Aurora." His voice carried the ghost of Marseille, vowels rounded and soft despite the clipped consonance. "I can hear your heartbeat." "Fuck off, Lucien." "Charming as ever." A pause. "I wouldn't be here if it wasn't important." Her fingers hovered over the first deadbolt. Six weeks. Six weeks since she'd walked out of that warehouse in Southwark, blood on her hands and his voice calling after her. Six weeks of dodging his calls, his messages, the envelope that had appeared under her door at the flat above Silas' bar with nothing inside but a pressed white rose. She'd burned the rose. Regretted it immediately. Told herself she didn't. "Give me one good reason." "Because someone's hunting you, and I'm the only one who knows why." The deadbolts clicked open one by one. Rory pulled the door back just far enough to see him properly, the cricket bat still clutched in her white-knuckled grip. He looked tired. That was the first thing she noticed — the shadows under his eyes, the slight looseness in the way he held himself. Lucien Moreau didn't do tired. Lucien Moreau did effortless, did immaculate, did that infuriating half-smile that made her want to slap him and kiss him in equal measure. "You look like shit," she said. "You look beautiful." He said it without inflection, a simple statement of fact. "May I come in?" She stepped aside. Hated herself for it. Lucien moved past her into the cramped chaos of Eva's flat, picking his way between towers of books with the grace of a cat. Ptolemy hissed at him from his grimoire throne. Lucien ignored the cat entirely, his attention fixed on the windows, the corners, the shadows pooling behind the overloaded bookshelves. "Your friend has interesting taste in reading material." He picked up a leather-bound volume from the nearest stack, examined the spine. "Sixteenth-century demonology. First edition, if I'm not mistaken." "Put that down." He set the book back with exaggerated care. "Still angry, then." "You left me." The words came out harder than she intended. Rory closed the door, threw the deadbolts, leaned against the wood with her arms crossed. "Southwark. You opened that portal and you walked through and you left me standing there with three dead bodies and no explanation." "I had no choice." "Bullshit." "Aurora—" "Don't." She held up a hand. "Don't you dare stand there in my friend's flat at midnight and tell me you had no choice. You always have a choice. That's what you told me, remember? Back when you were trying to convince me that the world wasn't as simple as I thought it was. Everyone always has a choice." Lucien was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke again, his voice had lost its careful polish. "My father called me home." The words hung in the air between them. Rory felt something shift in her chest, a tectonic plate of anger grinding against something softer underneath. "Avaros." She'd never said the name aloud before. It tasted strange on her tongue, like copper and ash. "Yes." He moved to the window, twitching aside the curtain to peer down at Brick Lane below. The amber eye caught the streetlight; the black one swallowed it. "When a demon of his rank summons you, you don't decline. You don't explain. You go, or you die. It's that simple." "Nothing about you is simple." The corner of his mouth twitched. Not quite a smile. "No. I suppose not." Ptolemy jumped down from his perch and wound between Rory's ankles, purring despite the tension crackling through the room. She reached down to scratch behind his ears, grateful for something to do with her hands. "What happened? In Avaros?" "Politics." Lucien let the curtain fall. "My father has enemies. They've learned about me — about my work here, my connections. About you." Her blood went cold. "Me?" "You killed a demon, Aurora. In that warehouse. Did you think that would go unnoticed?" "It was self-defense." "It was impressive." He turned to face her fully, and something in his expression made her breath catch. "Terrifying and reckless and utterly magnificent. You drove a consecrated blade through the heart of a creature that's lived for three centuries, and you did it to save my life." "I did it because he was trying to kill me." "You did it because I was about to die and you couldn't let that happen." Lucien crossed the room in three strides, closing the distance between them until she could smell his cologne — sandalwood and something darker, something that reminded her of smoke and old stone. "Tell me I'm wrong." She should step back. Push him away. Remember all the reasons she'd spent six weeks avoiding him. "You're not wrong." "Aurora." Her name on his lips was a prayer and a curse. "I never meant to leave you. I have spent every moment since trying to find a way back, trying to protect you from what's coming." "What's coming?" His hand came up, hovering near her cheek but not quite touching. Waiting. Always waiting for permission, even when everything else about him screamed danger. "His name is Vexris. He was the creature you killed's brother, and he's sworn a blood oath to destroy everyone I care about." Lucien's jaw tightened. "That list is very short. You're at the top of it." "I don't need your protection." "I know. That's not why I'm here." His fingers finally made contact, brushing a strand of black hair from her face. The touch burned like ice. "I'm here because you deserve to know. Because you deserve the choice I didn't have." "What choice?" "To run. To hide. To let me handle this alone." His thumb traced the line of her jaw. "Or to fight beside me, the way you did in that warehouse. The way you've fought since the moment you crashed into my world." Rory caught his wrist. Felt the pulse jumping under her fingers, too fast for someone so carefully controlled. "Six weeks," she said. "Six weeks, Lucien. No word. No explanation. Just that stupid rose." "You burned it." "How do you know that?" "Because I would have done the same thing." His smile was crooked, self-deprecating. "I've handled this badly. I handle everything badly when it comes to you. You make me forget how to think." "Good." "Good?" She pulled him closer by his wrist, close enough that she could see the flecks of gold in his amber eye, the impossible depth of the black one. Close enough that his breath ghosted across her lips. "I've spent six weeks trying to hate you. It's exhausting." "And did you succeed?" "What do you think?" He kissed her. It wasn't gentle. It wasn't careful. It was six weeks of silence and anger and terror pouring out between them, his hands in her hair and her fingers twisting in the lapels of his expensive suit. He tasted like whiskey and desperation. She kissed him back just as hard, teeth catching his bottom lip, a small sound escaping her throat that she'd never admit to making. Ptolemy yowled in protest and fled to the bedroom. Lucien pulled back just far enough to rest his forehead against hers. His breathing was ragged, his careful composure finally cracked. "I'm sorry," he said. "For leaving. For the rose. For not finding the words until now." "The rose was pretentious." "I know." "And dramatic." "Also true." "And the most romantic thing anyone's ever done for me, you complete bastard." His laugh was low and broken. "Is that a compliment?" Rory grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him toward the couch, sending a stack of mythology textbooks crashing to the floor. "Shut up." He shut up. For the first time in six weeks, the flat on Brick Lane felt warm. Outside, the city hummed with its usual nocturnal chaos — sirens and laughter and the distant rumble of the Tube. Inside, two people with too much history and not enough time tried to make up for six weeks of silence in a single night. They didn't succeed. But they made a start. It was nearly two in the morning when Rory finally pulled back, breathless and disheveled on the couch with Lucien's arm around her shoulders and his cane propped against the coffee table. Her lips were swollen. Her thoughts were a mess. She felt more alive than she had in weeks. "So," she said. "This Vexris. When do we start?" Lucien pressed a kiss to her temple. "Tomorrow. Tonight, we rest." "I don't rest well." "I know. Neither do I." His arm tightened around her. "But we can try."