AI Rory slammed the pint glass down harder than intended, foam sloshing over the rim onto the scarred wooden bar. The Raven's Nest hummed with low chatter, glasses clinking like distant gunfire, and she scanned the room for an empty stool, her duffel bag digging into her shoulder.
A man behind the counter turned, wiping his hands on a towel, his hazel eyes narrowing. Grey-streaked auburn hair framed a face she hadn't seen since she was twelve, but the slight limp as he stepped forward confirmed it. Silas Blackwood. Uncle Silas, her father used to call him, back when visits to Cardiff involved hushed conversations in the study and her mother's tight-lipped smiles.
"Rory?" His voice cut through the murmur, low and steady, like gravel under boots. He set the towel aside, leaning on the bar with both hands, his silver signet ring catching the dim light from the green neon sign filtering through the window.
She froze, the bag slipping an inch. "Silas. Bloody hell."
He didn't smile, but his beard twitched, as if remembering how . "Aurora Carter. Last I saw you, you were knee-high to a grasshopper, arguing with your dad about chess moves." He gestured to the stool opposite him. "Sit. What brings you to Soho? Not the scenery, I reckon."
She slid onto the stool, dropping the bag at her feet with a thud that echoed too loudly. The walls pressed in, covered in faded maps and black-and-white photos of places she didn't recognize—Prague spires, Berlin streets, relics of a life her father never fully explained. "Escaping, mostly. Cardiff got... complicated." Her fingers traced the crescent scar on her left wrist, a habit she thought she'd broken.
Silas poured her a fresh pint without asking, sliding it across. His movements were precise, economical, but the limp betrayed him when he shifted weight . "Complicated how? Your father's messages stopped a few years back. Said you were acing pre-law, destined for the bar like him."
She took a sip, the bitter ale grounding her. "Yeah, well, plans change. Evan happened." The name slipped out, sharper than she meant. She watched Silas's face, waiting for the flicker of recognition. Her father must have mentioned the ex, the bruises, the police reports that went nowhere.
"Evan." Silas repeated it like tasting poison, his hazel eyes steady on hers. He polished a glass that didn't need it, the cloth twisting in his grip. "Brendan mentioned trouble. Said you handled it. But here you are, looking like you've run a marathon through hell."
The bar's hum faded as a group of punters laughed at the far end, their voices a distant roar. Rory's bright blue eyes met his, holding the stare. "Handled it? That's one way to put it. He put me in hospital once. Thought that was rock bottom." She straightened her shoulder-length black hair, tucking a strand behind her ear. "Eva convinced me to bolt. Said London swallows people whole, makes them new."
Silas nodded, setting the glass down with a soft clink. "Eva. The firecracker from your school days. Smart girl." He leaned closer, his voice dropping. "And now? Delivery gig lined up, or you just passing through?"
She laughed, short and brittle. "Yu-Fei Cheung's place. Golden Empress. Starts tomorrow. Eva hooked me up with a flat, too. Above some bar in Soho." She paused, realization dawning . "Wait, this bar?"
His beard hid a grimace, but the signet ring tapped the bar once, twice. "Guilty. The Raven's Nest. My retirement project." He glanced at his left leg, the limp more pronounced as he adjusted his stance. "After Prague, the knee gave out. MI6 pension doesn't cover much, but a bar full of ghosts does."
Rory's hand tightened on her glass. Prague. Her father had whispered about it once, after too much whiskey, how Silas saved his life there, pulling him from a botched drop gone sideways. "You were always the hero in Dad's stories. The Spymaster, dodging bullets and charming secrets out of shadows." She looked him over, noting the grey in his hair, the quiet authority tempered by weariness. "What happened to that Silas? The one who taught me how to pick a lock with a hairpin?"
He chuckled, but it didn't reach his eyes. "Time's a thief, Rory. Steals pieces you don't notice till they're gone." He poured himself a measure of scotch, neat, and raised it. "To old times. And whatever the hell this is."
They clinked glasses, the sound sharp in the dim space. As she drank, the weight of unspoken things settled between them like dust on those old maps. She remembered the last time he'd visited Cardiff, her twelfth birthday, when he'd slipped her a small knife disguised as a pen, whispering, "For when life's puzzles need cutting." Her father had laughed it off, but her mother had paled, ushering Silas out with excuses about school nights.
"You regret it?" she asked, voice softer now . "Retiring. The limp. All of it."
Silas swirled his scotch, staring into the amber liquid. "Regret's a luxury for the young. I got out alive, opened this place. Network's still there—contacts drop by, share whispers." He nodded to the bookshelf at the back, its volumes slightly askew, hiding what she suspected was more than dusty tomes. "But yeah, some nights the knee aches, and I wonder about roads not taken."
She set her glass down, fingers drumming the bar. "I regret Evan. Wasted years thinking I could fix him." Her scar itched, a reminder of the childhood accident—a fall from a tree during one of Silas's visits, when he'd dared her to climb higher. He'd bandaged it himself, promising scars built character. "Dad wanted me in law, like him. But after Evan, university felt like a cage. Out-of-the-box thinking only gets you so far when someone's boxing your ears."
Silas's face hardened, the quiet authority sharpening. "Brendan should've intervened. I told him as much, last time we spoke." He paused, choosing words like selecting a weapon. "He regretted not pulling you out sooner. Said you were too stubborn, like your mother."
The mention of her parents twisted something in her chest. Jennifer's lessons in Welsh folklore, Brendan's late-night case files—ghosts now, after the fallout from her escape. "Stubborn? Pot calling the kettle black. You two were thick as thieves, back in the day. What happened? Why'd the messages stop?"
He glanced away, towards the green neon sign flickering outside, casting eerie shadows on the photos. The bar smelled of spilled beer and aged wood, a tang that clung to everything. A patron at a nearby table argued softly with his companion, voices rising like a building storm.
"Prague broke more than my knee," Silas admitted, voice barely above a whisper . "Botched op. Lost a partner. Your father pulled strings to get me home, but it cost him favors. We drifted after that. Regrets pile up, Rory. Like unpaid tabs."
She leaned forward, her cool-headed facade cracking. "And me? Did you regret teaching a kid spy tricks? Look where it got me—running, always thinking three steps ahead."
His hazel eyes met hers again, holding a weight she hadn't seen before. "Never regretted that. You were sharp even then. But I regret not checking in. When Brendan mentioned Evan, I should've come. Old habits die hard, though. Spies don't do family reunions."
The tension coiled tighter, unspoken regrets hanging like smoke. She thought of the flat upstairs, a fresh start above this nest of secrets. "Maybe we start now. Flatmates, of a sort. You with your limp, me with my scars."
Silas's ring tapped the bar again, a rhythmic code. "Dangerous offer. This place attracts trouble."
As if on cue, the door swung open with a creak, letting in a gust of night air. A man stepped in, tall and broad, his eyes scanning the room before locking on Rory. Evan. Her ex, face flushed, the same possessive glare that had haunted her nightmares. He hadn't changed—same coiled anger, same fists that bruised.
"Rory," he called, voice cutting through the hum like a blade . "We need to talk."
Silas straightened, his limp forgotten as he reached under the bar, quiet authority turning lethal. Rory's heart raced , her hand inching towards her bag, where that old pen-knife waited.