AI The rain in Soho didn't fall so much as it dissolved, a grey, atomized mist that clung to the brickwork and turned the pavement into a dark, oil-slicked mirror. Inside The Raven’s Nest, the air tasted of old cedar, hop-residue, and the faint, metallic hum of the green neon sign vibrating above the door.
Aurora Carter sat at the far end of the bar, her fingers tracing the condensation on a condensation-beaded glass of soda water. She was twenty-five, but in the low, amber light of the Nest, surrounded by Silas’s collection of yellowing maps and silver-framed photographs of cities that no longer existed, she felt like a relic . Her black hair, cut sharp at the shoulders, caught the light whenever she tilted her head. She pulled the sleeve of her oversized sweater down, subconsciously masking the small, crescent-shaped scar on her left wrist.
Behind the bar, Silas Blackwood moved with a practiced, heavy-footed rhythm. The slight limp in his left leg—a souvenir from a life he rarely spoke of—dictated the tempo of the room. He was polishing a highball glass, his hazel eyes scanning the few patrons scattered in the booths with a quiet, territorial authority. The silver signet ring on his right hand caught a stray beam of light as he set the glass down and looked at Rory.
“You’re thinking too loud again, kid,” Silas said. His voice was a low rasp, seasoned by decades of smoke and secrets. “It’s distracting the coasters.”
Rory offered a thin smile. “Just winding down. The lunch rush at the Golden Empress was a nightmare. Yu-Fei had me halfway to Kensington and back through the gridlock.”
Silas grunted, a sound of vague sympathy, and began to rearrange a row of gin bottles. The bell above the door chimed—a sharp, brassy note that cut through the low-fi jazz humming from the speakers. A man stepped in, bringing a gust of cold, wet air with him. He paused to shake out a black umbrella, his movements precise and expensive. He wore a charcoal overcoat that cost more than Rory’s monthly rent, and his shoes, though dampened by the London sludge, were polished to a high, unforgiving shine.
Rory didn't look up until the man climbed onto a stool three seats away. Silas approached him, his expression neutral, the mask of the veteran barman firmly in place.
“Whisky. Neat. Something old,” the man said .
Rory froze. The voice was a jarring chord from a song she had spent three years trying to forget. It was an educated voice, rounded by the lecture halls of Cardiff University and the stuffy boardrooms of her father’s law firm. She turned her head slowly , the movement heavy and reluctant.
“Leo?”
The man turned. He had a face built for success—symmetrical, clean-shaven, though the skin beneath his eyes was bruised with the fatigue of the high-stakes world. He squinted through the gloom , his gaze traveling from Rory’s worn leather jacket to the sharp line of her jaw.
“Aurora?” he whispered. His eyes widened, a mixture of shock and a strange, harrowing relief. “My God. It is you.”
He didn't call her Rory. To Leo Thorne, and everyone from the life she had fled, she was still Aurora Carter, the barrister’s daughter with the bright future and the brilliant, legalistic mind.
“It’s just Rory now,” she said, her voice steadier than she felt.
Leo stood, then seemed to think better of it and sat back down, his hands splayed on the mahogany bar. “Rory. Right. I… I’ve looked for you. Your father has looked for you. After you left Cardiff, after that business with Evan, you just disappeared. We heard London, but London is a big place to drown in.”
“I didn't drown, Leo. I just learned to swim in different water.”
Silas slid a glass of amber liquid toward Leo. His hazel eyes lingered on Rory for a fraction of a second—a silent check-in—before he retreated to the other end of the bar to tinker with the espresso machine. He remained within earshot, a silent sentinel .
Leo took a long pull of his whisky. “You look different. Not just the hair. There’s a… hardness to you.”
“Survival tends to do that,” she said. She looked at his hands. On his ring finger sat a heavy gold band. He had stayed the course. He had followed the map their parents had drawn for them. “I see you made Junior Partner. Or is it Senior now?”
“Senior,” Leo said, a flicker of pride quickly extinguished by the awkwardness of the moment. “I’m in London for a merger. Staying at the Savoy. I just… I needed a drink somewhere quiet. Somewhere no one would recognize me.” He let out a dry, hollow laugh. “Of all the gin joints, right?”
“This isn't a gin joint, Leo. It’s a sanctuary .”
“A sanctuary .” He gestured to the maps on the walls, the dim lighting, the faded grandeur of the place. “You were the top of our class, Rory. You could have been anything. You could have been sitting across from me at the Savoy, talking about case law and pensions. Instead, you’re… what are you doing?”
Rory thought of the bike journeys through the rain, the smell of ginger and soy from the Golden Empress, the quiet nights in her flat upstairs where the only sound was the muffled thump of the bass from the bar below. She thought of the freedom of being nobody, of the way the name Aurora felt like a dress that had always been three sizes too small.
“I’m living,” she said. “Without permission.”
The tension between them was a physical thing, a bridge built of old memories that was slowly collapsing under its own weight . Leo looked at her with a pity that made her blood simmer. He saw a tragedy; she saw a narrow escape.
“He’s still there, you know,” Leo said softly . “Evan. He’s back in Cardiff. He’s… he’s cleaned up his act. He asks about you.”
Rory’s hand twitched. The crescent scar on her wrist felt hot, a ghost-pain from the night she’d tripped over a glass coffee table while trying to escape a storm she hadn't realized she was living in. Silas’s rag stopped moving. The bar went very quiet.
“I don’t care about Evan,” Rory said, her voice dropping to a dangerous, low frequency . “And I don’t care about the version of me you carry around in your head, Leo. That girl died on the M4 somewhere near Reading.”
Leo flinched. He reached out as if to touch her arm, but the cold intensity in her blue eyes stopped him. “I didn't mean to—I’m just saying, it doesn't have to be like this. Your father, he’s older. He’s had a heart scare. He wants the daughter he lost back.”
“He has the daughter he deserved,” Rory replied. “The one who did exactly what he wanted until she couldn't breathe anymore. Tell him I’m dead if it makes it easier for him. It’s functionally the same.”
Leo stared at her, and for a moment, the polished veneer of the high-flying solicitor cracked. He looked at the shadows in the corner of the room, at the maps of lost empires, and he seemed to realize that he was the one who was out of place. He was a man of the light, of contracts and certainties, standing in a room built for people who lived in the margins.
“You’ve changed so much, Aurora,” he said, his voice thick with a regret he couldn't quite name . It wasn't just regreting for her—it was the realization that the world wasn't as stable as he believed. That someone could simply step off the path and vanish into the fog.
“No,” Rory said, sliding off her stool. “I’ve just stopped pretending. There’s a difference.”
She turned to Silas. “I’m going up, Si. See you in the morning.”
Silas nodded once, a sharp, decisive movement. He turned his gaze to Leo, a look that wasn't hostile but carried the weight of a physical barrier. “Drink’s on the house, counselor. Have a safe walk back to the Savoy.”
Rory didn't wait for Leo’s response. She walked toward the back of the bar, past the bookshelf that led to the secret room she’d only seen once, and up the narrow, creaking stairs to her apartment.
Halfway up, she paused. Through the floorboards, she heard the muffled chime of the bell as Leo exited back into the Soho mist. She stood in the dark for a long time, her hand resting on the banister. She looked down at the scar on her wrist, barely visible in the gloom . It was a small mark, a little crescent moon, a reminder of the cost of leaving.
The weight of the years she’d spent in Cardiff felt like a heavy coat she’d finally dropped in the hallway. She took a breath, the air smelling of London rain and the old, reliable wood of The Raven’s Nest, and continued climbing, leaving the ghost of Aurora Carter in the bar below.