Run: 2026-09-01-01M1EPGB20JB6PT4EG7A54VVD8

The three deadbolts slid back under Rory's fingers. She pulled the door open. Lucien filled the landing, rain beading on the shoulders of his charcoal suit. Platinum hair stayed in place. One amber eye and one black eye locked on her. "Rory." "Lucien." She kept her body in the gap. "Eva's at the British Library. She won't be back for hours." He rested both hands on the ivory handle of his cane. "I didn't come for Eva." Ptolemy streaked past her ankles and hissed. Rory did not step aside. The curry smell from the restaurant below mixed with wet wool and whatever cologne he wore. "Three months." She let the number sit. "You vanish after that night and now you knock like we're still... whatever we were." Lucien moved forward. The cramped hallway left her no choice. She backed up. He crossed the threshold and shut the door himself. The locks stayed undone. Books and unrolled scrolls covered the sofa, the kitchen counter, the floor. Research notes papered one wall. He took it in without comment, then looked at her again. "We both know what we were." Rory went to the kettle because her hands needed a job. She filled it, set it on the hob. The scar on her left wrist showed when her sleeve rode up. "You left. That's what I know. I woke up in your bed and the sheets were cold. No note. No number. Nothing." He leaned the cane against the overflowing bookshelf and unbuttoned his jacket. "People were looking for me. The kind who don't knock. I couldn't bring that to your door." "You don't get to decide what comes to my door." She pulled two mugs from the draining board anyway. "You don't get to decide anything after you put your mouth on me and then disappeared." The kettle began its low rumble. Lucien picked up a scroll from the counter, scanned the symbols, set it down. "Eva's work on Avaros. She's digging in the wrong places." "She's helping me understand what I slept with." Rory's blue eyes stayed on him. "After you, I needed the facts." He took the mug she shoved toward him. Their fingers touched. Neither pulled back at once. "It was never just that." His voice dropped. "I left because the last person who stayed close to me ended up in pieces. I won't have that for you." Rory laughed once, no humour in it. She kept her own mug. "Protecting me by ghosting. Original. And now you're here because you need something. Information. Always information with you." "There's a contract. A relic that could crack a door to Avaros. Eva's notes might have the location." He set the mug down without drinking. "That's not why I came first." She turned to the window. Brick Lane neon painted the glass. People still moved on the pavement below despite the hour. "Don't." She watched his reflection come up behind her. "Don't start with the 'I couldn't stay away' line if you plan to walk out again." Lucien stopped close enough that the heat of him reached her back. "I thought of you every day. The way you talk when you're thinking three steps ahead. The scar when you grabbed my shirt that night." Rory faced him. Five-eleven to her five-six. She had to look up. "You remember the scar." "I remember the story. Childhood. The fence. You told me in the dark after." His hand lifted, hovered near her wrist, dropped. "I remember you didn't run when I told you what I am." "I should have." She stayed where she was. "Half-demon. Father from Avaros. Eva filled in the rest. The rest I worked out myself because you weren't around to ask." Ptolemy jumped onto the windowsill and stared at them both. Lucien's gaze flicked to the cat and back. "Eva knowing that much puts her in it too." "She's my friend. She tells me the truth. She doesn't vanish." The space between sofa and bookshelf forced them closer. Rory set her mug on the sill. Steam curled. "What do you actually want, Lucien? The notes? Or is this the part where you say the night meant something and then you leave again?" He took her left hand. His thumb traced the crescent. The contact ran up her arm. "It meant something. Too much. My kind don't get mornings. We don't get the girl from Cardiff who delivers noodles and still looks at a demon like he's just a man." "You don't get to call me the girl from Cardiff." She did not pull her hand free. "You don't get to make it sound like I was some holiday." "It wasn't a holiday." His other hand came up, stopped short of her jaw. "I wanted to stay. I wanted the kettle in the morning and your voice telling me I was an idiot. I wanted it enough that I ran before my enemies found the address." Rory's pulse showed in her throat. She should have stepped back. The three months sat between them like another piece of furniture. "You ran. That's the part I keep. Not the wanting." Lucien let go of her wrist. He picked up a notebook from the nearest pile, flipped pages, put it down. "The relic. If her research has a name, a location, anything, I need it. Not because of the contract. Because if that door opens, the people looking for me become the people looking for anyone who ever stood next to me." "So now it's my problem because I stood next to you once." Rory crossed her arms. The kettle clicked off, ignored. "You made it my problem when you didn't stay to explain." He retrieved the cane. The ivory looked yellow in the flat's cheap light. "I have a number now. I can give it to you." "You had a number then." "I know." He took a cream card from his inner pocket and laid it on a stack of papers. "If you find something in the notes. Or if you want to finish the conversation we started that night." Rory stared at the card. She did not touch it. "Finish. That's rich. You started it. You ended it. Now you want a sequel." Lucien moved toward the door, then stopped with his back to her. "I never stopped. That's the part I didn't say." She picked up Ptolemy. The cat's claws pricked her jumper. "Say it now or don't. But don't stand there like the rain on your suit is an excuse." He turned. The heterochromatic eyes found hers again. "I wanted you. I still do. And I hate that I have to stand in Eva's flat surrounded by her warnings about me and admit it." Rory set the cat down. Ptolemy immediately wound between Lucien's legs and then away. "Eva warned me. I didn't listen. That's on me." She gestured at the room, the scrolls, the taped notes. "This is on you. You brought Avaros into a delivery girl's life and then decided I couldn't handle the morning after." "You handled it. That's the problem." He took one step closer again. "You handled the chase, the blood, me. You looked at the black eye and the amber one and you didn't flinch. Most people flinch." "I flinched later. When the bed was empty." The words hung. Neither reached for the card or the door. Lucien's hand found the edge of the bookshelf to steady himself. Papers shifted. "There's more coming. The relic isn't the only thing. If Eva's research goes deeper, they'll come here. Three deadbolts won't matter." "Then tell me what they are. Don't decide I can't know." Rory's voice stayed level. "You want the notes, you tell me the rest. No more vanishing acts. No more 'for your own good'." He looked at the scar again, then at her face. "The rest is that my father still has interests on this side. The relic would let him walk through. The people hunting me work for him or against him. Either way, they use whoever I touch." "You touched me." She let that sit. "You don't get to un-touch it by leaving." Lucien's jaw tightened. He set the cane down once more. "I know. That's why I'm here. Not the contract. Not Eva. You." Rory picked up the nearest scroll, the one with the Avaros symbols, and held it out. "Then look. Tell me what this means. Stay long enough to explain it. And if you walk out that door again without a number I can actually use, don't come back." He took the scroll. Their fingers brushed a second time. This time he didn't let go immediately. The cat watched from the windowsill. The curry smell rose through the floor. Rain tapped the glass. Lucien read the first line, then the second. His mouth opened. "This isn't just location. This is a name. The name of the one who last held the relic." Rory waited. He looked up from the parchment. "It's a name I know."