Florence, nightfall
The name Caedra burned like a brand on Esmé's tongue.
She whispered it once as she strapped the obsidian pendant Serae had given her to her wrist. The carved symbol glowed faintly, reacting to her presence—not in defense, but as if recognizing the one fated to unmake its mistress.
Luca stood at the edge of the chamber, watching as she packed vials, glyphs, and her glass-dagger. His expression remained unreadable, but the tension in his shoulders betrayed him.
"She won't come willingly," he said.
"She doesn't have to," Esmé replied.
They both knew this wasn't just a mission.
It was a reckoning.
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They tracked her to the ruins of an abandoned apothecary west of the Santa Croce quarter. According to Serae, Caedra resurfaced every few nights to perform a binding ritual on stolen souls—using a mixture of blood and whispered memory to shatter the will of her victims.
Esmé didn't wait for backup.
She slipped in through the fractured arch of the door, breath held, senses open.
Inside, the walls were blackened with soot and carved with runes that pulsed in rhythm with something underground.
The room reeked of incense and salt.
At the center stood a low stone table—and beside it, cloaked in crimson, her hands raised over a bowl of glowing ash—
Caedra.
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The Veil reacted before either of them moved.
The sigils on the walls recoiled.
The pendant on Esmé's wrist grew warm.
Caedra turned.
She was tall, deathly pale, her face a mask of serenity stitched in scar-twine.
"You're early," she said softly.
"I'm not here for your prophecy," Esmé said.
"Then why bring the shard?"
Esmé raised her wrist. "To return what you left in my father."
That made Caedra smile.
"Ah. The glassmaker's daughter. The girl with too much light and too little understanding."
Esmé stepped closer.
"Undo it."
Caedra tilted her head.
"No."
The air cracked.
Esmé struck first—dagger drawn, glyphs on her skin flaring with protective runes. Caedra's robes unfurled like wings, shadows spinning from her sleeves.
They clashed.
The Veil warped around them—glass shattering from shelves, blood sigils igniting on the floor.
Esmé held steady.
Focused.
Caedra hurled a memory shard—an illusion meant to fracture her.
Esmé closed her eyes and let it pass.
Truth isn't afraid of memory.
She countered with the pendant—slamming it to the table.
The symbol inside reacted with a howl.
Caedra staggered.
And then Esmé called his name.
Her father's.
"Matteo Loredan!"
The shadows shrieked.
The binding threads unraveled.
And Caedra screamed—not in pain, but in rage.
"You don't understand what you've done."
Esmé stood firm, panting, sweat on her brow.
"I freed him."
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She left the ruins before they collapsed, the walls devouring themselves as the anchoring spell broke.
Luca waited in the alley beyond.
When he saw her, he stepped forward.
"She's not dead," Esmé said.
"But the mark is broken?"
Esmé nodded.
"She'll come after you now."
"I hope she does."
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That night, Esmé returned home.
Her father was already asleep.
But when she kissed his forehead, he murmured something.
Her name.
No darkness.
No blank stare.
Just recognition.