Azalie stepped further into Molch’s study, feeling the weight of the room settle over her like a shroud. The dark cherry flooring gleamed with a fresh layer of beeswax polish under the dim candlelight. The faint honeyed scent lingered in the air like a pleasant perfume. Her gaze traced over to the walls, the remnants of the scorch marks she’d seen earlier were now hidden by elegant ivory wallpaper, the delicate filigree scrolling across it in faint patterns. She wondered if it pained her father to cover up his beautiful marble stone walls with such a tasteless design that resembled little more than an oversized doily. If she’d chosen, she could have picked out something a thousand times better—an idea she quickly dismissed. He’d never ask for her opinion. 

Molch stood at the corner of his desk, one leg crossed over the other, his hip resting casually against its edge, as though entirely at ease with himself. He was speaking in a low murmur with another figure cloaked in shadow. She recognized him instantly—Navous, dressed in his usual dark combat attire with his hood pulled low, obscuring his face entirely. It was his outfit and the grave rasp of his voice, like gravel over stone, that gave him away. He sounded like he had been smoking every second of his human life and then a century after. Navous paused mid-sentence as he noticed Azalie walk in, giving the Lord a slight tap on the arm with the respect of someone who knew his place.

Molch’s crimson gaze followed Navous’s toward her. He looked so much younger like this, standing tall, instead of being hunched over his desk reading a thousand papers or barking orders at the Others. In fleeting moments, when he was relaxed like now, she’d almost forget he was older than most cities in Europe. Azalie and her twin had once found amusement in guessing Father’s age. Azalie enjoyed people watching and had gotten quite good at guessing human ages. Their ages were expressed so outwardly that it was easy to tell sometimes. However, with vampyres and Otherworlders, age wasn’t expressed so physically. At the most, she could tell what era they might have come from through their mannerisms or in how they dressed. Their father was an enigma, though. He always dressed in the current era and spoke the current tongue.

Her musings drifted off as her father waved Navous away and took his seat at his desk. Navous’s body shimmered then vanished into thin air—a mere clone illusion, she noted with a flicker of disinterest.

“Sit,” her father said, his tone oddly genial. Azalie didn’t show how taken aback she was by it and quickly grabbed a chair, sitting directly in front of him.

He opened his mouth to say something when he paused, his eyes scanned her up and down, lingering on the cracks in her hands and the redness of her skin.

“You look wretched, Azalie. What happened?” he asked, the pleasantness vanishing from his voice.

She shifted uncomfortably, looking at her clothes once more. “I wanted to change, but Dantalion said you wished to speak to me.”

His gaze sharpened. “Your clothes aren’t the concern. It’s you I’m asking about. Your skin is burnt, and you look as though you have not slept a decent night since your return.” He rested his chin on his hand as he continued. “And I heard you barely fed when you were at the Mother of Pearl.” 

He didn’t sound particularly angry with her over this. More a note of curiosity, though devoid of anything close to concern. Molch wasn’t an indulgent father; he was a collector of facts. Excuses would only invite contempt, so she held her tongue in fear of prompting an interrogation.

“Additionally,” he continued, with an edge of mild reproach, “I hear you got into yet another fight with Dantalion and froze the training hall.”

She gasped, caught off guard by the comment. He raised a hand, halting her before she could stammer a reply. “You have one chance to explain yourself, Azalie.”

“You mean what happened in the hall?” she asked, confused.

“Everything—your current state, your refusal to feed properly, and this… spectacle in the hall,” he said with finality.

Azalie swallowed, feeling a faint burn of apprehension creeping into her chest. She clenched her fists in her lap, trying to choke down the rising panic. Though, he didn’t seem to know of Lucius or her reasoning for being outside without permission. Had he known, he wouldn’t have asked, which meant her explanation would need care. She took a breath, gathering her resolve.

“You’re quite right, Father,” she began, voice steady. “At the Mother of Pearl, I only took about a bottle’s worth of blood. I thought, since I was on leave, the normal amount would be adequate. I hadn’t been told otherwise,” she said. “But then, the carriage was attacked. I had to resort to my ice abilities. I’m sure you have been made aware of that situation.” She let a small pause linger, watching for his reaction before she continued. “When I awoke, Azazel and I thought a training session might help, though I hadn’t yet recovered. We were sparring when Dantalion arrived, challenging me to a match. I declined at first, but he insisted—and didn’t honor the match rules. Azazel had to intervene to make him yield.” Her voice held its calm even as she felt her temper flare at the memory. “Afterward, Dantalion taunted me, and yes, I got upset. So I left, though I was not aware I had frozen the hall until Azazel pointed it out to me,” she added. “After everything that happened, I felt I needed to clear my head, so I took a walk outside. That’s why I look… as I do.”

As for her lack of sleep, Azalie suppressed a sigh, refusing to mention her dreams to her father. Especially since he was the one that sent her to China in the first place. Her father was the one that forced her hand on the innocent boy. She wanted to blame him for her own feelings of guilt, for the nightmares that followed her as a constant reminder. But she couldn’t. It was her own hand that held the blade.

She wondered briefly if her father ever felt remorse over the things he’d done. She watched him from the corner of her eye. He always seemed indifferent, as though the weight of his actions meant nothing to him. Perhaps it didn’t. Perhaps to him, killing was merely ink on paper, each life crossed off without so much as a second thought. Just a name on a page. She tried to channel that same indifference, to bury her feelings in cold detachment when she was doing her assignments. Only now she knew that such things were more easily done when the faces were unknown. When the ones she hunted were strangers, her indifference could mask the truth. But not when her heart was involved—not when she knew the target was more than just a name. 

As she stared across the room, doubt snaked through her thoughts. All those supposed rogues she had killed, were they really rogues at all? Or was their fate sealed by nothing more than a careless Lord’s decree? The thought haunted her, but she tried to shove it down. She shouldn’t be questioning his authority. And yet, she felt it was her duty to investigate the blood crisis to be sure things are as he says they are.

Leave it alone, she told herself, but her voice slipped out in a whisper that was beyond her control, low but loaded with defiance.

“Father, why do you not trust me to help with this investigation on the blood crisis?”

Her question seemed to rouse Molch from his thoughts. His gaze turned upon her, its familiar hardness flaring with something sharper, a warning. “I could ask you the same question,” he replied, his tone edged like a blade. Her throat ran dry. She shouldn’t have spoken.

“I told you that the blood crisis was not a matter for you or Azazel. I thought I made myself clear in saying that I did not want either of you working. And yet, you persist in defying my instructions. Why is it, Azalie, that you refuse to listen and trust what I say?” His voice steady and cold felt like the calm before a terrible storm.

Azalie’s heart pounded, but her tongue burned with unspoken words. She’d been a fool. His earlier inquiry was merely a pretense. Of course he had noticed her quiet investigations. Even if it wasn’t much, she still had tried. She cursed her own carelessness but refused to back down now. She should have known this was why he’d summoned her.

“Answer me, Azalie!” His words rang out in the study, vibrating through the air. She flinched but held her ground as his voice echoed painfully in her head.

“Father, you cannot expect me to not think about it!” she retaliated, her voice shaking but rising to meet his fury. “You tell us not to worry, but how can I when it seems like you’re hiding the whole crisis!” She’d never raised her voice to her father before and she could tell he was not happy with her about it.

Her father’s expression darkened, his eyes like twin rubies glowing from the shadows. “You are but a child, Azalie, and have no business meddling in this affair!” 

“No business?” She rose, feeling her restraint snap, her arms held wide in exasperation. “Have I not proven myself a hundred times over? Is this not what you have us trained for? ‘To handle any situation.’ Those were your words, Father!”

An image of Azazel flashed through her mind, and she forced herself to take a calming breath. She paused, just as a thought sparked within her mind, and her tone shifted as an unsettling realization dawned. “It is the Thaddious family, isn’t it?” she said with certainty. Why else would her father not want her and Azazel involved and also want to keep the Others from getting worked up by hiding the severity of the crisis? She searched her father’s face for confirmation, and for the briefest moment, his eyes widened before narrowing, his features hardening in defense.

Molch’s voice dropped to a low growl. “Who told you such a thing?”

Technically, no one told her, but Julia—the woman’s words flickered through her mind—subtle hints rather than outright confirmations. Though she dared not mention the woman.

“No one had to tell me, Father,” she replied evenly. “Your actions say it all, hiding information, demanding we don’t get involved. I’ve deduced enough to know the Blood Dens aren’t the real source of the tainted blood. If they were, you would have stopped us from drinking from them.” She steadied her breath, her words forming slowly as the pieces fell into place. “And yet, how is it that if all the Blood Dens are regulated, yet bad blood is still getting into the blood bottles?” she asked, rhetorically. “It’s because the tainted blood is coming from outside the dens,” she stated.

Molch glared at her as she pressed on.

“And how could it be that the tainted blood from outside the Blood Dens is getting mixed in with the good blood from within the dens? It’s because someone within our ranks is helping sabotage our supply. That’s why you insist we drink Live—because none of the women are sick.”

Azalie had only guessed about the traitor, but the logic had fallen into place so neatly that she couldn’t help but believe it. From the hardening of her father’s gaze, she could tell she wasn’t far from the mark.

“That’s the real reason you halted our assignments,” she pressed when he didn’t speak up. “Because the Thaddious family is involved somehow, and they would attack us if they found us.” She paused, her mind flickering back to the peculiar sight she’d witnessed before the carriage was attacked. “That kite we saw… The carriage attack—it was their doing, wasn’t it?”

Molch’s expression shifted, a rare look of surprise breaking his stoic mask. “What kite?” he asked, his tone taking on an edge of urgency as his crimson eyes sharpened, silently demanding her answer.

She hesitated, gathering her thoughts, then continued, “Right before the carriage was attacked, I saw something floating in the sky. Azazel thought it looked like a kite. But it was odd that someone would be flying a kite at such an hour.” Her words slowed as the memory sharpened in her mind. “It was visible even from afar, though hard to make out. It made me think it must have been a rather large kite—so large that it couldn’t have been an ordinary kite.” As she thought more about it, now it seemed obvious it must have been for surveillance of some kind. She clenched her fists in frustration, angered by how easily she’d overlooked it before.

Molch sat pensively, his chin resting on the knuckles of his hand, studying her with that cold, appraising gaze that always made her feel like she was under scrutiny for a transgression. “You’ve been back barely a week and have already gathered what my other elites have struggled to learn in twice that time,” he said, the slightest touch of praise in his voice.

Azalie felt a swell of pride in herself.

“However,” he continued, leaning forward in his chair, capturing her golden-yellow gaze with his crimson ones. “You are missing one critical piece of information: the why.”

Continue to next part. . .