“Hey.” Raziel’s hand found hers. “We’re going to fix this. You know that, right?”
She looked at him—the monster who had murdered her family. The man who had become her husband. Hervuampi.
“No,” she said quietly. “I don’t think we can fix it. But maybe we can burn it down properly this time.”
His smile widened. “That’s my little murderer.”
She didn’t return the smile. But she squeezed his hand once before letting go.
“Come on,” she said, turning away from the window and the dying city beyond. “Let’s go start fires.”
NINETEEN
The metropolis had become a corpse wearing lipstick.
A corpse who didn’t have the dignity to simply lie down and die.
Nadi pressed herself against the shadows of an alleyway, watching a patrol of vampires march past with rifles slung over their shoulders. Behind them, a chain gang of humans shuffled along in perfect synchronization, their wrists bound together by thick iron links, their heads bowed. They moved with the mechanical resignation of people who had given up hope.
She counted twelve in the chain. Men, mostly, though there were a few women near the back. Their clothes were little more than rags, and even from this distance, she could see the marks—bite marks—that decorated their throats and arms like obscene jewelry. They weren’t just prisoners.
They werelivestock.
“Don’t stare.” Raziel’s voice was barely a breath against her ear. “They’ll sense your attention.”
She tore her gaze away, forcing herself to focus on the crumbling brick wall in front of her. The urge to do something—anything—burned in her chest like she’d swallowed coals. Butshe was one fae. One fae and one vampire against an entire city that had been transformed into a prison.
The patrol passed. The chain gang’s shuffling footsteps faded into the distance, accompanied by the occasional crack of a whip and a muffled cry.
“Clear,” Raziel murmured. “Move.”
They slipped through the shadows like ghosts, navigating a city that Nadi barely recognized. Every few blocks, propaganda posters had been plastered over storefronts and street corners. The artwork was striking—bold lines and dramatic shadows depicting vampires as benevolent protectors, their arms spread wide. Crowds of grateful humans bowing in supplication.
And over them, stamped and printed in block letters, the messages were as subtle as bullets.
“SECURITY THROUGH UNITY,” one proclaimed.
“STRENGTH THROUGH SERVICE,” declared another.
And her personal favorite, in letters three-feet tall: “THE NATURAL ORDER RESTORED.”
Beneath one of the posters, a body hung from a lamppost by a noose. A sign around its neck read “TRAITOR” in crude red letters.
The corpse had been there long enough that the birds had found it.
Nadi looked away.
“Public executions,” Raziel said, his voice carefully neutral. “Mael’s idea, I’d wager. He always did believe in the power of spectacle. Or, even better, those are humans turning against themselves. Which was likely encouraged.”
“And Lana?”
“The propaganda.” He gestured at the nearest poster. “That’s her touch. Making it all seem righteous. Inevitable.” A bitter smile twisted his lips. “They always did work well together when they bothered to align their interests.”
The words sat heavy in the air between them. This was what the Nostroms had always wanted. What Raziel himself had wanted, once upon a time. Rule. Control. Vampires ascendant and all the world bowing at their feet.
The difference was the execution. Mael and Lana had all the subtlety of a cannon and an icepick.
They moved deeper into the outer districts, where the buildings grew older and more decrepit. Here, the gas lamps still flickered instead of the electric lights that dominated the central city. The cobblestones were cracked and uneven. The smell of coal smoke hung thick in the air.
