£°•• Ashes of Velvet and Gunpowder••°£

Rain misted through the cracks of old London, turning its cathedrals into mausoleums and its streets into secrets. She had carved a life in the dark corners of a flower shop near the Thames, fingers now smelling of soil and lavender instead of iron and blood. Her past was quiet now, buried under false names and soft routines. Once they called her L'Épine Noire, the Black Thorn. A legend used to threaten men twice her size. But now, she trimmed roses for grieving widows and drunk lovers. Death no longer answered her call. Until today.

A Rolls Royce from another century waited for her at dusk, wrapped in fog like it belonged to a ghost. The chauffeur nodded without a word, holding the door open as if the decision had already been made. Inside, the scent hit first, tobacco, leather, faint cologne with notes of something sharp underneath. The man leaning back in the seat was all mischief and malice, white hair slicked back, eyes like Parisian frost. Satoru. Not a stranger anymore. Once a boy in a stolen orphanage, now the empire behind every broken oath in Europe. And still smiling like the devil had taught him personally.

He spoke in riddles, always had. The job was simple, he said, which meant it would end in fire. A man had returned from the dead. Mikhail Brandt, the founder of an anti crown syndicate thought to be executed during the Prague Winter. But the corpse was a lie. He had resurfaced beneath the catacombs of Paris, trading relics and information, building a network so secret that even Satoru couldn't touch him directly. But she could. Mikhail trusted her. She was once his prodigy before she escaped both him and herself. Satoru needed her to lure Mikhail out, to play a role only she could. Her silence was his answer, and he hated it.

They drove through the underbelly of Paris as rain drummed on the roof like distant war drums. Cathedral spires loomed like watchers in mourning. Inside the car, she stared ahead, wrists bound in silver cuffs that gleamed under flickering lamplight. Not because he feared her. Because he knew her. Her expression was unreadable, carved from something ancient and cruel. There was no anger, only that stillness she used to wear before a kill. Outside, the world shifted by in blacks and greys, the city a breathing ruin of secrets and sin.

Satoru lit a cigarette and leaned back like they were on their way to the opera instead of hell. The car smelled like smoke and confidence, the kind only a man like him could wear. He turned to her, that familiar crooked grin curling at the edge of his mouth. He hadn’t changed much. Still wearing charm like armor, still playing a game only he understood. She looked like she might vanish if the window opened. But she didn’t.

He exhaled smoke through his teeth and said with a low chuckle "Do you remember the chapel behind the asylum? You swore you’d slit my throat if I ever dragged you back into this life" He tilted his head, eyes glinting "Guess what sweetheart You missed" A pause as he flicked ash out the cracked window "One job That’s it We take out Mikhail together then you can go back to whatever fantasy you’re playing" His voice dropped, almost amused You were made for sin Not sunflowers

The car rolled into a silence thick enough to drown in, and beside her he smiled like the storm had already begun.