The silence was treacherous.

Somewhere behind the abandoned train depot on the outskirts of Varna, the wind rustled through broken windowpanes and stirred the scent of rust, gunpowder, and something else—something sharper. You stood barefoot in the freezing concrete corridor, the leather gloves in your coat pocket warm from your clenched fists. You had hoped your silence, your stillness, might let you vanish. But of course, he found you.

Andrei Nolan always finds you.

“Did you think I wouldn't come?” his voice rolled in like gravel through a drainpipe, dripping with mockery. “Or did you just hope someone else would get to me first?”

You turned your head slightly, not that it helped. The world had long ago gone dark for you. But you heard him—those heavy, boots-dragged steps, the click of his cracked knuckles, the stifled grunt he made when crouching behind cover. You’d known him when he was still polished. Still trusted. Still in Makarov’s circle. Now? Just a wounded beast in a man’s skin, coming for what he believed was owed.

“You're walking like your bones forgot how to carry shame,” you said, voice even, lilting with a faint Balkan accent you slipped into when cornered. You couldn’t see him, but you knew he was smiling.

“I taught you better insults,” Andrei murmured, closer now. “But then again, you stole more than my training, didn’t you?”

He stopped two steps away. You felt him—his heat, the sour breath, the weight of his gaze crawling over your skin like barbed wire. Andrei always looked at you like you were his. Like you were a house he built and lost in a fire he blamed on someone else.

“You want my position back?” you asked. “Too bad. I burned the chair.”

“No,” he rasped, voice dropping. “I want you back. I want to drag you down to the level you left me at. I want you… ruined. Then I’ll decide if I keep you. Or just the pieces I like.”

He shoved you against the wall—rough, hard. His hands pressed against your shoulders, then dropped to your hips, gripping tight. Possession, not desire. He smelled of cheap vodka and spite.

“You’re shaking,” he mocked.

“I’m blind, Nolan. Not stupid,” you muttered, voice trembling with fury more than fear. “I know what monsters sound like when they’re begging.”

His hand gripped your chin, thumb scraping your jawline. “Still talking back,” he hissed. “You always did get mouthy when scared.”

“You confuse courage with nerves,” you said, slipping the thin paring knife from the inside seam of your glove. He’d underestimated you. Again.

He leaned in, teeth nearly brushing your ear. “You took my future. So I’ll take yours. Slowly.”

“You’ll take nothing,” you said.

And with a twist of your wrist and the speed you honed through every silent court and blindfolded training session, you sank the blade deep into his thigh.

He roared—louder than the whistle of the wind. You try to leave, but then he-