He stepped toward Caerel to take the gun.
Riven moved.
With practiced precision, he drew a blade from his belt and let it fly. It flew cleanly, silently hit Yerin square in the side, just beneath the ribs.
Yerin staggered back with a snarl, hand snapping to the hilt embedded in his side. Blood bloomed across his tailored coat. The gun fell from Caerel’s hand as he backed away, stunned.
Thane was already closing the distance, his blade out, every inch of him lethal.
Caerel dropped to his knees. “Wait—wait, please,” he said, raising his hands. “I didn’t know—I didn’t think he’d—”
Yerin yanked the knife from his own body, his face twisting in fury. “Shut up.”
With vicious speed, he hurled the blood-slicked blade.
It struck Caerel dead center in the chest. He jerked back like a puppet with its strings cut, then crumpled to the floor, unmoving.
The silence that followed rang louder than any explosion.
Yerin exhaled slowly, eyes narrowing as he met Thane’s gaze. “You ruin everything.” He smiled, blood running down his side. “Let’s finish it.”
Chapter 74
Yerin straightened, blood soaking his side, and let out a sharp breath through his nose. Then, as though the pain were a mere inconvenience, he reached up and dragged a hand across his face. Magic shimmered like oil on water, his illusion unraveling. The crisp lines of Lareth’s features melted away, revealing the scarred, glass-eyed face of Yerin Mecari.
“Let’s not pretend I came down here on a whim,” he said, voice low and smooth with satisfaction. “I knew exactly how House Virellien would respond. Seal the upper floors. Lock down the warded corridors. Run to the safe rooms.” He gestured vaguely at the chamber around them. “And just like that, I had them.”
Riven’s brows furrowed. He looked to Thane.
Thane exhaled, jaw tightening. “The failsafe,” he said. “You’re going to use the House’s own lockdown protocol to collapse it from the inside out. That’s why you kept her alive.” His gaze flicked to the Matriarch, still standing silent but sharp-eyed at the center of it all.
Yerin’s grin widened. “See? He gets it.”
“Not very creative,” Riven said dryly.
Yerin’s head tilted, glass eye catching the light. “Why mess with something that works?”
“Except it didn’t work,” Riven shot back. “We’re here. Kind of a glaring flaw in your master plan.”
For the first time, Yerin’s smile faded just a fraction.
“That,” he said coldly, “is something I intend to remedy—now.”
The glow of corrupted wards pulsed like a heartbeat beneath their feet—but Thane didn’t hesitate.
Neither did Yerin.
They launched at each other, fists colliding with flesh and bone in a blur too fast for the eye to track. No weapons now, just fury and decades of trained violence. Thane fought with precision, every movement controlled and devastating. Riven had seen him put down men twice his size without breaking a sweat—but Yerin was something else entirely. Twisted, yes. Wounded. But skilled. Every hit he took, he returned harder, faster, his strength shockingly intact despite the injury Riven had inflicted.
They slammed into the side of the vault, knocking over a table piled with tomes and scattering the remnants of old magic across the stone. Dust choked the air as they exchanged punishing blows. Thane ducked under a wild punch, landed a knee to Yerin’s ribs, and drove him back—but Yerin twisted, using the momentum to shove Thane into a stone column, cracking the surface.
Riven moved to help, but Thane had told him—run if I say run. And right now, he hadn’t said anything.
Thane gained ground again, seizing Yerin by the collar and slamming him against the curved wall, driving his fist into his stomach, his jaw, his temple. Yerin staggered, bleeding from his lip, breath ragged—but then—
He smiled.
Not the feral grin of a man enjoying a fight. This was something colder. Satisfied.
