Nyx, my sister. The Shadow.
“Draven.”Her voice is cold, carrying the weight of ancient power and absolute authority.“You have broken theLaw of Silence. You have violated theLaw of Balance.You have created an abomination and exposed our world to discovery. The Coven of Crows demands your presence for judgment.”
A pause, long enough that I think the message is over.
“You have seven days. Present yourself at the site of your first turning, or we will come for your entire club. Every brother. Every woman. Every soul you’ve claimed as family. We will erase them from existence, and you will watch before we end you. The choice is yours… seven days.”
The recording ends.
Silence floods the clubhouse, thick and suffocating. My brothers have gathered around me. Rogue stands near the shattered front entrance, his lycan eyes glowing gold with barely suppressed rage. Scorch leans against the pool table, smoke curling from his nostrils in angry spirals. Dread sits in a corner, his god form flickering just beneath his skin as if he’s fighting to keep it contained. Hades stands motionless near the counter, his necromancer’s calm a thin veneer over something darker. Grizz blocks the hallway, his massive frame tense and ready. Oracle watches from the fireplace, flames dancing in his phoenix eyes. Ronan paces by the windows, his usual cocky grin replaced by something harder. Jet phases in and out of solidity, his wraith form agitated.
The women are here too.
Eden perches on a barstool, her banshee senses making her fidget with nervous energy. Seraphine sits at the stage’s edge, her siren’s song held back but vibrating through the air.Reyna stands near the entrance to the clubhouse, storm energy crackling faintly around her clenched fists.
My family.
My club.
Everyone I’ve built a life with for the past century, all at risk because I couldn’t let one woman die.
No.I push that thought away violently.I’d make the same choice a thousand times over.
“So.” Rogue breaks the silence, his voice carrying that edge of violence he uses when he’s looking for a fight. “The Crows want you. What’s the play, Prez?”
“We fight.” Scorch’s answer is immediate, predictable. The dragon shifter’s solution to every problem is fire and fury. “Fuck the Coven. Fuck their laws. We have power here, we’ve got magic. We make them bleed for every inch they try to take.”
“They’re Originals,” Hades points out quietly, his necromancer logic cutting through Scorch’s bravado. “Five of them. Each one represents a fundamental force of darkness. You can’t fight that kind of power with rage alone.”
“Watch me… brothers.” I raise my hand, and the room falls silent. Authority radiates from me, not just as their president, but as what I am. An Original vampire who’s lived thousands of years and led men through every kind of hell. “Everyone, take a breath. We need to think this through.”
“Think?” Rogue’s gold eyes flash. “They just threatened our family, Crave. What’s there to think about?”
“Strategy.” I move to the center of the room, feeling every eye tracking me. “The Coven of Crows doesn’t make empty threats. If they say they’ll erase us from existence, they mean it. Erebus alone could unmake half of you with a touch.”
“Then we run.” The suggestion comes from an unexpected source, Ronan, the luck-bending fae whose usual solution to problems is to charm or gamble his way through them. “Scatter,regroup somewhere they can’t find us. We’ve got connections, resources, hell… I can bend probability enough to hide our trail for months.”
“Run?” Rogue’s voice drops to a growl, his lycan nature taking offense. “You want us to tuck tail andrun?”
“I want us tosurvive.” Ronan faces him without flinching. “There’s no shame in a tactical retreat, wolf. Live to fight another day and all that.”
“There’s every shame in abandoning our territory.” Scorch’s veins glow brighter, heat radiating from him in waves. “We built this place, fought for it, bled for it… I’m not giving it up because some ancient assholes send a threatening voicemail.”
“It’s not just territory,” Reyna adds, her Valkyrie nature making her voice carry weight. “It’s principle. We back down from this, then every supernatural faction will see us as weak. They’ll eventually come for us anyway.”
“Better eventually than in seven days,” Hex mutters, his fingers still flying across his keyboard. “I’m monitoring supernatural communications. The bounty on Sloane is already up to seven figures. Everyone wants a piece of her, and they know she’s here.”
The sound of Sloane’s name hits me like a spark to dry kindling. Heat flares low in my chest, sharp and instinctive, and then something answers it. A shift, a quiet stir that isn’t mine. The steady rhythm I’ve grown used to falters, quickens, as if she’s turning in her sleep upstairs, drifting closer to waking. Too aware, too alert, even unconscious, she feels the threat closing in.
“So what?” Jet’s voice fractures, his wraith form splitting the sound, so it comes from everywhere at once. “We hand her over? Trade one life for all of ours?”
The words hit hard.
Not logical.
Not strategic.
Heavy in a way that scrapes straight down my spine. The implication slams into me like a blade, casual, calculating, spoken as if her life is a currency to be weighed. Something feral tears loose in my chest, drowning out every other thought.
