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But Bloodburn was never built for normal people. It was built for the children of monsters.
A generation ago, the big mafia daddies, mine included, decided it was much cleaner to pack their heirs into a private little slaughterhouse with an accredited library attached.
Stab, break, maim, occasionally devastate someone’s bloodline before seminar. Cute, right?
Around me, students crowd the perimeter in loose clusters. In the center of the ring, two Morozovs are trying to cave each other’s rib cages in.
As usual.
Dimitri and Alexei.
Cousins. Sociopaths.
My emotional support predators.
I grew up with them. The Morozov syndicate has been tangled up with my family’s organization for decades, and by now I’m pretty sure our fathers share more assets than most married couples. Territory, shipping routes, shell companies with boring names, you know, the whole romantic package. Proximity like that, plus three feral children left unsupervised for years, either bonds people or produces a triple homicide.
We chose bonding.
Mostly.
Murder still gets discussed.
I rest one forearm against the top rope and watch Dimitri launch forward. Heir to the Morozov throne. Blue-eyed. Black-haired. Obnoxiously pretty in a way that makes people forget he’d happily torch a city block if it improved his morning mood by two percent.
He twists, driving a brutal kick straight at Alexei’s ribs. Fast, vicious, desperate. Dimitri fights like he has something to prove every second of his waking life.
Alexei blocks it with one forearm, barely shifting an inch.
Where Dimitri is fire and speed, Alexei is pure, unyielding granite. Unfairly tall, too, which I resent on principle. They’re both giants. Standing between them makes me look like an armed minion, and I am correctly sized, thank you very much.
Dimitri lands, pivots, and comes back in with a grin. “You getting slower, cousin?”
A guy in the second row laughs.
Dimitri doesn’t even look over; he just raises a gloved middle finger in the guy’s direction. “Shut the fuck up, Boris, before I feed you your own teeth.”
He turns back to Alexei, meaner now, throwing a left hook that catches Alexei square across the jaw.
The hit snaps Alexei’s head to the side. The crowd sucks in a breath, and Dimitri’s grin widens.
Then Alexei drives a straight right into Dimitri’s solar plexus.
I bark out a laugh as Dimitri stumbles backward, hits the ropes hard, and glares at both of us while gasping for air.
Watching Alexei pummel Dimitri is one of my few reliable serotonin sources. Cleanses the skin. Good for the soul.
Dimitri wipes a smear of red from his lower lip with the back of his glove. “Fuck you, Ilya.”
Alexei steps in and catches him with a jab to the shoulder.
I lean over the ropes, howling. “Don’t look at me, Dima! Keep your hands up! You’re getting folded!”
Dimitri points a glove at my face while circling Alexei. “You are supposed to be in my corner.”
“I’m in the corner of whoever is actively causing you cranial trauma,” I shout back, smiling sweetly. “Please don’t interrupt my viewing experience. It’s the only joy I have left.”
Dimitri’s blue eyes flash murder. He lunges again, faster but also sloppier, because Alexei is under his skin. He tries for the side, but Alexei reads it instantly, sidesteps, and shoves Dimitri hard enough in the chest that he skids across the canvas, dropping to one knee.
