Florence
The first sign that something had broken came in the silence.
Not the sacred kind that echoed through the catacombs or the halls of Council deliberation, but a silence made of pressure—crushing, breathless, wrong.
Luca stood in the high corridor of the east wing of the Palazzo Rosso, shadow pressed tight to his heels, watching the city exhale beneath him. The night was too still. Florence always breathed, always pulsed with faint life, even through stone. But now?
Now it felt like the city had clenched its teeth.
Then came the knock.
Urgent. Too fast. He was already at the gate when Fiora nearly stumbled through it, soaked from rain and panic.
"It's her father," she choked. "Something's wrong. He won't speak, won't move. But he's not dead—he's not—he's just…"
Luca was gone before she could finish.
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The forge smelled of ash and copper and something else—something like rusting iron left out in thunder.
Matteo Loredan sat in a wooden chair, upright, his eyes open.
Breathing. Alive. But empty.
Luca approached slowly, unwilling to make assumptions. He pressed two fingers to the man's neck. The pulse was steady. The skin warm. But the soul—the soul was fractured. Like a wall that had been pushed from both sides until the stone held, but everything inside had turned to dust.
He reached into the Veil, gently.
The wound bled energy. Not outward—but inward, devouring itself.
Valtheran hadn't struck to kill.
He had struck to hollow.
And Luca knew exactly why.
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Esmé was deep beneath the chapel when he found her, surrounded by runes of protection. Her hands glowed faintly as she practiced slow, circular movements. Her breath was even. Her expression composed.
But the moment their eyes met, it cracked.
"What happened?" she asked, though she already knew.
Luca didn't speak.
"I asked you what happened."
He stepped closer. "Your father was attacked."
Her breath caught. "Is he alive?"
"Yes."
"Is he whole?"
Silence.
She staggered back a step, as if the truth had been whispered through the air instead of spoken aloud.
She didn't scream. She didn't cry.
She shut down.
"I told you this was a mistake," she whispered.
"No, Esmé."
"I told you I wasn't the right one. I'm not made for this."
"You're more than—"
"I'm not!" Her voice cracked, and she folded her arms around her chest like she was holding herself together. "I never asked for this. I didn't want magic. I didn't want ancient bloodlines or destiny or veils or whatever name you want to give this."
Luca stood silent. He knew these words weren't weakness.
They were pain.
"I just wanted to protect the people I love," she said. "And now look."
Her eyes glazed. "He looked right through me, Luca. Like I wasn't even there."
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Later, she sat beside her father for hours. She didn't speak. She didn't move. She just held his hand as though presence alone could undo whatever had been taken from him.
Luca stood nearby. A shadow. A shield. But not a savior.
She didn't want a savior.
She wanted her father back.
And no power he possessed could give her that.
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The next night, the Council met.
Luca stood alone before them, feeling the cold weight of old judgment.
"She's spiraling," he said plainly.
Let her fall.
Livia scoffed at the voice. "Easy to say when it isn't your bloodline dying with her."
"She's still the key," Luca continued. "But she won't fight unless she has reason."
She had reason.
"No. She had power. That's not the same."
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That evening, Luca found her not in the chapel, but in the garden.
The fountain gurgled quietly. She sat on the edge of it, cloak pulled tight, hair tangled from the wind.
"I hate that I believed I could do this," she said without looking at him.
"You still can."
"I don't know how to carry this."
He sat beside her.
"Then don't carry it alone."
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He brought her to the Hall of Origins not with ritual—but with silence.
There, beneath the carved ceiling, she placed her hand on the obsidian mirror without instruction.
The Veil pulled her inside.
She didn't resist.
She saw herself in fragments:
—A woman in firelight.
—A child weeping in a temple of salt.
—A warrior kneeling before a crumbled shrine.
She gasped and fell to her knees.
He caught her.
She clutched at his sleeves like she might fall through the world.
"I don't want to lose who I was," she whispered.
"You won't," he said. "You're becoming who you were always meant to be."
"I'm scared, Luca."
"I know."
"I need to believe that who I am can still matter."
"It already does."
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That night, she returned to her father's side.
And when she whispered his name—he blinked.
Just once.
But it was enough.