The world pressed down on her chest.
Heavy.
Cold.
Wet.
At first she thought she was still dreaming —
caught under the same slow, crushing tide of nightmares.
The ones where the walls wept and hands reached from the dark.
But something was different this time.
The air was wrong.
Thicker.
Sharp with the metallic stink of blood.
She tried to move —
and the ache that lanced through her muscles was real.
Her body felt like paper —
thin, brittle, used up.
Every nerve screamed with need —
for Stardust, for alcohol, for oblivion —
but there was no comfort here.
Only the cruel clarity of waking up.
A touch on her shoulder.
Too light.
Too urgent.
She flinched violently, her whole frame seizing.
"—Liz. Liz, please—"
Alexandra’s voice.
Breathless.
Choked with something dangerously close to panic.
Liz forced her eyes open,
every motion sluggish and heavy,
like dragging herself out of tar.
The world blurred,
then focused:
White ceiling.
Soft, flickering lights.
The pale, trembling face of Alex leaning over her.
Fear twisted across her friend’s features —
real, raw fear —
the kind Liz hadn't seen in a long time.
Something was wrong.
Very wrong.
She tried to sit up.
The cold hit her like a slap —
sweat cooling fast against her bare skin under the loose silk dress,
making her shiver uncontrollably.
Her throat burned —
dry, cracked.
Her chest hurt from breathing.
The performance had drained her.
The nightmare had unraveled her.
And now—
this.
The smell hit her fully then.
Blood.
Real.
Fresh.
Not memory.
Not dream.
It coated the room like invisible chains.
Heavy. Metallic. Inevitable.
Her eyes darted instinctively —
and froze.
He was standing there.
A man wrapped in black.
Still as death itself.
The black matte mask covering his face was blank —
faceless —
only two eye slits carved into the dark ceramic.
She couldn't breathe.
She couldn't move.
Faceless men.
They came for her.
They took her.
They branded her.
She remembered the needles —
the way the "14" had been branded into her thigh,
not as a name, not as a person, but as property.
A number. A possession.
Her heart lurched —
a primal terror igniting in her chest.
Memories flashed —
chains.
tattoo needles.
the stench of cold metal tables.
screams swallowed in the back of her throat.
But then—
the eyes.
Steel-grey.
Sharp.
Silent.
Watching her.
Not greedy.
Not cruel.
Just —
seeing.
The terror twisted.
Softened.
Something else slipped into its place —
confusion.
hollow fear.
the terrible ache of being recognized as something more than a body.
The mask made him faceless.
But the eyes anchored her.
Liz clutched weakly at Alex’s wrist,
gasping for air she couldn’t taste.
The man —
the Faceless One —
did not move.
Did not speak.
He simply watched her.
Measured her.
Weighed her.
And in the silent judgment of those grey eyes,
she felt the most fragile, terrifying thing of all:
She still mattered.
Even broken.
Even ruined.
Even now.
She mattered enough to be seen.
And for the first time in a very long time,
Eliza Deme did not know if she wanted to cry, scream, or beg.
She clutched at the red-haired one’s wrist —
weakly,
desperately.
Her body trembled.
Not from defiance.
Not from rage.
From the simple, hollow terror of a creature
who had already been taken too many times.
Dante watched her.
Silent.
Unmoving.
Measuring.
His steel-grey eyes read the story written in her gaze
as easily as he had once read battlefields.
He saw it there —
etched deep.
Not the fear of death.
Not even the fear of pain.
The fear of being reduced again.
Of being made nothing again.
The desert inside him —
that cold, endless place that had carried him through a thousand deaths —
shifted.
And stilled.
For the first time in a long time,
Dante Saint felt the faint, hollow ache of something
he had thought burned away by years of slaughter:
Restraint.
Mercy.
She stared at his mask —
that blank, pitiless face —
and he saw the echoes it conjured for her.
Not him.
Not now.
But others.
Worse ones.
The ones who had carved her soul as carelessly as they had carved her skin.
He did not speak.
There was no need for words.
Only action.
Slowly, with a precision more careful than any blade stroke,
Dante lifted his hands.
No rush.
No sudden movements.
He reached up.
Fingers brushed the clasp of the Verlone cloak —
undid it.
The heavy fabric fell away from his shoulders,
whispering against the air.
Beneath it, the simple, worn robes he had worn since his arrival —
dark, unadorned, marked only by the aged gleam of Imperial gold along the hems.
Still recognizable.
Still himself.
Then, even slower, he reached for the mask.
His fingers found the cold ceramic edges —
lifted.
Revealed.
Steel-grey eyes.
Scarred face.
The cross-shaped wound carved into flesh and memory.
No monster’s visage.
No faceless horror.
Just a man.
Broken.
Silent.
Unmoving.
But real.
He let her see.
Let her breathe.
Let her have this small, meaningless thing:
the truth of his face.
Because he would not —
could not —
become another ghost chasing an innocent through the ruins of her own mind.
The desert inside him stayed silent.
And for once,
it felt almost right.
The mask fell away.
And for a moment,
the world slowed.
He was handsome.
Brutally so.
Not the delicate, polished beauty of the Verlone court,
not the plastic perfection of the augmented nobility.
Real beauty.
Rugged.
Carved in violence and survival.
The kind that was earned, not bought.
Her eyes traced him without meaning to —
the high, hard cheekbones,
the strong jaw shadowed with dark stubble,
the sharp angles of a face forged by hardship rather than artistry.
And then —
the scar.
The first thing that truly struck her.
The cross-shaped wound cleaving through flesh and memory.
It slashed vertically down his left eye —
cutting through the brow, the lid, the cheekbone.
And horizontally across the bridge of his nose —
from beneath the right eye outward, scarring the left cheek.
Two brutal lines that should have marred him,
but somehow crowned him instead.
A wound not hidden.
Not ashamed.
Worn like a brand.
A survival etched into skin.
And then —
the eyes.
Steel-grey.
Not cold the way cruelty was cold.
Colder.
Calm.
Immovable.
Like standing at the edge of a vast desert,
feeling its endlessness stretch out before you,
and knowing it could swallow you whole without even stirring the sand.
He was terrifying.
He was beautiful.
But that wasn’t what truly held her frozen.
It was something else.
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
Something worse.
Or maybe — something better.
When he removed the mask,
he hadn’t revealed a monster.
He had revealed a man.
A kindred spirit.
A man who knew.
Knew what it was to carry things that left you hollow.
Knew what it meant to be marked by survival.
Knew the terrible loneliness that came from being seen only as weapon or waste.
Liz’s breathing hitched in her throat.
Tears prickled behind her eyes —
not from fear.
Not from pain.
From the unbearable weight of understanding.
She didn’t know him.
Didn’t know his name.
Didn’t know why he had come.
But she knew —
deep in her broken, blood-stained bones —
that he had chosen, for reasons she couldn’t grasp,
not to be another faceless man in her nightmares.
He could have hidden.
Could have let her drown in her terror.
But he had chosen to show her his face.
And that choice —
small, silent, sharp —
cut deeper than any blade.
Liz swayed slightly where she sat,
still clutching at Alex’s wrist.
Her body weak.
Her mind fraying.
But somehow,
somehow,
she stayed upright.
Facing him.
Trembling.
Tattered.
Unbowed.
The faceless man was gone.
And in his place stood a scarred sentinel,
silent and terrible,
watching her with eyes that had survived too much to waste mercy lightly.
She didn’t trust him.
She didn’t feel safe.
But for the first time in a very long time,
Eliza Deme wasn’t invisible.
And that was enough.
For now.
The silence pressed in.
Heavy.
Unbreathing.
The man — no, the being — stood before her, unmoving.
His grey eyes steady, endless, as if he could see through her.
And then—
A soft, broken sound.
Not from him.
From Alex.
A tiny whimper —
like something wounded catching breath before the slaughter.
Liz turned her head slightly —
felt Alex’s hand clutch tighter around her wrist,
shaking.
The redhead leaned down, her mouth close to Liz’s ear,
her voice barely more than a breath:
"Dante Saint..."
A whisper.
A prayer.
Or a curse.
Another pause.
Alex swallowed visibly — her whole body trembling.
Then, even softer:
"The Emperor's Envoy."
The words hit Liz like a blow to the chest.
For a moment, she couldn’t breathe.
She didn’t know everything about him —
no one did.
But she knew enough.
Dante Saint may be an envoy. The Emperor’s Envoy. But to them, he was a Blademaster.
And the fear of Blademasters perhaps the most constant companion for people like them.
It lived in every hushed story traded between drunkards.
In every mother's whisper to a child who wouldn't sleep.
In every battlefield where bodies were left broken without a single shot fired.
A Blademaster wasn’t just a soldier.
Not just a killer.
They were war given breath.
One could slaughter battalions.
Topple cities.
Break armies with nothing but a blade and their will.
And now one was here.
Stood before her.
Mask gone.
Face revealed.
Eyes steady.
And whatever fragile ground she thought she had found under her feet
vanished.
The silence shattered.
The door cracked open —
not slammed,
not burst through —
but eased,
as if the shadows themselves were slipping into the light.
Figures entered.
Three.
Four.
Maybe more.
They moved like they belonged to the night —
dark cloaks rippling like oil against marble floors,
grotesque, monstrous masks gleaming dully under the room’s low lights.
Fanged mouths.
Twisted, alien visages.
Eyes hidden behind black slits.
Not human.
Not anything human.
Liz’s heart spasmed in her chest.
The fragile thread of almost-trust she’d clung to —
the strange, shivering breath of stillness when he had revealed his face —
snapped.
Gone.
The memories came surging back like floodwaters:
Faceless men.
Chains.
The burning of the "14" into her skin, while masked monsters watched without blinking.
She recoiled instinctively,
pressing herself closer to Alex,
every nerve screaming for escape,
even as her body trembled too violently to obey.
The figures spread out —
silent, inevitable,
like snakes slithering across the sand to strike.
They were going to take her.
Chain her.
Carve her away again.
But then—
A voice.
Not a shout.
Not a bark.
A command —
calm, cold, and absolute.
"Hurry."
Liz's gaze snapped back to him.
To the scarred man without the mask.
Dante Saint.
Still standing there —
still watching her —
but not as a hunter.
As something infinitely colder.
And infinitely safer.
The monsters obeyed instantly.
No hesitation.
No wasted movements.
They moved —
not toward her,
not toward Alex —
but toward the dark shapes she barely noticed on the floor.
Bodies.
The realization hit her like a delayed explosion.
There had been bodies here.
Corpses.
Killed and dropped while she had still been half-conscious, half-dreaming.
Blood was in the air,
seeping into her pores,
making everything heavy.
The masked figures worked quickly.
No words.
No grunts of effort.
Just the soft hiss of cloth and steel,
the dull drag of boots across tile.
They lifted the corpses like bundles of rags —
carried them with frightening efficiency.
No ceremony.
No mercy.
Just duty.
In less than a minute,
they were gone.
The door clicked shut behind them,
soft as a breath.
And the monsters were swallowed back into the dark where they belonged.
Liz sat frozen,
hands clutching uselessly at Alex’s sleeve,
her chest heaving with sharp, shuddering breaths.
Her entire body sang with terror —
trembling, weeping, begging for numbness.
But somewhere —
deep, buried beneath the ruin of her panic —
a singular thought planted itself:
He didn’t let them touch me.
He didn’t let them look at me.
He made them leave.
And even though her hands were still shaking,
even though the cold sweat slicked her spine,
even though her mind screamed at her to run,
something quieter —
something stubborn —
held her frozen in place.
Watching him.
Waiting.
Breathing.
Still breathing.
He turned his full gaze on her.
On them.
The grey of his eyes —
sharp and cold and endless —
pinned Liz to the moment.
And then, in a voice low, even,
carved from the same silence he carried like a second skin,
he spoke:
"Forget everything you have seen tonight."
No threat.
No flourish.
No need.
It was a command —
a decree from something ancient and merciless.
Something that would not ask twice.
Liz's throat worked soundlessly.
Alex, beside her, was frozen stiff — wide-eyed, trembling.
Neither of them spoke.
Neither of them could.
And maybe that was good.
Maybe silence was safer.
She watched — barely breathing —
as he turned away.
His movements were smooth, practiced, as if even now,
he wasted no motion.
He stooped, lifting the heavy black Verlone cloak from the floor.
With a single efficient motion,
he draped it back over his shoulders,
the fabric whispering against itself like the shifting of dunes.
He fastened the clasp.
Pulled the hood forward.
Shadows swallowed his scarred face.
Only the glint of steel-grey eyes remained —
briefly, terribly.
And then even that was gone.
He lifted the mask.
The blank, matte ceramic face —
cold and faceless once more.
He slid it over his features without hesitation.
The man disappeared.
The weapon returned.
Liz's chest tightened.
Her pulse pounded in her ears.
It was like watching the door to something real slam shut —
leaving only the monsters behind.
Without a sound,
he moved.
One step —
fluid as water.
Soundless as breath.
Another.
And then he was gone.
The door clicked closed behind him —
soft, final, like a seal pressed onto wax.
The room felt cavernous in his absence.
Too big.
Too empty.
The air was heavy with the scent of blood and silence and something else —
something colder.
Liz’s fingers clenched weakly into the fabric of her dress.
Alex was breathing fast, shallow,
her face pale, her eyes darting toward the door like it might open again.
But it didn’t.
The storm had passed.
And somehow,
they were still standing.
Barely.
But standing.
The silence pressed in —
heavy, merciless.
It crushed against Liz’s ribs,
squeezed her lungs into tight, desperate knots.
The tremors started in her hands.
Spread to her arms.
Her chest.
Her heart stuttered —
too fast, too hard,
like it was trying to tear free from her chest.
She couldn’t breathe.
She couldn’t move.
Panic seized her in a vice.
The room tilted —
spun —
closed in.
The walls were too close.
The air too thin.
Her skin too tight.
A noise tore from her throat —
half-sob, half-whimper —
as she staggered upright.
Alex said something —
a sharp, broken sound —
but it didn’t matter.
Nothing mattered.
Liz's hand fumbled into the folds of her dress,
seeking without thought, without reason.
The vial.
Cold, metallic, familiar.
She yanked it free with shaking fingers —
uncapped it —
and inhaled.
The Stardust burned sharp into her nose,
a silver fire that cut through everything.
Pain.
Fear.
Memory.
All of it.
Gone.
The hit was instant.
The panic, the terror, the ragged edge of a scream building inside her —
all smothered under a heavy, warm blanket of numbness.
Her muscles slackened.
Her heartbeat slowed.
Her mind floated upward, slipping free of her battered body.
She slumped down onto the couch,
boneless, weightless, adrift.
The room blurred —
the walls melting into soft colors,
the blood-smell fading to nothing.
But even as she drifted —
even as the chemical clouds wrapped her tight in their velvet embrace —
something stayed.
Something sharp.
Something steel.
Those eyes.
Steel-grey.
Endless.
Watching her from the back of her mind,
refusing to vanish.
She squeezed her eyes shut,
curled in on herself like a broken thing seeking shelter.
But still —
they lingered.
The scarred face.
The heavy silence.
The choice he had made —
to show her his face.
To leave her breathing.
And even in the haze,
even in the soft, soothing darkness closing in around her,
Liz knew one thing:
Whatever storm had touched her life tonight —
it wasn’t over.
Not by a long shot.
The room was quiet now.
Too quiet.
The air hung heavy — thick with the ghost of blood and burning Stardust.
Alex stood frozen by the door,
watching Liz sink deeper into the velvet shroud of her high,
watching her tremble once, twice,
then go still.
Gods.
She had never looked more heartbreakingly beautiful.
Liz was sprawled across the battered couch —
a broken, sensual angel drowning in the soft poison of her own salvation.
Her raven hair spilled across the leather like black silk,
damp with sweat, clinging to the sharp angles of her cheeks and collarbones.
Her skin —
pale, luminous —
seemed almost too fragile for this world,
almost translucent under the flickering light.
Her long legs curled lazily beneath her —
curves draped in the dark, flowing fabric of her ruined dress,
barely decent, utterly breathtaking.
The faint shimmer of jewelry glinted at her throat and wrists —
chains, bands, small totems of a life that had never known peace.
And there —
etched into the delicate skin of her thigh,
the faint black lines of a tattoo:
"14."
A number.
A brand.
A memory of everything the world had tried to steal from her.
Alex’s throat tightened painfully.
She crossed the room slowly,
kneeling by the couch,
reaching out but not quite touching Liz.
She didn’t dare.
Not now.
Liz’s eyelids fluttered,
half-shut, lost somewhere deep in the cloudy mists of Stardust and exhaustion.
A broken star still trying to burn.
And yet —
they were alive.
Somehow.
They were still breathing.
The realization hit Alex like a delayed blow.
They had survived an encounter with the Emperor’s Envoy.
With Dante Saint.
A Blademaster.
A force of nature disguised in human skin.
And not just him —
but his monsters, his shadows, his nightmares walking under Verlone cloaks.
They should be dead.
They should have been erased.
And yet —
here they were.
Alive.
Alex wiped a trembling hand across her mouth,
the taste of fear still thick on her tongue.
Her heart slammed against her ribs,
refusing to believe it was over.
But it was.
For now.
And then—
the memory crashed into her.
The Noble.
The one who had been at the performance.
The one who had stared too long, too hungrily, when Liz sang.
Alex hadn’t thought much of it at the time —
after all, Liz’s booking tonight had been official, arranged through the house stewards.
Sanctioned by Verlone officials.
There had been no warning.
No whispered threats.
No dirty promises tucked into contracts.
Just another performance.
Just another night.
But now—
Alex could see it.
Feel it.
When he said "here" —
his hand already reaching for the door handle —
he hadn’t hesitated.
He hadn’t paused to check the room numbers.
Hadn’t asked.
Hadn’t wondered.
He knew.
He knew exactly whose door he was standing before.
Exactly who was behind it.
Exactly who he had come for.
A shudder rolled through Alex’s spine.
Not a coincidence.
Not bad luck.
A target.
Liz had been marked tonight.
And if it hadn’t been for Dante Saint —
if it hadn’t been for the masked death waiting behind that door—
Liz would’ve been lost.
Taken.
Destroyed in a way no song could ever sing whole again.
Alex clutched the couch tighter,
her nails biting into the fabric.
She closed her eyes,
breathed slow and shallow against the rising sickness.
Tonight, death had come.
And for once—
it hadn't worn Liz’s name.
He had come for Liz.
He had come to her room.
Alex could see it now —
the way the hallway would have stretched before him,
the heavy, predatory steps of his guards,
the hand reaching for the door—
Only to be met not with helpless prey —
but with Dante Saint.
Alex squeezed her eyes shut,
a fresh wave of nausea roiling through her.
The Elder —
his guards —
they were gone.
Cut away from existence.
Before they could even touch Liz.
Before Liz even knew.
Alex pressed her forehead lightly against the edge of the couch,
close enough to feel Liz’s warmth,
close enough to remember why she fought so hard.
Because she was worth saving.
Even if the world didn’t deserve her.
Even if Liz didn’t believe it herself.
Alex stayed there, breathing slowly,
holding onto the smallest truth she had left:
Tonight, death had come.
And for once—
it hadn’t come for Liz.
The room had fallen into a strange, trembling stillness.
Only the soft sound of Liz’s breathing, slow and heavy under the weight of Stardust, filled the air.
The worst was over.
But the aftershocks still rattled Alex’s heart.
Moving gently — so gently, like Liz might shatter at a wrong breath —
Alex rose to her knees.
She found the old, worn blanket draped over the nearby chair —
the one Liz always left there, half-forgotten.
She pulled it over her.
Tucking the edges around Liz’s fragile form, careful not to wake her, careful not to disturb the small, broken peace the Stardust had carved out.
Liz murmured once in her drugged sleep —
a soft, pained sound.
Alex froze, hand hovering above her.
And then, with a voice barely a whisper, barely even hers,
she said:
"You're safe now.
You're okay."
It wasn't a promise.
Gods, it wasn't a promise.
It was a hope.
A prayer thrown into a universe too cruel to answer kindly.
But for tonight —
for this heartbeat —
it was true.
Alex sat back, pressing her fists into her lap until her fingers ached.
She stared at the floor,
at the faint smudges left behind where blood had been.
She swallowed hard.
And made herself a vow:
No more.
No more performances for nobles.
Not for coins.
Not for prestige.
Not even for the mighty House Verlone.
She didn’t care how rich the offers were.
How powerful the names attached to them might be.
Never again.
Never again would she gamble Liz’s soul for applause.
Never again would she let vultures gather around her broken angel under the guise of culture.
Not while Alex still had breath left in her body.
Outside, somewhere beyond the sealed door, the Emerald Spire gleamed under silver moons —
beautiful and hollow and rotting from within.
But inside this small, battered room,
Alex pulled the blanket a little higher around Liz's shoulders.
And kept her vigil.
Because tonight, death had passed them by.
And that was enough.
For now.
The halls of the Emerald Spire bent around Dante Saint like obedient reeds.
He moved through the twisting corridors without hesitation —
without slowing.
No wasted steps.
No second glances.
No uncertainty.
The path back to the grand ballroom unfolded before him like it had been marked into the stone just for him.
The chaos of performers, stylists, stewards —
it blurred into meaningless noise around him.
He slipped through them
like water between stones,
like the desert wind moving unseen over broken bones.
The cloak hung heavy on his shoulders.
The mask was still in place.
And inside him—
The desert was still.
Silent.
Weightless.
Perfect.
Ahead, the thrum of music swelled —
strings, synth, distant applause.
The celebration continued.
The Verlones danced.
The Imperial Courtiers laughed and drank.
No one knew.
No one even suspected.
Dante reached the periphery of the grand hall —
and with a slight, subtle shift of his fingers —
signaled.
A ripple passed through the Blade Attendants, stationed invisibly throughout the room.
Silent acknowledgment.
No words needed.
The substitution was smooth, practiced, perfect.
One cloaked figure drifted into the swirling mass of guests —
replacing the fake Dante.
The masked doppelg?nger melted back toward the shadowed alcoves —
disappearing without leaving a single thread to pull.
No one noticed.
No one dared.
Dante moved with the current now.
Among the glittering river of gowns and polished boots and masks.
He accepted a dance with a slender woman adorned in living silver embroidery —
a Noble from the Main Verlone line.
He exchanged brief, glinting conversation with a Lord from the Imperial Court —
one of the minor satellites to the Emperor’s orbit.
He smiled when necessary.
He listened when required.
But inside —
inside, he remained untouched.
From the corner of his eye,
he caught the smooth entry of Adam Graves and two of his Shadows back in the hall. Still disguised underneath those cloaks.
Silent.
Fluid.
Undetected.
The final pieces slipping back into place.
Now—
now, all that remained was to wait.
The Verlones would find the bodies eventually.
Not now.
Not tonight.
But soon enough.
And when they did —
the first cracks in their perfect marble would begin to show.
Dante danced, smiled, murmured polite phrases.
But his mind had already moved past the ballroom.
Already, he was watching the seeds he had planted take root.
Already, he was calculating the harvest to come.
What would the Verlones think?
How would they explain corpses in the heart of their sacred Spire?
Would they blame a rival House?
Would they suspect Imperial hands?
Would they turn on each other, gnawing at the bonds that held their rot together?
He wondered —
coldly, clinically —
how long it would take before the first whispered accusations bloomed.
Before trust turned brittle.
Before beauty cracked into blood.
And Dante Saint the Emperor’s Envoy, his Silent Blade would be there.
Watching.
Waiting.
Guiding the fall.
