Chapter 30

  The sitting room faced the ocean, the winter light fractured by bay windows. Just after breakfast, Elizabeth lounged in a linen armchair, coffee in hand, as if the coastal house were another estate she’d claimed centuries ago.

  “I had thought of ending it,” she said. Her eyes were on the horizon, voice soft but edged with iron. “After so long, the world begins to be tasteless. You eat, you drink, you travel—but the flavors dull. Immortality is not redemption, Sadie. It is endlessly boring.”

  She paused, tilting her head like she was weighing whether to let me in on the secret. “You wonder how I came here, don’t you? Beyond the stained glass, beyond your precious

  museum.” Her lips curved. “When England looked west with hungry eyes, I slipped into the

  tide. Hawkins with his caravels. Frobisher chasing frozen passages. Raleigh’s Roanoke vanishing into whispers. And Drake—my Drake. He carried me farther than any priest could imagine, skimming the Pacific coasts of Spain’s empire, charting me a path to freedom.”

  She sipped, unhurried. “When the court wept at my so-called passing in 1603, I was already across the sea. Bartholomew Gosnold’s maps guided me, naming capes and islands that still endure. I was a ghost before I ever reached these shores.”

  Her voice shifted—lighter now, almost wistful. “And then came the centuries. I saw Lewis and Clark carve their way west, pretending they were the first to look upon those rivers. I dressed as a widow and watched Annie Oakley split the air with bullets straighter than arrows I kept silent at Donner Lake when wagons splintered and families turned on themselves. I stood in crowds as women shouted for the vote, New Zealand first, then the world following. And I listened in sterile rooms as doctors dared to say women should choose their pregnancies for themselves—marveling that choice had finally been pulled into daylight.”

  Her gaze flicked to me, sharp and knowing. “Great achievements. Great horrors. Do you see the pattern? I have been there—in one disguise or another—for every threshold. And yet, the longer I endure, the less it pleases me. Humanity’s chorus has become a hum I cannot silence.”

  The room felt smaller. Tudor prowled the threshold, fur raised, tail twitching like he wanted to bolt.

  Elizabeth leaned forward, eyes narrowing to points of flame. “But now—now comes you. Crow blood. You could end me if you chose. Not by accident, not by fate. You must be willing. You must take the phoenix dagger and drive it home. That is the only tether strong enough to burn me into final ash.”

  Her voice dropped, low and lethal. “Do you know why the Crow can kill? Because the Crow is an anchor. When your kind touches one of us—any of us—we are dragged out of the currents we swim in. The immortal turns mortal, the untouchable becomes touchable, until the contact is broken. A vampire’s fangs dull, a witch’s spells unravel, a werewolf feels his bones grind back into human form. Even a phoenix can feel the weight settling, wings clipped. You are the counterweight to our chaos.”

  She smiled without mirth. “A single brush of your hand can strip eternity away. A single breath too long in your presence can make an immortal bleed. That is why my kind fear yours, little Crow. That is why you, and only you, could kill me.”

  My throat went dry.

  Her smile faltered. For the first time, there was something behind her eyes that wasn’t fire but smoke.

  “Dying is not simple for me. Not with what I’ve become. And because I have spent lifetimes convincing myself each new age would be different. That people would grow wiser.” She looked away, the line of her jaw tightening. “But rulers, rebels, mothers, lovers— they all treat each other with the same cruelties, only dressed in finer words.”

  “So you’re tired of people?” I pressed. “Or of yourself?”

  Her gaze snapped back to mine, sharp but weary. “Both. I carried England through wars, rebellions, betrayals. I lied when I had to, killed when I thought it necessary. And yet—I regret more than I admit. I regret the way I trusted power to men who didn’t deserve it. I regret the blood spilled in my name. And I regret that in all my centuries, I rarely paused long enough to see what mercy might have built instead.”

  The admission hung heavy between us.

  I whispered, “That sounds almost… human.”

  Elizabeth laughed bitterly, but it was hollow. “That is the curse, child. To be both less and more than human, never able to stop being either.”

  She leaned back, regaining her poise, but I couldn’t shake the momentary glimpse of sadness that had cracked through her armor.

  Then her smile returned—lazy, predatory, as though the whole thing were nothing but a parlor game. “Don’t fret, Sadie. I ask for no promises. Not yet.” Her gaze locked on mine, unblinking. “But your silence tells me everything.” She leaned back, almost languid. “The Order of Malta will be here soon, no doubt—so eager to tuck me away in one of their safe houses, to call me ‘contained.’” A soft laugh slipped from her throat. “Let them. I will placate them, smile sweetly, and fold myself into their little plans. They will think me secured—when in truth, it is only I who keep them where I want them.”

  By late morning, the air had turned brittle, the sky a pale wash that made the ocean look colder than ever. A black sedan pulled up the sandy drive, tires crunching against salt and gravel. Two men stepped out, their dark coats cut too precisely to be local. Vatican, though they didn’t announce it. They didn’t have to.

  Elizabeth rose from her chair as though she had been expecting them all along. No protest, no hesitation—just a regal tilt of her head, as though she were still the Virgin Queen commanding her court.

  Richard’s hand tightened at his side. “Where are you taking her?”

  The older escort gave a polite, practiced smile. “To a secure residence in Portugal. Not a prison, not a convent. Think of it as a… cloistered villa. Remote. Guarded. She will have comforts.”

  Elizabeth’s mouth quirked. “Ah, yes. The villa near the Appian Way. High walls, faded frescoes of saints, a spring-fed cistern in the courtyard. I stayed there once, under another name, when Clement’s men feared I would ‘corrupt’ the French cardinals. Your wards still ring the lintels, don’t they? Old oak soaked in holy water. Charming. Ineffective.”

  The younger escort stiffened. “Those wards have been reinforced.”

  “Of course they have,” Elizabeth said smoothly. “Silver threads braided into the plaster, relics stitched into the curtains. You’ll station six men outside my chamber and believe yourselves clever.”

  The younger one flushed, but the older only adjusted his cuffs. “She will be protected. Contained, if necessary. You may sleep more soundly knowing her influence will not spread unchecked.”

  Richard’s eyes narrowed, voice low. “Guarded by whom?”

  “By us,” the younger escort snapped. “Our order has handled such matters for centuries. Papal shield extends not only to courts of law but to threats of… unnatural persuasion.”

  Elizabeth chuckled, sliding her gloves over pale fingers. “Men who think its their duty to hold me you mean? Ah, dear, a tale as old as time.”

  Steve stepped forward, his voice firm. “If you’re taking her, you’d best remember she’s been playing your councils longer than you’ve existed. Don’t mistake escorting her for controlling her.”

  I couldn’t help it—I blurted, “Wait. Hold on. When the hell did my parents become secret phoenix caretakers? Did I miss a newsletter? A family orientation packet?”

  Martha gave me a watery smile through her tears, Steve trying very hard not to smirk. Even the older escort’s polished mask cracked for half a second before he smoothed it over.

  Elizabeth’s smile softened—oddly tender. She reached for Martha’s hands. My mother’s eyes brimmed, though she tried to blink it away. “Be careful,” Martha whispered, voice breaking.

  Elizabeth leaned in and pressed a kiss to Martha’s cheek. “You always did carry the better half of me,” she murmured.

  Then Steve, for all his Warren steel, wrapped her in a brief, crushing embrace. His eyes closed, just for a second, as though parting with her meant parting with an old, complicated truth.

  Elizabeth pulled back, composure restored. “Enough tears. I am not going to execution. I am going to Portugal. I expect the green wine to be chilled and there to be paella daily.”

  One of the escorts opened the car door. She lingered only long enough to glance at me. “Do something interesting before I see you again,” she said, the words more order than farewell.

  Then she turned to Richard. “So now you’re the wolf in exile? Careful, someone will remember what your kind once hunted.”

  Richard’s expression didn’t change, but I felt the way he went still beside me.

  Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

  She slid into the car, the door closing with a soft, final click. The sedan pulled away, its black frame shrinking down the curve of the drive until it disappeared beyond the dunes.

  Richard didn’t move until the vehicle was out of sight. His jaw was tight, his shoulders rigid, like he was fighting to keep something buried.

  I finally said, “Relieved?”

  He shook his head, eyes still on the empty road. “Uneasy.” The word hung between us, heavier than it should have been.

  Because I knew what he meant. Elizabeth might have left the house. But she hadn’t left us. Not really.

  By afternoon, the house felt too full of silence. My nerves kept jangling, like I’d swallowed static. Elizabeth’s departure should have lifted the weight, but instead it left everything off- balance—like the floorboards weren’t nailed down.

  Richard had buried himself in phone calls, pacing from room to room with clipped tones and phrases I couldn’t follow. His voice dropped low whenever I walked too close, like he was translating another Vatican dialect.

  Meanwhile, my parents did what they always did when the world tilted sideways: they cooked. Martha’s kitchen was already steamy, the air thick with thyme, onions, and melted cheese. Steve was chopping with military precision while she layered noodles into aluminum pans.

  “The Langleys just lost their daughter-in-law,” Martha said. “We’ll drop a casserole on the porch. And Mrs. Forbes hasn’t been to church since her hip—”

  “Nothing steadies grief like starch,” Steve added , sliding carrots into the pot.

  I almost laughed, but it caught in my throat. My parents made casseroles; Richard made calls to shadow councils; and I was just… buzzing, stuck between both worlds.

  That was when Nina knocked on the open doorway. She’d been quiet all morning, but now she looked almost fragile, hands wrapped around her own elbows. “Want to get out?” she asked softly. “Coffee shop’s still open down in town.”

  The idea of air, of leaving the crowded house, felt like a lifeline.

  “Yeah,” I said, grabbing my coat before I could second-guess myself. “Please.”

  Steve glanced up from the chopping board, eyes warm but worried. “Be back before dark.” Martha pressed a foil-covered casserole into his hands, as if that was her blessing.

  So I followed Nina down the front steps and into the winter air, the smell of tomato and cheese trailing after me, and for the first time that day, I could breathe.

  ---

  The café was quieter than usual, half its tables empty, steam clouding the front windows. We claimed a booth by the radiator, tea and pastries arriving on mismatched china. I wrapped my hands around the mug hoping it could sooth me..

  Nina stirred sugar into her tea without drinking it. Finally, she said, “I owe you an apology.” I looked at her. “For which part?”

  Her mouth twisted. “All of it. For vanishing when you needed me. For choosing the wrong side of the Vatican mess. They promised me things—safety, protection for my family, advancement. I wanted to believe it was worth the compromises.”

  I sipped my tea, let the silence hang before answering. “So you abandoned me for a promotion.”

  She flinched, but didn’t argue. “I did. And I regret it. Every bit of it. I can’t fix what I did, but I can start doing better. If I hear anything—anything at all—about Corwin’s body, about wether he’s still a threat , I’ll send it your way.”

  I set the mug down. “Trust isn’t a light switch, Nina. It’ll take time.”

  Her eyes glistened, but she nodded. “I don’t expect forgiveness overnight. I just don’t want you to think I’m your enemy.”

  The heaviness sat between us until I tore off a piece of my pastry. “Friends don’t let friends eat too many croissants,” I muttered.

  Before I could reach for the second one, Nina leaned over, grinned, and licked the buttery tip of it. “There. Now you can’t.”

  I groaned, pushing it toward her. “You’re the worst.” “And yet, still your friend,” she said, finally taking a bite.

  For a second, the tension cracked, replaced with something warmer.

  Then Nina leaned in, her voice dropping. “Sadie, you need to know—Richard isn’t just some Vatican errand boy. He’s an original Templar – from the Order of Malta. Maybe one of only twenty left in the world.”

  I froze, croissant halfway to my mouth. “A what?”

  “A Templar,” she repeated. “The order didn’t die with Philip of France in 1314. Some were

  hidden, remade. The Vatican bound them with relics, blood rites, and oaths so deep they carved scars into the soul. They became less men and more weapons.”

  My pulse hammered. “But how could they survive this long?”

  “Barely,” she said. “Most went mad. The few still alive are confined in monasteries under the Greek Orthodox Church. Their minds shattered by centuries of binding. They chant through the night, wards stitched into their very skin. Think of them as… vessels too full of fire to set down.”

  I swallowed. “And Richard?”

  “Richard is one of the few still sane enough to walk in daylight. But don’t mistake sanity for safety.” She hesitated, then added, “There was an experiment once, in the fifteenth century. They tried to make more. Boys chosen young, sealed in a crypt for forty nights with relics and scripture. Only one crawled out. His eyes burned white, and he screamed in Latin for three days straight before collapsing dead. They called it a failure. I call it a warning.”

  The croissant sat like a stone in my stomach. “And Richard survived something like that?”

  Nina’s voice softened. “Ask him what price he paid. Ask him what he promised before he was even grown.”

  We sat in silence for a moment, the radiator hissing like it was in on the secret.

  Finally, I sighed. Martha’s words from the night before echoed in my head—about balance, relics, vows. And here was Nina, tilting the scale in her own shaky way. “Well,” I said softly. “This is some wild shit.”

  For a while we just sat, eating pastries that flaked sugar across the table. Outside, traffic hissed in the snow, and the world felt—briefly—normal.

  When Nina finally rose, she pulled her coat tighter around her shoulders. “I’m going back to Boston, on the next bus, in like ten minutes,” she said. “If I learn anything, I’ll get word to you.”

  I stood too, following her to the door. “Don’t disappear again,” I told her. Her mouth curved into the faintest smile. “Not unless I have to.”

  Then she boarded the bus, the doors hissing shut, and I was left staring at the empty seat through the fogged glass, wondering which side of the line she’d stand on when it mattered most.

  The little seafood place at the pier smelled of salt and charred lemon, the kind of scent that clung to your coat and followed you home. String lights swayed in the wind, reflected in the black water below. Inside, it was warmer, candles guttering in squat glass jars, linen tablecloths pressed but fraying at the edges.

  I’d made an effort. Hair brushed, lips glossed, a dress that didn’t scream “finals week shut- in.” And Richard—well, Richard looked like a sin in human form. Crisp shirt under a tailored jacket, blond hair catching the light in ways that should’ve been illegal, like he’d been poured into the century instead of born into it. He smiled when I slid into the booth, and it wasn’t fair how much better it made him look.

  The waiter left us with a bottle of house red. It was thin, sour, and tasted faintly of metal— but we drank it anyway, because the ritual of pouring wine between us mattered more than the taste.

  For the first few minutes, we did exactly what normal people did. We argued about which movies were overrated, compared notes on the worst road trips we’d had, laughed over diner coffee so bad it felt like punishment. It felt good, simple—until the words burned out of me.

  “You’re a Templar.”

  His smile dimmed, just slightly. “Nina told you.” “Is it true?”

  Silence. The candle flickered. Finally, he leaned back, blue eyes steady. “Yes.”

  I gripped my glass, the bad wine catching in my throat. “So… what does that mean? What are you really?”

  He exhaled slowly. “I was taken young. Very young. In the thirteenth century, the Order of Malta carved us from childhood. Hours of prayer, drills until bones snapped, vows driven into the marrow. We weren’t raised to live. We were raised to serve. To fight. To bleed for Christ and for Rome.”

  Richard’s voice lowered, almost confessional. “I’ll share the battles you might know about—

  though there are too many to recollect.”

  He stared past me, as if watching centuries replay. “Gettysburg. Blue and gray tearing each other apart. The air stank of gunpowder and rot, bodies in heaps high enough to climb. The South’s Baptist zeal made them near unbreakable—fanatic faith sharpens teeth. And in the smoke, there were things that fed on that faith, twisting it. I cut them down in the dark between volleys.”

  The wine turned my stomach, but I forced another sip. “What else?”

  “The Somme, 1916. Mud thick with blood. Mustard gas drifting low, men clawing at their own faces. I fought creatures that wore the dead like coats, stumbling through trenches. We burned them with relic fire before they spread to the living. The soldiers thought they were hallucinating. Easier that way.”

  He refilled our glasses. His hands were steady. Mine weren’t.

  “Korea. Chosin Reservoir. Thirty below zero. Marines swore the ice itself screamed at night. They were right. I followed the cracks down into the frozen lakes. Something old had been waking under the ice, gnawing at the edges of the war. We drowned it in fire, but I still hear the screams.”

  I shivered. He looked—God help me—magnificent. Not just strong, but burnished by centuries of belief and survival, the lines of his face carved deeper by history itself.

  “And after?” I asked.

  “The Cold War became diplomacy in daylight, covert work in the dark. I carried messages presidents never saw, bargained with priests who wore three faces. I watched empires teeter and helped decide which way they’d fall. Always in service to the Vatican. Always as a Templar. Now, I serve this branch - Malta.” His voice dropped. “. The things that should not happen. The things no one admits even exist.”

  I let the silence stretch. The candle sputtered low. Then I asked, “And in all of that… did you ever want a family?”

  His expression shifted, softened but pained. “I took vows of chastity. And I kept them.” I blinked. “But you’re still alive after eight centuries. How?”

  He leaned closer, voice dropping to a whisper meant for me alone. “Not phoenix fire, not blood rituals. The fountain of youth, Sadie. Hidden in Rome, beneath the Vatican itself. A spring older than scripture, older than Christ. The water glows faintly in the torchlight,

  silver with flecks of gold. It tastes like nothing—like cool air on stone—but once it touches your tongue, it sears its way through every vein. The first time I drank, I felt my heart seize and stutter, then burn as if the marrow of my bones had been lit. It remade me. Every few centuries, the Order brings us back to the spring. It sustains us, though each sip is agony.”

  I stared, breathless. “And no one knows?”

  A grim smile curved his mouth. “The Spanish chased phantoms across the ocean because we told them to. We whispered of fountains in the New World, sent them to waste their zeal on swamps and deserts while the true spring remained in Rome. They never suspected.”

  The words knocked the air out of me. A thousand years of war and shadow, and here sat a man who had never been touched except by violence, faith, and a stolen spring.

  I stared at him, at the sharp cheekbones, the steady hands, the impossible blue eyes, and thought: I am falling for a very old virgin.

  And the worst part? It made him even more dangerous. Because all at once, I wanted to be the exception to a vow that had lasted eight centuries.

  He reached across the table, hesitating just a breath before his hand covered mine. Neither of us spoke. The silence said enough.

  But then the silence stretched too long, and I blurted, “I should probably tell you something.” My cheeks went hot, traitorous. “I’ve never… you know. I’ve never had sex.”

  Richard’s hand tightened ever so slightly. His eyes flicked down, then up, searching my face like he was weighing what not to say. “Sadie…” His voice was low, almost pained. “That isn’t something you need to be ashamed of. Or rush.”

  I pulled in a breath, forcing a laugh that didn’t quite land. “Yeah, well, you should probably know what you’re getting into if this—whatever this is—even keeps going.”

  For a moment, he didn’t move, didn’t blink. Then he leaned closer, his words rough at the edges. “What you don’t understand is that your blood—your Anchor, your Crow—sings to me. It pulls me. Do you know what that does to someone like me?” His jaw flexed, as if keeping control cost him something. “I can’t resist it, Sadie. You make me… unmoored. And it’s driving me insane.”

  The air between us was sharp enough to cut. My heart thudded so hard I was certain he could hear it.

  Outside, the gulls screamed and the waves slammed hard against the pier, but here, for one impossible moment, the world was still.

  But for tonight, under the string lights and the salt air, I let myself hold his hand.