The boy's blood hadn't even dried when they returned to the flat.
London staggered under the weight of the morning's headlines, the city heaving and gasping like a body too long underwater.
But Carmen Vale moved through it untouched, as if fear itself knew better than to cling to her skin.
Julian trailed a few steps behind, boots scuffing the rain-slick stones. A cigarette tucked behind his ear, forgotten. He didn't need the smoke. Satisfaction clung to him like a second coat.
Vivienne stumbled between them, hugging her notebook to her chest. Her shoes were soaked, her hair plastered to her forehead in wet ropes.
She didn't speak.
She hadn't spoken since the docks.
Good.
Silence was safer.
The flat above the undertaker's shop swallowed them back whole, wrapping them in stale smoke and the low, iron scent of old blood.
It smelled like home.
Julian shed his coat with a careless flick, letting it fall wherever it landed.
Carmen crossed the room in a straight line, unrolling the battered city map across the desk.
Their map—scarred by ink and smudged by gloved hands that never quite came clean.
Vivienne hovered near the door, unsure if she was allowed to stay or expected to disappear.
She stayed.
Of course she stayed.
Carmen traced a slow finger along the veins of the city, pausing near Whitechapel where the newest body had surfaced.
No artistry.
No spiral.
Just rage — messy, thoughtless, pathetic.
Children scribbling on a painting they could never understand.
"They're multiplying," Julian said, voice low, almost amused.
"They're drowning," Carmen corrected, not looking up.
She circled a cluster of streets where four disappearances had been reported in as many days. None of them clean. None of them claimed by them.
Julian tilted his head, studying the chaos like a man considering how best to light a match.
"Should we start pruning?"
Carmen smiled faintly.
"Not yet.
Let them tangle themselves first.
The noose tightens better when they think they're winning."
Vivienne cleared her throat.
The sound, small and raw, cracked through the room.
Carmen and Julian turned — slow, deliberate — as if noticing a fly that had wandered into a web.
The air thickened.
Vivienne stepped forward, the notebook trembling against her chest like a dying bird.
"I heard something," she said, voice barely a thread.
Carmen raised an eyebrow, all patience and blades.
Vivienne swallowed hard.
"A name," she whispered. "Before we left the docks. The boy... he said a name."
Julian's jaw twitched, a silent warning flashing behind his eyes.
Carmen only watched her, waiting.
Demanding.
The room seemed to lean toward Vivienne, breathless.
Finally, she said it:
"Adrian."
The name hung there, jagged and heavy.
The fire guttered low in the hearth, coughing up sparks like tiny screams.
Julian muttered something ugly under his breath, his hands balling into fists at his sides.
Carmen did not move.
Did not blink.
"You're sure?" she asked, voice flat as black glass.
Vivienne nodded. A terrified, desperate nod.
For a moment, it almost seemed Carmen would strike her.
Instead, she turned back to the map with a movement as cold and final as a guillotine blade falling.
As if the name meant nothing.
As if it meant everything.
Julian crossed to the window, peering into the night beyond the glass. His hands flexed once, twice.
"This city isn't ours yet," he said.
Carmen's mouth curved, not quite a smile.
"It will be."
She spoke softer now, almost to herself, almost to the dark.
"And if Adrian's still breathing..."
She trailed off, but the meaning was sharp enough to cut the air.
He hadn't learned.
Not yet.
But he would.
Vivienne sank to the floor, her notebook slipping from numb fingers.
The spiral was growing.
She wasn't standing outside it anymore.
She was spinning inside it—caught in its current—dragged toward something vast and merciless and inevitable.
Something that smelled of blood and bone and the slow death of everything good.
Carmen didn't reach for her.
Julian didn't offer a hand.
They simply stood there, side by side.
Unmoved.
Unbroken.
Two shadows against the flickering firelight, watching the pawn realize she was already on the board.
And far, far too late to run.
The city outside trembled, oblivious.
Still believing in saviors.
Still waiting for heroes.
Not understanding that the executioners were already inside the gates—and they were only just getting started.