The dust settled slowly inside the Abattoir. Marcel pushed himself up from the broken floor, every movement sending fresh waves of pain through his body. Kai's magic had left his nerves singing a raw, angry tune. He stood, swaying slightly, and looked at what was left of his home.
Bodies of his vampires lay scattered around him. Some were already turning to ash. Others were just… still. The air was thick with the smell of blood, ozone, and defeat. This place, his fortress, was a ruin. Splintered wood, shattered glass, and chunks of broken stone littered the floor. The main hall looked like a bomb had gone off.
He took a slow, painful breath. His mind was already working, pushing past the pain. This was a setback, not the end. He still had cards to play. He had to get to the church. Davina was there. And the one thing he had that they didn't know about.
He didn't look back. He just turned and walked out, stepping over the debris of his kingdom, his footsteps the only sound in the crushing silence.
---
On the roof across the street, Lexi watched him go. She stood perfectly still, a silhouette against the brightening sky. Beside her, Kai leaned against a chimney, looking like he'd just enjoyed the best show of his life.
"He's tougher than he looks," Kai remarked, picking at his nails. "I'll give him that."
Lexi didn't answer. She pulled out a phone, her eyes never leaving Marcel's retreating figure as he turned a corner and disappeared from view. She put the phone to her ear. It rang once.
"He's on the move," she said, her voice flat.
On the other end, Viktor voice was calm, devoid of any surprise. "The Abattoir?"
"A wreck. But he's still standing."
"He always was resilient," Viktor said, a hint of something that wasn't quite admiration in his tone. It was more like clinical interest. "Erik and Alex will be buried there. In the crypts beneath the main hall. Find them. Remove the dagger and destroy it. Then blow that damn place off the map. Leave nothing for him to come back to."
Lexi's jaw tightened slightly. "Understood."
"And Lexi," Viktor added, his voice dropping a degree. "Where is he going now?"
"Looked like the direction of the church."
A pause on the line. "Stefan and Damon are with you?"
"They're nearby."
"Have them follow him. I want to know what's in that church. What's giving him the spine to stand against us after a beating like that."
"On it." Lexi ended the call and turned to Kai. "We have a job inside. A rescue mission."
Kai's face lit up. "Ooh, grave robbing. My favorite."
Down in the street, seemingly from the shadows themselves, Stefan and Damon Salvatore fell into step. They exchanged a single glance, a whole conversation passing between them in a second.
"Follow the wounded king?" Damon said, adjusting his jacket. "How very noir."
"Just don't get seen," Stefan replied, his gaze already fixed on the path Marcel had taken. "Viktor doesn't like loose ends."
"Nobody likes loose ends," Damon quipped. "That's why they call them loose."
They moved off, two predators gliding through the early morning streets, following the trail of blood and defiance.
Back inside the Abattoir, Lexi and Kai stood in the ruined main hall. Kai kicked a piece of broken pillar.
"So. A secret crypt. How do we find the door?"
Lexi closed her eyes, extending her senses. She was older than this building. She could feel the layers of history, the whispers in the stone. Her eyes snapped open, and she pointed to a section of the far wall, mostly hidden by a collapsed bookcase.
"There. It's behind that."
Kai grinned. With a flick of his wrist and a surge of telekinetic force, he shoved the heavy wreckage aside as if it were cardboard. The sound of grinding stone echoed as a hidden door, etched with fading symbols, was revealed.
Lexi placed her hand on the cold stone. "They're in there."
"Then let's not keep the boys waiting," Kai said, his magic already flaring at his fingertips, ready to burn the past to the ground and see what rose from the ashes.
The hidden door gave way with a groan, revealing a steep staircase that smelled of damp earth and deep, deep time. Lexi descended first, Kai close behind, his magic casting a cold, blue light that pushed back the absolute blackness.
The crypt was small, more a prison cell than a tomb. The air was still and foul. And there, chained to the far wall with thick silver-reinforced manacles, were two skeletal figures.
It took Lexi a moment to understand what she was seeing. They weren't dagged, peaceful in magical sleep. This was worse. So much worse.
Their bodies were desiccated, skin stretched tight over bone like parchment. Their hair was brittle and white. They were curled in on themselves, frozen in postures of eternal agony. Their eyes were sunken, hollow pits. They had been left here, trapped in the darkness, with no blood, no sustenance, for decades. Starved. Not killed, but… preserved in a state of endless suffering.
One of them was her brother, Alex.
Lexi stopped dead. The air left her lungs in a quiet rush. All the noise, all the fury from the fight above, just… vanished. The only sound was the frantic beat of her own heart.
Kai let out a low whistle, the sound obscene in the silence. "Well, damn. That's a new kind of cruel. I'm almost impressed."
Lexi didn't hear him. She took a slow, shaky step forward, then another. Her hand reached out, hovering just inches from Alex's withered cheek. She couldn't touch him. It felt like he would crumble to dust.
She saw the faint, almost imperceptible rise and fall of his chest. A single, torturous breath every few minutes. He was still in there. Trapped. Conscious in a nightmare.
The shock crystallized into a cold, sharp thing in her chest. It wasn't hot rage. It was something deeper, more absolute. A promise.
Her hand fell back to her side, clenched into a white-knuckled fist.
"He didn't dagger them," she said, her voice unnervingly calm, a flat line in the oppressive quiet. "He just… left them here. To starve. To feel every second of it."
She finally turned her head, and her eyes met Kai's. There was no fire in them, only a glacial, bottomless cold.
"He's going to pay for this," she whispered. "I'm going to make him feel every single second they felt."
It was a vow, spoken into the dust and the darkness, and it was more terrifying than any threat she had ever made.