The days slipped by with deceptive normalcy.
But Alaric, seated quietly in the background of the Marrow estate's grand drawing room, felt the shift long before anyone else noticed.
There was a rot growing beneath the polished marble floors and fine crystal chandeliers — a tremor in the delicate balance that Celeste's family pretended to maintain.
It began with hushed conversations behind closed doors.
With guarded glances between Garron Marrow, Celeste's father, and the visiting financier — Mason Sterling.
A man who oozed charm and ambition in equal measure, and who looked at Celeste a little too long, a little too possessively.
Alaric's instincts prickled with silent warning.
He saw what others missed: Mason wasn't just courting opportunity — he was laying traps.
That evening, after the latest formal dinner (in which Garron once again found ways to subtly humiliate Alaric with backhanded compliments and mocking laughter), Celeste slipped into Alaric's study.
She closed the door behind her, hesitant, almost ashamed.
"My father is planning something," she said quietly, arms crossed tightly around herself. "I overheard them talking about some... deal. Something risky. Mason's involved."
Alaric leaned back in his worn leather chair, his expression calm.
"And he's pitching it as salvation, isn't he?" he said.
Celeste blinked. "How did you—?"
Alaric offered her a small, grim smile.
"I've seen men like Mason before. They never offer salvation without asking for a piece of your soul."
He rose from his chair, pulling on a simple jacket. "Stay here. I'll look into it."
"But how?" Celeste asked, confused.
Alaric paused at the door, the pendant under his shirt warm against his chest.
"Sometimes," he said, voice low, "the right answers aren't found by asking permission."
Under the shroud of midnight, Alaric moved through the city.
He was a ghost among the neon lights and empty alleyways — unnoticed, unimportant to anyone who happened to glance his way.
At Mason's high-rise office, Alaric didn't force entry. He didn't need to.
He simply walked through the service entrance with the cleaning crews, invisible, blending with the world's overlooked.
Within minutes, he had found Mason's personal files.
Hidden under false corporate fronts, disguised by shell companies, the truth revealed itself:
Mason wasn't offering Garron a legitimate financial rescue.
He was orchestrating a hostile takeover — designed to leave the Marrows indebted, broken, and ultimately powerless.
And Celeste?
She was the final prize — a marital alliance to cement Mason's control.
Alaric returned home just before dawn, slipping into the apartment without a sound.
The next phase had to be executed with precision.
He didn't confront Garron.
He didn't accuse Mason in public.
Instead, he reached out — quietly — to the contacts Balen had discreetly provided from the Astoria network: a handful of old-money players who still feared the whispered name Vane.
Through them, rumors began to surface about Mason's past dealings — shady bankruptcies, bribed officials, investments that ended in ruin for anyone but himself.
By the end of the week, the rumors had reached Garron's ears.
By the end of the next, the financial institutions backing Mason's latest venture had pulled their funding, citing "instability and reputational risk."
And by the third, Mason Sterling's empire crumbled before he even realized where the first blow had come from.
The Marrows were safe.
And none of them — not even Celeste — knew why.
It was during a rare quiet evening that Celeste found him again, this time sitting on the balcony, staring out over the city skyline.
"You had something to do with it," she said quietly, sitting beside him.
Alaric didn't answer.
He simply sipped his tea, letting the cool night breeze stir his hair.
Celeste reached out, gently brushing a lock from his forehead.
"Thank you," she whispered.
Alaric turned to her, a thousand words unspoken between them.
He didn't say he would always protect her.
He didn't promise that the battles ahead would be easy.
But in that moment — in the way he leaned slightly into her touch, in the way she didn't pull away — an understanding passed between them.
No matter how the world tried to tear them apart, they would walk forward together.
In the darkened streets below, whispers began to circulate.
Of a man who moved unseen.
A man who could collapse empires without lifting a sword.
A man with silver-flecked eyes... and the blood of kings.
They didn't know his name yet.
But they would.
Soon.