"They say the sun burns blue at noon because an adventurer slew a being too old to die. He carved its fat for wax, set its corpse to flame, and that fire became our day. The blue is no sky's gift—it's the marrow of the ancient, still burning."— The last witness
Rachel smiled like she'd won and raised the box.
Flash.
White fire across my vision.
She closed the notebook, already turning.
"Going somewhere?" I caught her wrist. Her eyes went wide, pen frozen midair. With my other hand I ripped the camera from her, heavy and fragile in my grip. I let her see the decision before I made it.
Then I slammed it against the table. Glass shattered. Shutter popped like a dying insect.
She gasped, clutching her wrist. "That—That was evidence!"
"No," I said, voice flat. "That was mine."
The café hushed. Too quiet. I felt eyes burning from the windows.
Then another flash. Not hers.
I turned.
Outside, through the smeared glass, the woman was there — the blonde streak bright as a flag, child clutched to her breast. Camera raised, lens gleaming. She caught me mid-crime: my hand on Rachel's wrist, her on the floor, camera guts bleeding across the table.
She smiled first. Then her mouth twisted, and she cried out like I'd struck her, clutching the child tight. People around her recoiled, gasps rippling like fire across dry grass.
My chest burned. She's writing me in. Branding me with her own ink.
I shoved past Rachel. She tumbled to the floor, pen skittering across tiles. The café erupted — chairs scraping, voices yelling.
"Bastard!" someone roared.
"Thief!" another spat.
I didn't care. I shouldered through the doorway, boots hammering cobblestones.
The woman staggered back as I closed on her. Milk dripped from the child's mouth; the baby's cry cut through the chaos.
"Give it," I snarled, hand shooting for the camera.
She twisted, fell deliberately to the stones, child wailing in her arms. The camera dangled just enough for another flash to burn my cheek.
"Monster!" she sobbed, loud, too loud. "He's attacking us!"
Crowd voices cracked like whips.
"Bastard!"
"Get him!"
I tore the camera from her grip and smashed it against the wall. Wood and glass burst apart, gears spilling like guts.
Silence for a heartbeat. Just the baby crying.
Then the shouting roared again, sharper, closer.
I didn't wait. I ran. Smoke and steam swallowed me, Ironreach howling for my blood.
They chased me, yelling bastard, thief, devil's brat. The words weren't new. They'd just learned the chorus from another century.
Flash—back then, hoods pulled low, my brother and I ducking bottles and spit. Didn't matter. The street hated us. We hated back harder.
The men gained. Boots on cobble, iron rods in hand.
Flash—Juneilve. Juvenile hall. The court lied, the guards laughed, and boys ganged up until I was in my underwear, bones blue from their boots.
I hit the alley wall and turned.
"Come then," I growled.
They surged. Four shadows.
The first lunged wide. I caught him by the throat, slammed him back, fingers digging deep until cartilage crunched.
Another came from the side, blade flashing. I turned his wrist, drove my pen through his throat. His blood sprayed warm on my cheek, bitter in my mouth.
The third roared and swung a pipe. I ducked, rammed my thumb into his eye until it burst. His scream was short, wet.
The last was bigger, a bull of a man. He tackled me, drove my head against brick until my vision swam white. Pain lit my skull. His fists were anvils. But I kicked—low, brutal, again and again. Groin, groin, groin. His strength broke with a sob. He crumpled, clutching himself, red soaking his trousers.
Flash—juvenile again. My back on cold tile, a ring of boys laughing, stripping me bare. Shame carved into skin.
Present. Silence.
I sat on the stones, breath ragged, cigarette trembling between blood-wet fingers. My hand shook like it didn't belong to me, red dripping off my knuckles into the gutter.
I struck the match, lit up. The smoke hit my lungs.
And just like that, the shaking stopped.
The alley stank of piss and iron. Around me, bodies twitched or lay still, rivers of red threading through the cracks.
I exhaled, calm now. "Two can play that game," I muttered. "She wants front page? I'll give her a bigger scene."
The rune on my wrist flared. It burned like a brand waking up. My hand jerked, veins crawling with blue fire.
The corpses convulsed. Chests heaved though lungs were shredded. Eyes bulged white, jaws snapping like hounds chained too long.
I rose, towering over them.The blue Noon light split the alley, sky blued sharp as glass.
"On your feet," I rasped. My pets clawed upright, shuddering, bleeding but alive in a way that wasn't life.
I pointed to the street. "Slaughter. Leave no witness."
Their screams followed me as I walked, smoke trailing, suit torn but straightened. I didn't look back. The factory gates waited ahead
The alley still hummed behind me—screams, the wet shuffle of what I'd left behind. My hand was still dripping when I shoved it into my pocket. Cigarette between my teeth, I smoked until the tremor stilled. By the time I reached the gates of the old industry spire, I'd washed the blood off, wiped the face clean. To anyone else, I looked like I'd just had too many puffs, not too many kills.
The factory rose like a dead god's ribcage. Concrete gray, cracked and sweating damp, every seam fed with green veins of fungi. The barbwire fence sagged in rusted curls, gate bent in two. Noon burned above—but not gold, not white. Ironreach's sun was blue at noon, the light washing everything in a ghost's hue.
I stepped through the gap. Didn't climb—didn't want my clothes torn. I was still in the baggy shirt, collar sagged, sleeves loose, trousers caked from dust. Coat was gone. Could've stolen one off the men I dropped earlier, but no—this was me. Bare.
The air inside stank of mold and wet iron. Puddles stretched black on the floor, oil shimmering faint in their skin. Broken glass crunched underfoot.
And then she appeared.
Porcelain. That's the only word. The maid looked like she didn't belong to this rot. Skin pale, lips plum, long black hair brushed to a mirror's shine. Eyes—sharp, foxlike. She didn't say a word, only turned on her heel. I followed, boots dragging echoes down the ruin hall.
Past collapsed pillars and peeling walls, the deeper chambers changed, men guarded it and the deeper we went the higher their rank not like i could tell in the face only expenses. The mold gave way to polish. Carpets rolled over cracked concrete. Paintings hung where fungus had been scraped off. Smoke of cigars drifted. By the time we reached the inner room, the ruin was gone.
A dragon's skull hung above the mantle, hollow eyes watching. Bear skin stretched across the floor, teeth bared. Pistols and glass vials lay scattered on a heavy oak desk. Smelled of coke and powder, sharp, raw. I leaned to take a breath of it—her hand snapped up, pinching my nose shut. Eyes cold as steel. She hated me. I could feel it. But hate bends. Always does.
I smirked and stepped into the den. My father sat waiting. Holland and Patrick beside him, and on a chair an old man named sanza,grey eye like the dead but he still held youth and beauty in his look, He was my uncle Holland god father.suits sharp, ties neat. I looked like the odd mutt in my baggy shirt, collar loose.
"You're late," my father said, voice flat.
"Not like I've got a car," I shot back.
He gave me a long look. "You're not noble anymore. And that dressing ?" His hand flicked toward the door. "Get out of my domain. Not till you're proper."
The room went quiet. Holland was high, tie knotted to his trousers, grinning like a fool. But no one laughed.
I swallowed my words. Left in silence.
The maid led me to a back room. Suits lined the walls, black and gray. She found my size, handed it over without a word. The fabric was tight, neat, clean. Fit like a cage. When I pulled the coat shut, I caught myself in the mirror. Didn't look like me. Looked like someone I might kill.
I walked back. They were gone. Already scheming.
The maids filled the hall, working. I barked at them—called them sluts, loud enough to sting. Just for the attention.
The room was thick with perfume and polish, but underneath it I smelled the real thing—mildew, iron, the rot of an old factory masked in velvet. The maids moved like dolls, porcelain faces with steady hands, skirts brushing the dusty floor. Too perfect. Too clean. I squinted and said it sharp, just to make them flinch:
"All of you. Sluts."
The word cracked through the hall. Not because I believed it—truth was, they carried themselves like professionals—but because the place reeked. Not of sex, but of cover-ups. Soap and lilies burned over mold, polish over rust, powder over gun smoke. A den dressed in lace. Calling them sluts was my way of saying I see through it.
They didn't break stride. Eyes forward, hands steady. But I saw the twitch in their jaws. Heard the rumor of their reputation hiss around me. Even porcelain cracks.
One of them drifted too close, sat beside me without asking. Pretty. Too pretty to just be another faceless hand in the house. She placed a tray down with cookies, glass of milk balanced neat.
I raised a brow. "Which batch is this?"
"The last one," she said softly.
"So," I muttered, leaning back, "I'm the leftover. You pitied me 'cause Father didn't regard for me."
She didn't answer. I lit my canna, dragged deep, then held it out toward her. She shook her head.
"I'm a maid," she said.
"Custom," I replied flat, pushing it closer.
Her lips parted. Pink. She leaned in, bit down, pulled smoke into her lungs. Eyes watered. She wasn't built for it. I took it back, dragged the last heat, then plucked the glass from the tray.
"Drink," I ordered.
She hesitated, but I tipped the milk against her lips anyway. White ran down her chin. The other maids froze in the corners, hands pausing mid-task. Watching.
I set the glass back, tugged a handkerchief free, wiped her mouth slow. She flushed, shook her head. "That's enough," she whispered, and fled the room.
Her name, later, was Cecilia. I made sure to remember.
I left the hall, smoke trailing, the others' eyes burning holes in my back. Air outside the chamber was damp, heavy. I roamed, boots clanging up a spiral stair until the echoes went silent. Voices replaced them.
The spire rose from the carcass of Ironreach like a broken rib. Once, it had been the crown of a steel refinery—smokestacks fused together into a single jagged column. Now, fungi bloomed along its base, fat and pale, sweating moisture into cracks of concrete. The stairwell wrapped the outside, iron teeth biting into the air, each step corroded and slick with dew.
The blue sun made everything stranger. Under that light, colors warped—the rust shimmered like wet copper, the mold glowed faint green, and the flowers that clung to the cracks opened not with yellows or whites, but with bruised purples and blood-red throats. They called them Sablepetals. Flowers that only bloomed beneath the blue star, feeding on metal and ash instead of soil.
And then there were the creatures. You never saw them whole—just the sound. A high, metallic trill, like crickets dragged across steel wire. The locals named them Gloamchirps, shadows with legs too thin to catch in the light. They nested in pipes, crawled through the rafters, and sang louder the deeper silence pressed in. To most, they were a nuisance. But to men who lived long in Ironreach, their chorus meant one thing: don't stay too long where things rot.
Daemon knew that sound. He heard it as he climbed the outside stair. The Gloamchirps rattled in chorus, like mocking laughter, each note echoing in the hollow bones of the spire. His boots dragged rust flakes loose, clattering down into the dark guts of the factory where water pooled black and deep.
From that height, the city sprawled—a quilt of smoke, spires, and chimneys, everything painted in the strange bruised light of the blue noon. He leaned against the railing once, looking down, imagining how a fall from here wouldn't even grant you a body. Just paste and bone dust lost to the factory's damp.
That was the stage when he heard them. The low murmur of voices, words carried by the hollow throat of the spire. His father. Holland. Patrick. Conspirators caged in the rotting lungs of a dead empire, planning how to rob a newborn one.
Daemon drew his gun, let the Gloamchirps sing for him, and stepped into the chamber.
"Would you look at that," he said, smoke curling from his teeth. "Jackpot."
Three heads turned. My father. Holland. Patrick. Suits neat, ties sharp.
"Out," my father growled.
"Shut up," I snapped. "Send me out, I'll conspire with Sanza."
His eyes narrowed. "Then I'll kill you both."
"Fair," I said. "Not fair enough."
The silence cracked. I laid it bare. "You plan to use Sanza and the crew as a diversion. Send 'em loud, draw the eyes. Meanwhile you three take the real prize. Why risk it? Because the new currency's worth more than gold—it's legitimacy. Why not tell the gang? Because betrayal's natural. Men will slit each other's throats the moment power's in reach. And because there are traitors. Always are."
Patrick shifted in his seat. Holland chewed his lip, high as ever. My father just watched, eyes like dead stone.
"The facts?" I went on, pacing slow. "Our assets are in gold. Converting them straight draws heat. Spread it out among the nobodies and it dilutes. Not enough for your important men. Registration's a trap. They'll force everyone to line up, hand their names, their blood. We don't fit that mold. We hide our dark in the light. So the only play—the cleanest play—is to take it before it arrives. Steal the future before it hits the streets."
I stopped. Met my father's stare. "That's what you're meeting about. Am I wrong?"
A slow grin cut his face. "You're brighter in a suit. The rest of the time, you're stupid. Not a bad read. But you forgot one thing: first impressions. The government's not stupid. They'll make sure this money works. Even if it's stolen, they'll shove it through, silence every whisper. It's already running."
Charmevolé leaned in, voice tight. "Our informant swore it's tomorrow."
Holland shook his head, wild-eyed. "No. Today. Crowds don't lie. Every hotel's booked, every merchant foaming. It's here. They're trying to throw us off."
The room thickened with smoke and argument. I leaned back against the wall, lips curled in a smirk.
"Then we hit today," I said. "With Sanza's cars. They're fast, they're illegal, they're hard to control. Perfect. We don't need control—we need chaos. While the streets choke, we take the vein and bleed it."
Patrick glanced at my father. Charmevolé tapped his watch. Holland muttered about engines.
Finally, my father nodded. "Fine. You're in. We'll need that… power of yours. Wear the suit. Keeps you sane. Don't want you crashing out."
Engines roared below, deep in the belly of the factory.
I pushed my hands into my pockets, smoke curling from my lips. A grin split my face, sharp and hungry.
"Finally," I said. "A real heist. This is what I died for."