The footsteps grew louder, whoever it was, they were inside.
Adrian pushed open a trapdoor that led into an abandoned attic. Moonlight filtered through cracked tiles, casting pale beams across the floor. He motioned for her to stay low as he crouched beside her, every muscle taut, listening.
Elena's heart pounded so hard she feared the intruders would hear it. She was pressed close to Adrian, their shoulders brushing, his breathing warm against her ear. Despite the danger, she felt an inexplicable calm in his presence, as though his steadiness anchored her fear.
Below....voices murmured....male...two maybe three. The words were indistinct, but the intention was clear—they were searching.
Adrian leaned close his lips near her ear "If they find us, stay behind me do not move."
Elena nodded, hardly daring to breathe, minutes dragged like hours. Finally the footsteps receded, the door creaked and silence returned. Adrian waited a moment longer before exhaling softly. He turned to her, their faces close in the dim light. Relief softened his face expression, though tension still rippled beneath the surface.
"Are you alright?" he asked.
Elena nodded, though her body trembled "I think so."
For a moment, they stayed like that—two fugitives, pressed together in the moonlight shadows, the air thick with unspoken words and then almost without thinking Elena whispered, "Why do I feel like I can trust you when I shouldn't?"
Adrian's gaze darkened, something fierce and conflicted flickering there. His hand lifted, almost reaching for her cheek before he pulled back with visible restraint.
"Because fate is cruel", he said, softly "It makes us trust the very things that could destroy us".
Elena's breath hitched, her heart thundered tone between fear and the dangerous yearning that his words awoke inside her.
Before she could respond, a crash echoed from the street outside....glass shattering, a cry of alarm. Adrian tensed instantly his hand going to the inside of his court where she caught the glint of steel, his voice dropped to a whisper "They are not gone... they are circling."
Elena's fear sharpened, but so did her resolve. She had been swept into this storm against her will yet some part of her refused to cower anymore. She met his gaze her words steady....
"Then what do we do?" Adrian studied her storm and fire in his eyes for a moment something like pride flickered there.
"We fight!" he said.
And as the night closed in around them, Elena realised her life had changed forever, not because of the danger, not because of the Midnight Rose, but because of the man beside her, mysterious, dangerous, magnetic. A man who carried both her fear and her hope in his eyes and she knew with a certainty that terrified her that she was already too deep to turn back.
The nght was alive with tension. The sound of distant voices outside the sanctuary faded slowly but the threat lingered like smoke in the air. Elena sat near the oak table, her arms wrapped tightly around herself, watching Adrian pace the room with restless energy, his movements were controlled, precise but his eyes betrayed something raw— something that looked almost like regret.
"Adrian..." she said quietly, her voice cutting through the silence "I can't keep running blind if...I am part of this now. Then I need to understand... I need the truth."
He stopped pacing, his back to her, shoulders taut beneath his coat for a long moment. He said nothing then with a quiet sigh he turned his storm-gray gaze heavy with shadows.
"The truth isn't kind Elena" , he said "it never is."
"Then let me decide whether I can bear it" she replied surprising even herself with the strength in her voice.
Adrian studied her, as though weighing her resolve. Finally, he crossed the room and sat across from her at the table. He placed the Codex Rosarum between them, his fingers resting on its worn cover.
"I wasn't born into this fight" he began, his tone low deliberate "but I was dragged into it before I was old enough to understand what it meant, my family was part of the Order once... blindly until the day they realized what the Order truly was."
Elena leaned forward slightly her breath catching.
"My father discovered the Codex", Adrian continued, "he saw its potential and it's danger. He tried to hide it to keep it from the Order but you can't steal from the Rose without paying a price."
His voice hardened, "They came for us, I was 15, my mother and father didn't survive." Elena's heart twisted, the pain in his eyes was unmistakable, etched deep into him like scars that never healed. She reached out instinctively, her fingers brushing his hand it rested on the book.
"Adrian...." he flinched almost imperceptibly at her touch as though he wasn't used to gentleness, but he didn't pulled away.
"I escaped", he said after a moment "alone with the Codex. Since then I've been hunted. The Order doesn't forgive betrayal, especially from blood. Every day since I have left with a single purpose, keep the Codex hidden, keep the Rose from their hand."
Elana's eyes burned with unshed tears "and you have done this alone all these year?"
Adrian gave a short humorless laugh "alone is safer alone. No one else pays the price" Elena tightened her fingers over his "until me."
His gaze snapped to hers, fierce and conflicted "I didn't want you in this. You should have been safe and untouched by all of it but the moment our path crossed, they marked you and now..." his jaw clenched "Now I can't walk away."
The silence between them was thick, charged. Elena's heart pounded,torn between fear and the pull she felt toward him. This man who had lost everything, who carried his pain like Armor, and yet, who had risked himself to protect her, she wanted to say something anything to ease the weight in his eyes instead she whispered
"What is Rose really? Beyond the Legend?"
Adrian hesitated his thumb brushing absently over the books, embossed cover "It's more than a symbol, The Midnight Rose was a creation of the old world, a fusion of science and alchemy, knowledge far ahead of its time, a flower, unlike any other said to bloom only in the darkest hour when moonlight and blood touched its petals. Those who held it claimed it granted insight, even visions of the future...to some it was salvation. To the order, it was power, the kind that bends nations."
Elena shivered "And it's still exist?"
Adrian's eyes darkened "If it didn't, the Order wouldn't still be hunting... somewhere hidden, the Rose waits and the Codex is the only guide."
Her mind spun, it sounded like myth, like something out of the pages of a fairy tale and yet, looking at Adrian the raw conviction in his gaze, she knew he believed every word.
The room felt suddenly smaller. The candle light flickering like fragile hope. Elena gaze drifted to the Codex to the intricate rose etched into its cover. Something tucked at her memory, something she couldn't place.
"Elena?" Adrian's voice drew her back.
She looked up meeting his eyes "What if I could help you?"
He blinked as though startled "Help me?"
"I am an artist" she said, "I see patterns details others overlook maybe I could..."
"No", the word cut sharp final, his hand-pulled away from hers "This isn't your fight."
Her chest tightened, "It became my fight the moment they came after me."
Adrian's jaw clenched. He stood abruptly pacing again as though , trying to burn off the conflict tearing through him
"You don't understand what the Order is capable of" he said "they will break you, use you, destroy you without hesitation. I won't let that happen."
Elena rose to her voice from despite the fear curling in her stomach "And what if I don't let you face it alone?"
His eyes snapped to her storm-gray and blazing with something raw... anger, fear desire.
"Elena", his voice was low strained. He stepped closer, too close until she could feel the heat radiating from him "If I let you in... if I let myself need you. It won't end well.... for either of us".
Her breath caught "Maybe it's not your choice anymore."
The tension between them, crackled fierce and undeniable. His hand lifted hovering near her cheek, trembling with restraint. For a heartbeat she thought, he might finally close the distance between them, erase the space with the kiss that had been building since the night they met.
But before he could, a thunderous bang shook the door.
Elena jumped, her heart leaping to her throat. Adrian's expression hardened instantly, he grabbed the Codex, tucking it into his coat, "They have found us."
The door rattled again, under the weight of blows. Voices shouted in harsh tones, demanding entry. Adrian turned to her, his voice fears but steady "There is a hidden passage beneath the floorboats....Go now."
Elina's eyes widened "What about you?"
"I will hold them off"
"No", the word tore from her throat before she could stop it "I won't leave you."
His gaze softened, just for an instant, then he pressed a small drager into her hands, It's handle cold and solid "If they get through...defend yourself, but stay alive Elena, promise me?"
Her fingers curled around the blade trembling. She wanted to argue to click to him but the look in his eyes stopped her. It wasn't just command, it was desperation.
The door cracked splinters flying.
Adrian's lips brushed close to her ear. His voice, a whisper of steel and fire "Run.."
And he turned facing the door ready to meet the storm.
Elena's heart pounded as she stumbled toward the trapdoor, her mind a whirlwind of fear and defines. She didn't know what waited in the shadows below or what fate, the Order carried with them.
But one truth was clear, Adrian's past had become her present and if she survived this night, she would no longer run from it, she would uncover the Secrets of the Rose.
No matter the cost.
The door exploded invert with a defining crack would splintering , like bone shadows searched into the sanctuary, three men clogged in dark courts, their faces of obscured, but their movements, precise, lethal, symbol of a rose glamoured faintly on the handles of their blade.
Adrian moved with the speed of someone who had lived his life anticipating this moment. Steel flashed in his hand long slender.....a weapon designed for precision. He met the first intruder head on the clash of metal ringing out like a bell in the hollow chamber.
Elena crouched near the trapdoor, her heart hammering, the dagger clutched so tightly in her palm that it bit into her skin. She should run, that's what Adrian told her. But every fiber of her resisted leaving him, she couldn't..... wouldn't abandon him to fight alone.
The second intruder launched at Adrian from the side, he twisted deflecting the blow, his movements a deadly dance each strike calculated for a moment. Elena was transfixed —not just by his skill, but by the way he fought with precision, with fury, with a desperation carved from years of survival.
But then the third man broke away, eyes locking on her. Elena's stomach dropped.
The intruder advanced, blade gleaming. She's scrambled back panic surging, her fingers tightened around the dagger, Adrian had given her.
He swung, she ducked, the blade hissing past her ear. Instinct screamed at her to run, but something deeper rooted her to the spot she lifted the daggar clumsy, but determined and slashed the blade, grazed his arm.
The man hissed, stumbling fury flared in his eyes.
"Elena.." Adrian's voice cut across the chaos.
She barely had time to react before Adrian was there, intercepting the intruders next strike, steel clashed sparks flying. Adrian drove the man back with brutal efficiency, finishing him with a swift decisive blow that left the intruder crumpled on the floor.