Chapter 5:A Stranger's Voice

The night crept in like a shadow with a knife. Ariella sat by the frosted window of her room, her fingers still curled around the coin Lucien had given her. The symbol etched into its face seemed to pulse with a life of its own, as if it knew more than either of them dared to say.

She hadn’t spoken to Lucien since he dropped that final, devastating line. "You already are."

What was she in the middle of?

Some elite war? A secret society? Was this some kind of mad revenge mission cloaked as a marriage?

Her chest tightened with confusion and frustration.

The sound came just after midnight—a soft scrape, like someone brushing against the wall outside her bedroom.

She stilled.

Another scrape. Then the creak of a floorboard.

Ariella moved without thinking. She slipped from her bed, grabbed the ornamental dagger her father once gifted her, and crept toward the door.

The hallway was pitch black.

She waited, breath held. Then, a whisper. Faint. Male.

"Don’t trust the Blackthorns."

Her spine stiffened. "Who’s there?"

Silence.

She stepped out slowly, eyes adjusting to the dark. At the end of the hallway, the grandfather clock ticked like a heartbeat. She followed the sound, one cautious step at a time.

Suddenly, a shadow darted across the staircase below.

"Wait!" she called.

She hurried down the stairs, the cold marble beneath her feet chilling her more than the fear.

The foyer was empty. The front door was locked.

Then she saw it—an envelope slipped beneath the statue in the hallway. It wasn’t there earlier. Trembling, she picked it up.

No name. Just a black wax seal.

She broke it open.

Inside: A single photo. A man in a hospital bed. Bandaged. Bruised. Alive.

Her heart stopped.

It was her father.

She swore the world tilted beneath her feet.

He was dead. She saw the casket. She watched them lower it. She touched the cold stone.

But the date on the photo was just two weeks ago.

There was something else in the envelope. A note, scrawled hastily:

"He’s alive. And Lucien knows."

Her knees buckled. She grabbed the banister to keep from collapsing.

Had Lucien lied to her this whole time? Had he known her father lived and used her grief to manipulate her?

Everything inside her screamed for answers. But the house was silent.

Except for a new sound—footsteps. Behind her.

She spun, dagger raised.

Lucien stood in the hallway, shirtless, eyes dark with something between rage and dread.

"You’re not supposed to be out of your room," he said quietly.

"Is it true?" she gasped. "Is he alive?"

He said nothing.

"Lucien!"

He walked forward, slow and dangerous. "Where did you get that photo?"

She stepped back. "So it IS real."

Lucien reached for the envelope, but she pulled it back. "Don’t lie to me again!"

He froze. Then, almost gently: "If your father is alive, Ariella, it changes everything."

"So you admit it."

"No. I didn’t say I knew. But if someone wants you to believe he is, then we’re both being played."

She didn’t know what to believe anymore. Every thread of trust she’d tried to build was unraveling in her hands.

Lucien looked down the hallway, his jaw tight. "We need to leave. Now."

"Why?"

"Because if that picture is real, someone is watching us. Inside this house."

Ariella glanced up at the dark chandelier. Suddenly the walls felt thinner. The shadows deeper.

She clenched her jaw. "Then tell me everything. No more secrets. No more half-truths. Who are the Blackthorns really? Why did you marry me? And why would someone fake my father’s death?"

Lucien turned toward her, eyes haunted.

"Because your father wasn't just a businessman, Ariella. He was one of the architects of the blood pact that started this war."

She blinked.

"He knew too much. He tried to get out. They couldn’t let him."

Ariella gripped the photo, her entire body shaking. "Then who killed him?"

Lucien looked her dead in the eyes.

"That’s what we’re about to find out."

Then he reached into the back of a nearby mirror, revealing a hidden compartment.

Inside: a phone, a gun, and a second envelope.

He handed it to her.

She opened it.

Another photo. This time, it was her. As a child.

In Lucien's arms.

The date read: Twelve years ago.

Before she ever remembered meeting him.

Ariella's blood ran cold.

"You knew me back then?"

Lucien nodded slowly.

"I was assigned to protect you. Long before you ever knew my name."

Ariella took a step back, struggling to process everything.

"So all of this... the marriage... the tension... this whole setup... it was never real?"

Lucien's voice dropped, low and honest. "It started as duty. But it stopped being that a long time ago."

She stared at him, uncertain whether to cry or scream.

Then the silence shattered again.

Glass broke upstairs.

Lucien grabbed her hand. "We're out of time. Whoever left that message is back. And they don’t want us finding out the rest."

Ariella didn't resist.

As they fled through a side corridor, she looked back one last time at the hallway. At the secrets buried in these walls. At the place where she thought she might finally heal.

Now all that remained was danger. And a man who might be her only protection—or her greatest betrayal.

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