All Chapters of Blood Ties And Silk Chains: Chapter 121 - Chapter 130

Smoke still bled over Dockside when Bram’s call came through.“Three dead,” he said flatly. “Two missing. And you’ll want to see what they left behind.”Liora stood by the window of the command suite, city lights fractured through rain. Varian stood beside her, silent. His reflection looked carved from the glass.“Marcelli?” Liora asked.Bram’s answer came with a curse. “Their crest. Painted on the side of the van in the victims’ blood. It’s not just a hit—it’s a declaration.”Varian turned then, eyes narrowing. “A declaration of war.”Bram’s voice crackled through the comms. “They’re using Harrow tech—trigger rig was modified with Corsair code. Whoever did this wasn’t guessing.”Liora’s jaw tightened. “Then they’ve merged. The Marcellis and what’s left of Edda’s network.”“Not merged,” Varian said, voice low. “Hijacked. The Harrow’s chaos gave them cover to crawl out of their graves.”Bram sighed. “They’re making Dockside bleed again. You know what that means.”Varian’s expression di

The lights in the command room glared too bright for dawn. Ines’s monitors flickered through data trails like veins of electricity—payments, proxies, ghost accounts. Her fingers flew across the keyboard, hair tied back in a messy knot.Bram leaned over her shoulder. “Tell me that’s not what I think it is.”“It’s worse,” Ines muttered. “Three holding companies—Whitevale, Ferron Systems, Aegis Trades. All routing payments to the same offshore node.”“Whose node?”She tapped the screen. The symbol glowed faintly—a stylized H.Bram cursed. “The Harrow.”Liora entered then, still in her black field jacket, face drawn but alert. “They’re supposed to be finished.”Ines shook her head. “Not finished. Fragmented. Someone’s using their shell network to buy manpower. Mercenaries, freelancers, deniable assets.”“Who’s paying?”“That’s the best part,” Ines said grimly. “The Marcellis. Using Harrow ghosts to fund a private army inside city limits.”Varian’s voice came from the doorway, low, sharp.

The rain hadn’t stopped since the yard burned. It came down thin and relentless, a whispering curtain over the makeshift funeral pyre in the courtyard of the old tribunal hall.Two bodies lay beneath tarps—Daren and Silo—the last of the old guard who had stayed when everyone else had fled. Around them stood a dozen of Varian’s people: Bram, Ines, Liora, and the scattered remnants of a family stitched together by blood and war.No priests. No speeches written in advance. Just silence, and the smell of soaked earth and smoke.Liora stepped forward first. The torch trembled slightly in her hand, though her face was carved from calm.“They built this with him,” she began, nodding once toward Varian. “Every brick. Every system. Every risk. They knew the cost, and they paid it without hesitation.”Bram looked away, jaw tight.“They didn’t die for a throne,” Liora continued. “They died to make sure this city never bows again. And if that’s the price, then none of us gets to pretend we’re inn

Ines burst into the room so fast the door rebounded off the wall. “Liora. Varian. You both need to see this. Now.”Varian straightened from the holo-map, tension already sharpening. “If this is another Marcelli strike—”“It’s worse,” Ines said, tossing a drive onto the table. “I found something in the city-grid logs. Ghost packets. Disappearing code threads. Someone’s been routing intel into Marcelli hands through a pattern we’ve seen before.”Liora’s stomach tightened. “Edda.”“Or what’s left of her,” Ines murmured. “The code’s fractured… but it’s still thinking.”Varian leaned in. “Show me.”Ines projected the data. A twisting, pulsing lattice of symbols and jumps, almost organic, almost alive.Liora whispered, “She’s dead.”Ines shook her head. “Her body is dead. But this? This is the Harrow’s architecture—her architecture. And it’s been feeding the Marcelli everything they need to stay twelve moves ahead.”Varian stared at the spinning code. His jaw locked. “So the Marcelli think

The footage had hit every screen in the city.Explosions rolling down the docks.Silhouettes of armed figures moving through smoke.Civilians fleeing.A single frame—Varian’s profile, backlit by fire.The anchor’s voice cut through the chaos:“Authorities are now labeling Varian Kole and his network domestic terrorists.”Liora’s stomach turned as the clip replayed—selective, spliced, engineered for maximum damage.Ines cursed under her breath. “They cut out the evacuation corridors. They cut out Bram pulling families from that loading bay. They cut out everything that proves we weren’t the attackers.”“They got what they wanted,” Bram muttered. “Varian looks like he lit the whole district on purpose.”Varian leaned against the console, utterly still. “Whose watermark?” he asked.Ines zoomed the video. A faint symbol pulsed in the corner—too faint for public eyes, but unmistakable to them.A serpent.Stylized.Digital.Harrow-modified.Liora exhaled sharply. “Edda.”Varian nodded once