Page 116 of Savage Saint
Every instinct roars to life. Fuck stealth, fuck the plan. I'm moving before rational thought can stop me, taking stairs three at a time, following that sound like a lifeline.
The cry doesn't repeat, but I know which direction it came from. The east wing, where Jerzy keeps his private suite. Where he trained her. Where he broke her.
Where I'll fucking end him if he's touched her.
I round a corner too fast, nearly colliding with a guard. He's young, green, his eyes widening in the split second before I strike. My knife opens his throat in a spray of crimson, and I'm past him before his body hits the floor.
No time for subtlety now. She needs me.
The hallway stretches ahead, doors on either side like teeth in a monster's maw. Behind one of them is Kasia. Behind one of them are answers.
Behind one of them is blood.
38
KASIA
The servants' entrance is exactly where I left it over a month ago. My fingers find the security panel without conscious thought, instinct taking over as I input the override sequence. The same one Jerzy taught me when I was seven, convinced no one would ever think to change it. He was right. Arrogance has always been his fatal flaw.
The lock disengages with a soft click. Three seconds is all it takes me to get inside the house that's haunted my nightmares. Not the fifteen minutes I told Angelo.
I slip inside, the familiar scent of lemon polish and old wood hitting me like a physical blow. Beeswax and brass cleaner, the smell of wealth maintained by invisible hands. My stomach clenches, but I push the sensation down. I lied to him for a reason. This confrontation needs to happen without him in the crossfire. Without him seeing what I become within these walls. What I've always been within these walls.
The corridor stretches ahead, servants' quarters dark and silent with everyone gone at this hour. The night shift runs a skeleton crew, another of Jerzy's predictable patterns. My feet remember every creaky floorboard, every loose tile. The thirdstep from the kitchen creaks like a gunshot. The tile near the pantry shifts if you put weight on the left corner. I move like smoke, like the ghost I've always been in this house, avoiding every trap the old building sets.
Movement ahead. A guard rounds the corner, flashlight sweeping lazily from left to right in a pattern any first-year security student could time. Amateur. I'm on him before his brain registers the threat, my hand clamping over his mouth as my knife slides between his ribs, angled up toward his heart with surgical precision. The blade parts skin and muscle like warm butter, finding the gap between bone with practised ease. He drops without a sound, eyes wide with shock that fades to nothing.
I drag him into an alcove, arranging his body behind a dusty curtain. My hands work automatically, checking for blood spatter, smoothing away drag marks. A lifetime of training condensed into efficient movements.
"Clean up your mess, Kasia. No evidence. No witnesses."
Jerzy's voice slithers through my mind like poisoned honey, and I taste bile. But my hands don't shake. They never shake when I'm working. When I'm what he made me.
I'm not doing this for you anymore,I tell the voice.I'm doing this to end you.
The guard's radio crackles softly, routine check-in in another eight minutes. I pocket it, monitoring their chatter as I move deeper into the compound. Three more patrols, exactly where they have always been. Jerzy always was a creature of habit, believing his own myths about invincibility.
I ghost through the kitchen, empty at this hour except for the lingering scent of tonight's dinner service. The marble countertops gleam in the moonlight filtering through barred windows, wrought iron painted to look decorative but strong enough to stop a car. How many times did I sneak throughhere as a child, stealing food after Jerzy withheld meals as punishment? My stomach would cramp with hunger while he explained that weakness deserved to suffer.
The main corridor leads toward the security office, Persian runners muffling my footsteps. Each step measured, each sense alert. This is what I am. What he made me. A weapon wrapped in flesh, designed for silence and death.
Another flash of memory hits as I pass a familiar doorway—
Ten years old, blood streaming from my split lip, Jerzy's hand wrapped in my hair as he drags me down this exact hallway. "Pathetic," he snarls. "You think your enemies will show mercy because you're small? Again. We go again until you get it right."
I force the memory down, lock it away with all the others clamouring for attention. Not now. The mission comes first. Always the mission first. Focus on the present, on the goal.
The security office door appears ahead, light spilling from beneath like liquid gold. Two guards inside, according to the rotation schedule Arrow provided. I pull the canister from my belt, grateful for the ventilation system Jerzy never bothered to upgrade. Too proud to admit his fortress might have flaws. The gas will take fifteen seconds to fully deploy. Twenty for them to go under.
I crack the door, toss the canister, and count.
One Mississippi. Two Mississippi.
Shouts of alarm, quickly muffled as confusion sets in.
Eight Mississippi. Nine Mississippi.
Choking sounds. A chair scraping against the floor. A body hitting the ground with a dull thud.
