Chapter 4: The Coven's Shadow
Lucius
The Danube glittered black beneath a Halloween moon.
I crouched on a warehouse roof overlooking the river, coat collar turned up against the October wind. Across the water, Ördögház rose like a gothic fever dream—spires and gargoyles, lit windows casting amber light across manicured grounds. The Devil's House. Headquarters of the Old World Coven. Home to creatures who'd been killing for centuries before my previous life's great-grandparents were born.
Blood Appraisal painted the mansion in crimson numbers.
[ SCANNING... ]
[ MULTIPLE TARGETS DETECTED ]
[ RANGE: 312 METERS. APPRAISAL ACCURACY: 67% AT THIS DISTANCE. ]
Signatures floated above the distant figures like macabre price tags. Guards at the main entrance: [ 52 BP ] and [ 48 BP ]. Movement in the Grand Salon windows: clusters of [ 45-80 BP ] signatures mingling. Servants scurrying between wings: [ 2-4 BP ]—humans, blood dolls probably, trading service for the addiction they couldn't escape.
And in the basement level, three signatures that made my Blood Appraisal stutter.
[ ??? ]
[ ??? ]
[ ??? ]
The Elders. Viktor, Marcus, Amelia—whichever two were sleeping while one ruled. The system couldn't read them. Too powerful. Too ancient. Three question marks representing a combined age of thousands of years and enough power to crush me like an insect.
"Noted. Stay the hell away from the basement."
I pulled a water-damaged notebook from my coat and sketched the layout. Three main entrances, all guarded. Service entrance on the east wing, lower traffic but still monitored. Underground access through the old sewer system—risky, probably trapped. The rooftop was clear but exposed to any vampire with decent night vision.
Direct infiltration was suicide. Even if I somehow talked my way past the guards, every vampire inside would smell an unknown fledgling. Questions would follow. Questions I couldn't answer.
I needed legitimacy. A sponsor. A story that explained my existence without revealing the truth.
The truth being: I died in another world, woke up in a vampire's corpse, and now a mysterious system was tracking my power growth through blood consumption.
"Yeah, that'll go over well at the orientation meeting."
A car engine cut through the night.
I shifted position, tracking the sound. A black Jaguar XK8 swept through the mansion's front gates, sleek and predatory. The driver parked precisely, killed the engine, and stepped out in a single fluid motion.
Selene.
Even from three hundred meters, Blood Appraisal lit her signature like a bonfire.
[ SELENE - DEATH DEALER - 178 BP ]
[ NOTE: POWER LEVEL EXCEPTIONAL FOR NON-ELDER. COMBAT EFFICIENCY ESTIMATED AT 340% OF STANDARD DEATH DEALER. ]
She moved like water over stone—no wasted motion, no hesitation, every step placed with predator's precision. Black leather combat suit. Twin Berettas holstered at her thighs. Dark hair pulled back from a face that managed to be beautiful and terrifying simultaneously.
Six hundred years old. Viktor's most loyal weapon. Believes Lycans murdered her family when she was nineteen. Doesn't know Viktor himself slaughtered everyone she loved to keep the secret of William's prison.
The memories from the films surged up unbidden. Selene awakening Viktor. Selene killing Viktor. Selene falling for Michael Corvin, drinking Alexander's blood, becoming something beyond vampire or Lycan.
In the original timeline, she was the catalyst that destroyed the old order.
In this timeline, she was walking through Ördögház's front doors without a glance at the guards who practically cowered as she passed.
Another figure emerged to greet her in the doorway. Male, tall, dressed in expensive silk that screamed "regent" louder than any title. Kraven. My Blood Appraisal tagged him at [ 156 BP ]—powerful for a non-Elder, weak compared to Selene.
They spoke. I couldn't hear the words, but body language told the story. Kraven leaning in, proprietary. Selene leaning back, closed off. His hand reaching for her arm. Her subtle step that turned the gesture into a miss without seeming intentional.
She tolerated him. Maybe feared his political position. But she didn't want him. Not even close.
"Unrequited love. Classic villain motivation."
I watched Selene disappear into the mansion's shadows. Even surrounded by her own kind, she carried herself like a soldier in enemy territory. Always alert. Never relaxed. Six centuries of war had carved the softness from her until only the blade remained.
Alone. She was profoundly, completely alone.
[ RELATIONSHIP STATUS: SELENE - UNKNOWN (0/100 TRUST) ]
[ NOTE: TARGET IS CRITICAL TO LONG-TERM STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES. RECOMMEND ESTABLISHING CONTACT. ]
The system wasn't wrong. Selene was the keystone. In weeks, she'd discover Michael Corvin. In months, she'd awaken Viktor. In less than a year, the entire vampire power structure would collapse.
Unless someone changed the equation.
Unless someone reached her first. Proved their value. Showed her the truth about Viktor before she had to discover it through betrayal and blood.
But that required getting inside Ördögház. Building trust. Accumulating enough power that she'd see me as an asset rather than an insect.
Fifty-four BP to the first gene tree threshold. After that, real abilities. Real power. Real options.
Movement at the mansion's east wing drew my attention. A lone figure exiting through the service entrance, moving with purpose toward the river. Blood Appraisal painted him mid-range: [ 92 BP ].
I pulled up the memory fragments I'd absorbed. Death Dealer names and faces from Trix's final thoughts. This one matched—Rigel. Mid-tier warrior, loyal soldier, often assigned solo patrols in less critical areas.
Following him would be risky. If he spotted me, he'd either attack or report. Either outcome ended badly.
But 92 BP was more than double my current total. And he was alone.
I weighed the options. Wait for a better opportunity—possibly days or weeks away. Or take the risk now and accelerate the timeline.
The notebook went back in my coat. I dropped from the warehouse roof, landing silent on rain-slick cobblestones, and began trailing Rigel toward the waterfront.
Halloween crowds provided cover—humans in costumes, drunk tourists, couples stumbling between bars. None of them saw the predator moving through their midst. None of them noticed the second predator following the first.
Rigel walked with a soldier's awareness, checking angles, scanning rooftops. Professional. Dangerous. But focused forward, toward his destination, not behind.
I matched his pace from a block back.
The night stretched before us, full of possibilities and violence.
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