Chapter 59: The Grand Duke Goes Underground (4)

The water recoiled, with the mouths screaming.

I understood at once.

Abi was not here. Not fully. He had not abandoned the estate. He had simply tugged on the connection between us, lending me a trace of his presence through the vow.

A trace. It was just a trace.

Yet the chamber trembled as if a mountain had looked down through its ceiling.

Jinns were truly unreasonable.

It was unfair.

I approved.

"Your timing is decent," I muttered.

Abi’s laughter brushed my mind. "Praise me later. Preferrably with better desserts. For now, cut the anchor."

Anchor, huh? The basin? No. Not the basin itself.

My gaze dropped to the bottom of the stone bowl, where the black water had lowered enough to reveal a small object embedded into the stone.

A tooth.

No, it was a shard of bone shaped like a tooth.

It was covered in inscriptions too fine to read without magnification, but one symbol stood out.

The mouth, the place that remembered names.

I smiled.

"Found you."

The creature shrieked, suddenly desperate. Its remaining limbs stretched toward the basin, trying to cover the shard.

Too late, though.

I twisted my sword free and brought it down. The blade struck the bone shard. For the first time, there was true resistance.

A deep sound pulsed through the chamber, not heard but felt. The air thickened and the water turned heavy. My own shadow stretched beneath me, lengthening toward the basin.

Something pushed back through the shard.

It was a command to kneel.

How laughable.

I was born a Konstantin.

My mother taught me etiquette by making me kneel on polished stone for hours until my posture remained perfect even through pain.

My father trained me by throwing me into desert winds and calling it a bonding exercise.

William hit me with a wooden sword until my soul considered escape as a career option.

If this underground mouth thought a little pressure could make me kneel, then it clearly lacked imagination.

I pressed down harder.

The blade sank into the shard by a hair. Then another. The violet line around my arm flared.

Abi’s voice became sharper.

"Now, Skandar."

The shard cracked.

Every candle in the chamber went out.

For one breath, there was only darkness.

Then the old aqueduct screamed.

The ward collapsed inward. Black water dropped all at once, sucked back through the cracks in the floor like a beast retreating into its burrow. The sealed exits flickered back into view. The creature pinned to the basin unraveled, its body peeling apart into strips of shadow and wet thread.

The voices rose again, but this time they were not singing.

They were gasping.

As if freed from underwater.

I stood still, sword lowered, and listened.

Names. So many names. They floated around my ears like whispers. Some faded quickly. Others lingered against the stone. I caught some fragments of them.

Toma.

Elis.

Neria.

Bell.

Savio.

Then one voice, smaller than the rest, whispered clearly beside my ear. It was too faint. Far too faint.

"Spiro."

My fingers tightened around the sword hilt. The chamber became very quiet. The shadows did not speak and Perrin remained unconscious.

Good for him. Had he been awake, I might have asked him questions in a manner William would later call excessive.

"Spiro," I repeated.

No answer came. There was only the drip of ordinary water returning to ordinary stone. Which somehow should have given me a sense of relief.

And yet, how infuriating.

How absolutely unacceptable.

I turned to the nearest shadow. "Secure Perrin."

"Yes, Your Excellency."

"Make sure he’s alive."

The shadow paused for half a breath.

"Understood."

I pointed toward the basin. "Remove nothing until I inspect it. Mark every symbol. Copy the chamber. Do not touch any remaining water with bare skin. If something whispers your name, ignore it. If it uses a loved one’s voice, ignore it even harder."

The shadows bowed.

I crouched near the broken shard.

It had split into three pieces. Most of the inscriptions had burned away, but not all. I took out a handkerchief and carefully picked up the largest fragment without allowing it to touch my skin. Even through the fabric, a faint coldness seeped into my fingers.

The fragment smelled faintly of stale temple incense and decay.

Really disgusting.

I placed it inside a small containment case and sealed it with aura.

Abi’s voice returned, quieter now.

"Are you alive?"

"What a useless question."

"Answer it anyway."

"I am alive."

"Good. I would have been irritated if you died after forbidding me to come."

"How touching. Your grief would have been measured in irritation."

"Deep irritation."

"Then I am honored."

The connection dimmed, though not entirely. It remained like a violet thread resting somewhere beneath my ribs. I disliked how reassuring it felt.

Family was a troublesome concept.

One moment, they were annoying you at breakfast. The next, they were lending you ancient power through an unbreakable soul vow so an underground horror could not chew on your existence.

Very troublesome.

I stood and looked toward the passage behind the basin. The collapsed arch no longer looked sealed. Beyond it, the tunnel sloped downward.

The singing had stopped. But there was a new sound now.

A faint tapping.

It was slow and measured.

Three taps.

A pause.

Three taps again.

Pause again.

One shadow lifted his blade. "Your Excellency?"

"I hear it."

"Should we proceed?"

Every sensible instinct advised against it.

We had secured Perrin. We had broken the immediate anchor.

We had evidence. We had a possible connection to Spiro, the children, the chapel, and perhaps the Crown Prince’s affliction. Proceeding deeper without Abi, without William, and without more preparation was unwise.

A good villain knew when to retreat.

A great villain knew when to make others think he had retreated while he merely changed the battlefield.

I looked at the dark passage and smiled faintly.

"No."

The shadow blinked. "No, Your Excellency?"

"We are leaving."

The tapping continued.

Three. Pause.

Three. Pause.

It sounded almost impatient.

How rude.

I turned my back on the passage.

"If something down there wants to meet me," I said, walking toward the exit, "it should make an appointment."

The shadows followed without question.

Behind us, from the darkness below, a final whisper rose.

"Wish-bearer."

I did not answer.

The whisper changed.

"Father."

My steps stopped.

The voice was Spiro’s.

Not just a similar one.

His.

Small. Frightened. Pleading.

"Father, don’t leave me."

The chamber sharpened around me.

The shadows went still.

For a moment, the dark passage seemed to breathe.

Ah.

So that was its trick. A despicably ugly and crude trick.

How unforgivably stupid.

I turned my head slightly, just enough for the darkness to feel my attention.

"You made a mistake," I said softly.

The voice went silent.

I smiled.

It was not pleasant.

"You should not have used my son."

A tremor passed through the passage.

The thing below understood.

Good.

Understanding was the first step toward fear. It should properly learn how to fear me.

I resumed walking.

This time, no voice followed.

We emerged from the aqueduct into daylight that looked too ordinary for what had just occurred beneath the city. The southwest district continued its daily noise. A vendor cursed at his cart wheel. A child laughed somewhere down the street. A pigeon strutted along a roof with the arrogance of a minor duke.

The world had the audacity to keep moving.

I removed my gloves and handed them to a shadow.

"Burn them.

"

"Yes, Your Excellency."

Perrin was carried out wrapped in a cloak, still unconscious and pale enough to pass for a corpse if one lacked attention to detail. We would take him to a safe house first, not the estate. If the chapel had marked him, bringing him near Spiro would be foolish.

I was many things.

Foolish was not one of them.

A shadow approached from the street entrance and bowed. "Your Excellency, urgent message from the estate."

My eyes sharpened.

He held out a folded note bearing William’s mark.

I opened it.

The message was brief.

Young Master Spiro has written the first names he remembers.

Among them is one recorded in the Crown Prince’s childhood rite.

I read the line once.

Then again.

The city noise faded to a dull murmur.

A name connected Spiro’s orphanage memories to the Crown Prince’s stabilization rite.

So the child in my house and the future emperor in the palace had stood beneath the same shadow long before I entered the Capital.

I folded the note carefully.

It would not do to crumple good paper simply because the people behind this conspiracy were becoming increasingly offensive.

"My carriage," I said.

The shadow bowed. "At once, Your Excellency."

I looked back toward the aqueduct entrance.

The old stones sat quietly beneath moss and grime, pleading innocence.

A mouth under the city.

A prince with a sealed life force.

A child with stolen names in his memory.

A chapel that smelled of incense and rot.

How troublesome. The kind of troublesome that could not be ignored.

I sighed.

I truly wanted to be a villain lord.

So why did every step toward villainy keep bringing me closer to cleaning up someone else’s filth?

No matter.

If the Capital had a hidden mouth, I would break its teeth.

If the chapel had roots, I would tear them out.

If someone had placed their hands on Spiro before he became mine, then they would learn a simple truth.

House Konstantin did not forgive trespassers.

And I, unfortunately for them, was very good at collecting debts. With high interest charged.