The private elevator ascended in silence, lined with polished wood and brass inlays. Soft classical music played, but neither Alaric nor Balen paid it any mind.
Balen stood straight, hands clasped behind his back, but there was something almost reverent about the way he occasionally glanced at Alaric — as if to confirm that the man beside him was real and not some hallucination conjured by desperate loyalty.
When the doors slid open, they entered a private executive lounge at the top of the Astoria.
The room was breathtaking — floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the city, leather seating, a marble bar untouched by lesser guests. This was not the place for transactions. It was a throne room for the unseen rulers of the city.
Balen gestured toward the main seating area.
"Please, Sir Vane."
Alaric set the box of fittings down quietly against a side table, shrugging off the obligations he'd come under false pretenses to fulfill.
Balen didn't hesitate. He dropped to one knee.
"I, Balen Creed, descendant of the Creed line sworn to House Vane, pledge my loyalty," he said, voice steady despite the emotion bleeding through it. "I have waited long for your return. My ancestors served your ancestors — through wars, through betrayals, through the near extinction of your bloodline."
Alaric stared at him, something stirring in the deepest parts of him. His hand instinctively touched the pendant hidden beneath his jacket — the crescent moon wrapped in flames.
"You knew," Alaric said, voice even.
"I knew the moment I saw your eyes," Balen said without rising. "The silver-flecked gaze of the true Vanes. No imitation could forge that mark."
The words rang with a gravity Alaric couldn't deny. He remembered the stories whispered in the orphanage — tales of ancient bloodlines, of cities falling at the feet of men who bore the silver gaze.
He had never believed he could be one of them.
Until now.
Balen rose smoothly, retrieving a heavy black binder from a concealed panel in the wall. He laid it on the table and opened it.
Inside were profiles — dozens of them.
Men and women. Bankers. Lawyers. Mercenaries. Healers. Politicians. Business owners.
"Remnants," Balen explained. "Those who kept faith even when the world forgot your name. Quietly positioned. Waiting for the signal to rise again."
Alaric thumbed through the pages. Each name was marked with a small silver crescent at the top. Some were aged; others were younger — the next generation of silent sentinels.
"And you think... I can bring them back together?" Alaric asked, a shadow of doubt flickering.
"I know you can," Balen said. "Because blood remembers. And so do we."
A heavy silence settled between them, charged with something ancient and electric.
Alaric closed the binder slowly.
"Then we begin," he said.
Balen smiled, a rare and dangerous thing.
"You only need give the word, my lord," he said. "And this city — this world — will remember the name Vane."
Alaric sat back in the leather chair, looking out over the glittering skyline.
He thought of Celeste.
Of Harold Marrow's dying eyes.
Of the mocking laughter from the Marrows, from Amelia, from the countless others who had spat on him because he hadn't worn his heritage on his sleeve.
The time for silence was ending.
But he would not roar yet.
No — his rise would be methodical, quiet, undeniable.
They would not even realize what he was until it was too late.
Alaric touched the pendant one more time, feeling the faint hum of something ancient stirring within him.
Not power.
Authority.
The kind born from a bloodline that had once shaped kings and kingdoms.
The kind no enemy, no matter how loud or wealthy, could mimic.
He leaned forward.
"Gather them," he said.
And with that single command, the legacy of the Vanes began to stir from centuries of slumber.