Cassian's POV
Cassian made it back to his chambers on shaking legs.
The hallways were empty and quiet. Servants had been sent away for the night. Guards were positioned at every exit. Nobody was supposed to be awake except for the newly married couple consummating their union in the royal bedchamber.
Instead, Cassian was alone in the guest chambers, staring at his reflection in the mirror and trying to understand what had just happened.
He was bound now. Tied to Damian by a contract that promised mutual destruction. If he exposed the crown prince, Damian would expose him. If Damian exposed Cassian, both of them would burn.
It was perfect survival logic.
It was also completely terrifying.
Cassian peeled off the silk nightgown and scrubbed the makeup from his face. The girl in the mirror disappeared and became a boy again. But it didn't matter. The boy was gone too. Cassian was neither of those things anymore. He was something new. Something in between. Something that didn't have a name.
He was a fraud married to another fraud.
The thought should have made him panic. Instead, it made him feel almost calm. At least now he wasn't alone in this. At least now someone else knew the truth and hadn't immediately betrayed him.
Cassian put on simple sleeping clothes and lay down on the massive guest bed. Sleep seemed impossible but his body was exhausted. His mind was exhausted. Everything was exhausted from the effort of pretending for so long.
He was just starting to drift when the sound woke him.
A bell. Not a regular bell. An alarm bell. The kind that only sounded when something catastrophic was happening.
Cassian sat up immediately, his entire body going rigid.
The alarm continued. Long, urgent tolls that echoed through the palace. Within seconds, he heard running footsteps. Shouting. Guards moving quickly through hallways. The organized chaos of a palace responding to a threat.
Cassian threw off his blankets and moved to the door. He opened it carefully and peered into the hallway. Guards were racing past, weapons drawn. One of them spotted him and immediately changed direction.
"Get back in your chambers and lock the door," the guard commanded. "Nobody knows what's happening yet. It's not safe to be in the halls."
Cassian obeyed. He closed the door and locked it behind him. Then he pressed his ear against the heavy wood, trying to understand what was happening.
More footsteps. More shouting. Someone screaming orders. And underneath it all, the sound that made Cassian's blood turn to ice.
Gunfire.
Not swords. Not traditional weapons. Actual guns. The kind that The Collective used. The kind that elite assassins carried when they were hunting someone.
The kind they'd used to hunt Cassian for five years.
No. No, that wasn't possible. They couldn't have found him. He'd covered his tracks. He'd disappeared into a new identity. He'd become Princess Seraphina.
But The Collective never stopped hunting.
There was a sharp knock at his door. Three quick raps. A pattern that made Cassian's heart leap.
"Open the door," a familiar voice called. Elias.
Cassian unlocked it immediately. His guard slipped inside and locked the door behind her. She was fully dressed and armed, which meant she'd been expecting trouble.
"We have to go," Elias said urgently. "Now. Before they make it up to this floor."
"What's happening?" Cassian demanded, but he was already moving, pulling on boots and grabbing a heavy coat.
"Collective operatives," Elias said. Her jaw was tight with anger. "About thirty of them. They breached the palace grounds about five minutes ago. They're moving through the lower floors, killing guards as they go."
Cassian's worst fear had come true.
They'd found him.
"How did they know I was here?" Cassian asked. It didn't make sense. He'd left no trail. He'd disappeared completely.
"I don't know," Elias said. "But we need to move. They're moving up the east wing. We can use the west corridor."
She grabbed his hand and they moved into the hallway. Servants were hiding in locked chambers. Guards were organizing a defense. The entire palace had shifted from celebration to combat in minutes.
Cassian and Elias moved quickly and quietly, staying close to the walls. They could hear the gunfire getting louder. Closer. Each burst of shots meant another confrontation. Another guard either dead or engaged with Collective operatives.
They were almost to the main stairwell when a Collective operative appeared around the corner.
He was dressed in tactical gear. Professional. Trained. His weapon was already raised and his eyes locked on Cassian immediately. He'd been hunting long enough to recognize his target even in borrowed clothes.
"Target acquired," the operative said into his comm device.
Cassian moved without thinking.
His training took over. The five years of assassination work kicked in like muscle memory. His body moved faster than the operative could react. One sharp movement and the weapon went flying. Another movement and the operative collapsed with broken ribs and internal bleeding.
Cassian stood over the body, breathing hard, and realized what he'd just done.
He'd killed. Again. In this palace. In front of witnesses.
"Go," Elias hissed, pulling him forward. "More will be coming."
They ran down the corridor. Behind them, the operative was gasping for breath. He wouldn't make it. Cassian knew the signs of that kind of injury. He'd inflicted it hundreds of times.
The stairwell opened ahead of them. They started descending when Cassian heard a voice he recognized.
Damian.
The crown prince was at the bottom of the stairs with a security team. He was fully dressed despite the late hour. His expression was hard and controlled but his eyes found Cassian immediately.
"Get him to the panic room," Damian commanded his guards. He didn't acknowledge the body Cassian was leaving behind. Didn't ask questions. Just gave orders like someone who'd been trained for exactly this kind of crisis.
"Your Highness, you need to get to safety," one of the guards said.
"After they do," Damian replied, gesturing toward Cassian and Elias. "Move."
Cassian wanted to argue. Wanted to tell Damian to save himself because this was Cassian's problem. This was The Collective hunting for him. But there was no time.
A guard grabbed his arm and pulled him down the remaining stairs. Damian and his security team held the position at the bottom, weapons ready.
The gunfire was getting louder. Much louder. They were moving fast through the palace.
The guard pulled Cassian through a corridor and into what looked like a solid wall. But when the guard pressed his hand against a specific stone, the wall shifted. A hidden passage. Of course a palace like this would have hidden passages.
They moved into darkness. Behind them, Cassian could hear Damian giving orders. Could hear the crown prince organizing his guards to defend against an invasion.
"Stay with me," the guard said, pulling Cassian deeper into the passage. "The panic room is secure. Nothing can reach you there."
But that wasn't true, Cassian thought. The Collective always found their targets. It didn't matter how many walls protected you or how many guards defended you. They had resources and patience and the kind of determination that made them impossible to stop.
They moved through the passage. The gunfire sounded distant now but still present. Still happening. The palace was under attack because of him.
Because The Collective wanted him dead.
The guard led them to a reinforced door. He pressed his hand against a panel and it slid open, revealing a small room filled with security monitors.
On every screen, Cassian could see the palace under siege.
Collective operatives in tactical gear moved through hallways. Guards fought back desperately. Servants huddled in locked chambers, praying they wouldn't be found.
And in the east wing, Damian stood with his security team, meeting the attackers head on.
"What are they doing here?" Elias asked quietly. She was staring at the screens like she was trying to understand something impossible.
"Hunting me," Cassian said. The words felt heavy. Impossible. "I worked for The Collective. I was an assassin. When I refused to kill a target they wanted dead, they marked me for execution. I've been running for five years."
Elias stared at him. "How did they find you here? How did they know?"
"I don't know," Cassian admitted. "But they did. And now everyone in this palace is in danger because of me."
On the security monitors, the gunfire intensified.
Damian was moving through the palace with the grace of someone trained for combat. He was fast. Efficient. Deadly. And Cassian realized with a shock that the crown prince wasn't just pretending to be an Alpha.
Damian was trained for war.
"He's extraordinary," Elias whispered, watching Damian take down three Collective operatives without hesitation.
"He's also hiding as much as I am," Cassian replied. "Just different secrets."
Another guard burst into the panic room. His clothes were singed. He had blood on his face.
"Your Highness is in the west corridor," the guard reported to the first one. "He's moving toward the outer defenses. Collective forces are estimated at forty operatives. Casualties on both sides are mounting."
Cassian watched the screens and realized that Damian wasn't running.
The crown prince was fighting. Not to defend himself. To defend the palace. To defend Cassian.
A Collective operative appeared on one of the screens, moving toward the western corridor where Damian was. Cassian could see the operative's hand moving toward a detonator. A bomb. They were going to blow up the corridor.
Without thinking, Cassian moved toward the door.
"Wait," the guard said, grabbing his arm. "You can't go out there."
"They're going to blow the corridor," Cassian said. "He won't see it coming."
"Then he dies," the guard said coldly. "That's what happens in war, boy. People die."
Cassian looked at the screens again.
Damian was still moving through the corridor, unaware of the operative moving toward him with a detonator. Unaware that he was about to die. Unaware that the palace was being torn apart to capture one fraud in a princess's dress.
The operative raised his hand.
The detonator glowed with red light.
And Cassian understood that the crown prince was going to die because of him. That everyone in this palace was going to die because The Collective wanted him dead.
Unless Cassian did something.
Unless he walked out of the panic room and made himself visible.
Unless he became the target they were really hunting for.
"If I surrender," Cassian said slowly, "will they stop? Will they leave the palace alone?"
"Maybe," the guard said. "Or they'll kill you and burn the palace anyway. The Collective doesn't negotiate. They execute."
On the screen, the detonator's light turned brighter.
Cassian made his choice.
He yanked his arm free from the guard's grip and moved toward the hidden door. Behind him, Elias was shouting his name. The guards were reaching for him. But Cassian was already moving back into the corridor.
Back toward danger.
Back toward the place where Crown Prince Damian was about to die because of him.
The corridor exploded in light and fire and sound.