The cemetery was too small for Marco's death, too quiet for Scarlett's rage. As they lowered her brother's casket into the ground, she didn't notice the black cars pulling up behind the gathered mourners, but she felt it when the first gunshot shattered the morning silence.

Three days since Marco died in her arms. Three days of police questions and funeral arrangements that cost money she didn't have.

The funeral was small. Just Scarlett and a handful of neighbors. Mrs. Chen from 3B who used to bring him soup. Mr. Rodriguez who'd helped carry him up the stairs when the chemo made him too weak to walk.

A priest Scarlett had never met spoke words that meant absolutely nothing.

"Marco Benedetti was taken from us too soon. A young man with his whole life ahead of him. A beloved brother. A gentle soul."

The priest didn't know Marco. Didn't know how he used to make jokes even when the pain was unbearable. Didn't know that his last words were an apology for being scared.

Scarlett stood there in her black dress, covered in enough concealer to hide the hollowness in her cheeks. She hadn't slept since that night. Hadn't eaten.

The police had ruled it a home invasion. Random violence. Wrong place, wrong time.

They were idiots.

The casket began its descent into the earth. Taking Marco away forever.

Mrs. Chen was crying. Mr. Rodriguez had his hand over his heart.

Scarlett felt nothing. Just a cold, hollow rage that had replaced everything else.

She stepped forward as the casket reached the bottom. Picked up a handful of dirt. Let it fall through her fingers.

"I'll make him pay, Marco," she whispered. "I swear."

---

The sound of car engines cut through the cemetery silence like a knife.

Three black SUVs were pulling up the narrow cemetery road, moving fast. Too fast for a place of mourning.

They screeched to a halt, surrounding the burial site. Doors opened. Men emerged.

Six of them. All tall. All armed.

The mourners scattered immediately. Mrs. Chen grabbed Mr. Rodriguez and they ran. The priest dropped his bible and bolted.

Within seconds, Scarlett stood alone at her brother's grave.

The men formed a semicircle around her, cutting off any escape routes. And then he emerged from the center SUV.

Kieran Volkov, dressed in black instead of his usual white.

"What are you doing here?" Scarlett asked.

"Leaving so soon, Tentatrice?" His smile was predatory. "We haven't paid our respects."

"This is a private funeral. Get out."

"I don't think so." He walked toward her slowly. "See, you have something that belongs to me."

The video. He was here for the video.

"What do you want?" She backed away, but there was nowhere to go. Just Marco's open grave behind her.

"To finish what I started." Kieran's smile widened. "Can't have you showing that little video to anyone."

"Alessio killed my brother. What more do you want?"

Kieran laughed. Actually laughed like she'd told the funniest joke he'd ever heard.

"Alessio? You actually believed it."

Ice slid down Scarlett's spine. "What are you talking about?"

"Your brother's last words. About the man with dark hair. The expensive suit. The name Alessio De Luca." Kieran took another step closer. "Did Marco describe him perfectly?"

"Yes."

"He said exactly what I told him to say."

The world stopped spinning.

"No."

"Want to know a secret? Want to know my favorite party trick?"

Before she could respond, his face began to change.

His features shifted and morphed, bones restructuring beneath the skin. His blonde hair darkened to black. His blue eyes turned brown. His jawline sharpened.

Within seconds, Alessio De Luca stood before her.

Perfect. Identical.

"Hello again," he said in Alessio's voice.

Scarlett's legs gave out. She fell to her knees.

"Face-shifting." Kieran's voice came out of Alessio's mouth. "Useful for framing rivals. Killing nosy little brothers."

His face shifted back. Blonde hair. Blue eyes.

"You killed Marco."

"I did. Looked just like your precious Alessio when I did it too. Made sure to introduce myself properly." Kieran crouched down to her level. "And you fell for it beautifully."

"Why?"

"Because I wanted you to hate him. Wanted you to blame him." His eyes gleamed. "And it worked. You've spent three days planning his murder when you should have been planning mine."

Alessio hadn't killed Marco. Hadn't betrayed her.

She'd been wrong about everything.

"You're a monster."

"Says the girl who strips for killers." He nodded to his men. "Make it hurt."

---

Scarlett tried to run.

She made it three steps before the first man caught her. His fist connected with her face and something in her nose exploded. Blood poured down her chin.

She fell hard. Pain shot up her legs but she tried to crawl anyway.

A boot slammed into her ribs. She heard them crack.

"Please," she choked out. "Please stop."

"Did Annabelle beg? Did your brother when I held the knife to his throat?"

Another kick. This one to her stomach. She vomited blood.

The men took turns. Systematic. Methodical.

Fists to her face. Her chest. Her back.

Boots to her ribs. Her spine. Her legs.

She tried to scream but her lungs wouldn't work.

All she could do was curl into a ball and pray it would end soon.

Her screams echoed off the tombstones when they broke her fingers one by one. When they stomped on her legs until the bones snapped. When they grabbed her hair and slammed her face into the ground over and over.

"Stop," she whispered. "Please stop."

But they didn't stop.

---

Scarlett didn't know when the beating ended.

She lay in a pool of her own blood, barely conscious. Every breath was agony.

Through the haze, she could see Marco's grave.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm so sorry, Marco. I'm so sorry, Alessio."

She'd blamed an innocent man while the real killer stood right in front of her.

And now she'd die without ever making it right.

Footsteps approached. Kieran knelt beside her broken body.

He grabbed her hair and lifted her head.

"Any last words?"

Scarlett's mouth filled with blood. She gathered what little strength she had left and spat directly in his face.

His laughter was the last sound she wanted to hear.

"Feisty until the end. I almost admire that." He wiped the blood off his cheek. Then he looked at his largest man and nodded.

The man walked over to a nearby grave. Picked up a chunk of broken gravestone that must have weighed thirty pounds.

He carried it back. Stood over Scarlett.

Raised it above his head.

---

The stone hung there for what felt like forever.

Scarlett thought of Marco. Of her mother. Of all the promises she'd broken.

She thought of Alessio's hands on her body. His whispered words. You're safe.

Not a lie. Never a lie.

The stone came down.

There was a crushing impact. The sound of her skull fracturing. Pain so bright it was almost white.

Then darkness. Immediate and absolute.

But in that last fraction of a second, a single thought crystallized in her dying mind.

I'm sorry, Alessio. I'm so sorry.

Then nothing.

---

Scarlett's body lay broken among the tombstones, blood seeping into the earth where her brother had just been buried.

Kieran stood and brushed dirt off his pants. "Clean this up. Make it look like a mugging gone wrong."

Kieran walked back to his SUV. The girl was dead. The video would die with her. Problem solved.

He didn't notice the way Scarlett's fingers twitched once. Twice.

Didn't see the strange shimmer of light that pulsed from her chest, faint as a heartbeat, before fading into nothing.

He climbed into his vehicle and drove away, leaving her corpse for the crows.

Behind him, in the dirt and blood beside an open grave, something ancient stirred.

Something that recognized the death of a priestess bloodline.

Something that would not let her story end here.

---