Chapter 20: Ashes in Her Veins

The smoke hadn't cleared when Celia stepped back into the old bell tower.

The charred remains of the ledger lay scattered in a black smear across the stone floor, curling like dead leaves under her boots. The fire was intentional, surgical, erasing more than just paper—it was a silencing. She crouched low, using the edge of her sleeve to sift through the ash. Most of it was irretrievable, but a sliver of carbon-stained paper clung to the stone, spared by some twist of physics or fate. The name “Orrin Callow” peeked through the soot like a ghost.

She tucked the fragment into her coat pocket and stood, eyes lifting to the shadowed rafters. There was no wind, yet the chimes above creaked. Not from movement. From memory.

The silence stretched deep into the marrow of the place. Once, this tower called worshipers to their knees. Now, it called the dead.

The precinct had nothing to offer. Records tied to the Saints had been redacted, shredded, buried under bureaucratic weight. Back in her apartment, Mara had pinned photos and documents across the wall, strings bleeding from thumbtacks in a constellation of madness. In the center: her brother, Kieran. Always Kieran.

She stared at his picture—dark-eyed, uniformed, unaware of the trap he’d stepped into.

The file from Ashgrove listed his death as a “classified operational casualty.” The term itself felt engineered to mean nothing. Officially, Kieran had died in a raid gone wrong. Unofficially, he had been burned by the same hand that torched the tower ledger. She didn’t believe in coincidence anymore. Coincidence was for those still naïve enough to think the system was blind.

Her phone buzzed.

UNKNOWN NUMBER.

A pause. Then a message.

“Go to Locker 91 at the Greyhaven station. Midnight. Come alone.”

She stared at the text until it blurred, heart ticking louder in her ears.

Greyhaven station sat at the edge of the city’s underbelly, a place where trains came to die and silence swallowed screams without a ripple. She didn’t ask herself if it was a trap. She already knew it was. But she went anyway.

Midnight folded over the city like a velvet shroud. The station lights flickered under a pallid moon. Rows of rusting lockers lined the terminal like mausoleums. Locker 91 stood near the end—its door slightly ajar.

Mara approached cautiously, gun drawn, senses on edge.

Inside the locker, there was no bomb. No wires. Just a manila envelope.

She took it with gloved fingers, eyes sweeping the shadows behind her. Nothing moved. Nothing breathed.

Back in her car, she tore it open. Dozens of black-and-white photographs spilled onto the passenger seat. Surveillance shots. Men in uniform. Men she recognized. Officers. Judges. Clergy.

At the bottom: a group photo dated fifteen years ago.

The Saints.

Young. Smiling. Wearing the old precinct emblem on their sleeves. A fraternity built on violence and oath-breaking. She scanned the faces, heart thudding, until she saw him—taller than the rest, smile crooked and warm.

Kieran.

No older than twenty-three. Standing beside a man with eyes like polished stone.

Orrin Callow.

The name from the ledger. The name that wouldn’t die.

She flipped the photo.

In elegant handwriting: “For the ones who never made it out.”

Back at her apartment, she digitized the images and ran the faces through the force database. Some were dead. Some were decorated. All had ghosts clinging to their names.

But one stood out.

Detective Rhea Morrow.

Still active. Still working. Transferred three years ago to Internal Affairs.

Celia stared at her ID photo. She had the same sharp cheekbones and calculating stare as the woman who once testified against a whistleblower officer in a now-sealed tribunal. That whistleblower? Kieran’s partner, Luis Calder.

She remembered Calder’s face—swollen and bruised in the hospital bed the night he told her, "They don’t kill you fast. They make you bleed until you forget why you started talking.”

He’d gone missing two weeks later. Presumed dead.

Celia leaned back, eyes closed. The noose wasn’t just tightening. It was already around her neck.

She needed a lifeline. She needed Calder’s file.

And there was only one person who could help her access sealed IA archives.

Julian Rook.

She hated owing him anything. He always collected in blood.

The old cybernetics lab where he squatted stank of solder, grease, and old paranoia. He opened the door without speaking, expression unreadable behind his fractured glasses.

“I need access to sealed Internal Affairs records,” she said.

Julian lifted a brow. “You sure you want to do this? There’s a difference between uncovering truth and burying yourself under it.”

“I’m already buried. I just want to dig.”

He motioned to the terminal. “Sit.”

His fingers flew across the keys, bypassing encryptions with the ease of a man who’d once built half the city’s surveillance systems. Celia leaned in as the screen flashed green.

“Found it,” Julian murmured. “Calder’s sealed file. You’ve got sixty seconds before the system traces us.”

The file opened with a hiss of static. Video testimony, redacted memos, scanned handwritten notes.

Celia skimmed them—words jumping out like bullets.

“Saints operate outside jurisdiction…”

“…cover-ups authorized by Deputy Chief Harrow…”

“…Callow's blood oath...”

“…Kieran Hart requested full investigation... denied.”

She froze.

A line of text blinked near the end: Kieran Hart’s final memo attached.

She clicked.

His voice played softly through the speaker—raw, determined, tired.

“If you're hearing this, I probably didn’t make it. I’m not afraid to die. But if I go, let someone know—this isn’t about revenge. It’s about stopping them from doing it again.”

The file ended in silence.

Julian shut the system down, breathing shallowly.

“Do you know what you just did?” he whispered.

“I heard my brother,” she replied.

Outside, the wind picked up. A storm was coming.

She could feel it building—not in the sky, but in the marrow of the city. The Saints were more than a rogue unit. They were a legacy. One passed down in violence, cemented in secrecy, and guarded by men willing to burn everything for silence.

But she wasn’t silent anymore.

She left Julian’s lab with the flash drive tucked in her coat and Kieran’s voice echoing in her chest like war drums.

As she stepped out into the city night, something shifted behind her eyes—resolve forged in grief and ra

ge. The Saints had taken her brother. They had buried truth under lies.

But the ashes weren’t cold yet.

And she was done waiting.