The Fallen

They call me The Fallen. Not because I was pushed. Because I jumped. In this city, mercy is weakness and love is leverage. I learned that early. So I became something else. Something colder. Cleaner. I leave a mark when I finish a job — a blackened halo split in half, one wing burned away. Even angels fall. The contract arrived in an obsidian envelope. Three names. Three rulers of the underworld. The Obsidian Triarchy. Malakai. Soren. Cassian. Untouchable. Unbreakable. Unified. The instructions were simple: Eliminate all three. Make it public. The payment was enough to disappear forever. I’ve never turned down a contract. So I did what I do best. I got close. They let me into their empire thinking I was a weapon they could use. Muscle. Strategy. Violence on demand. Malakai watched me like he already knew my secrets. Soren looked at me like he wanted to set them on fire. Cassian studied me like I was a variable he hadn’t solved yet. They were supposed to be monsters. Cold. Heartless. Brutal. They are. But they’re also something worse. Aligned. And when three powerful men move as one, you don’t break them apart. You get pulled in. I was hired to destroy them. Instead, I’m starting to wonder if I was meant to fall with them. And if I do— This city won’t survive what we become.