Chapter 43 Rayne Hates Me
Brea's POV
We arrived at the penthouse. It was on the forty-third floor.
I knew that because I counted the floors in the elevator, which gave me something to do other than think about the fact that I was riding an elevator made entirely of glass in a building that made every structure in the Valdon look like a model someone had built badly.
The doors opened directly into the apartment. I stepped out and stood still for a moment.
Floor to ceiling windows on three sides. The city spread out below in every direction still grey to me, still drained of color, but enormous, the scale of it something I hadn't fully registered from street level.
"You can look later," Elias said, already crossing to the desk. "Come here."
I came. He set a list on the desk in front of me. Handwritten, which surprised me. I hadn't imagined him as someone who wrote by hand. Dense columns of ingredients and compounds and potion components, each one with a price beside it in small precise numbers.
I ran my eye down the total at the bottom.
"Twelve thousand dollars," I said.
"Eleven thousand eight hundred and forty," he corrected. "Roughly."
I looked up at him. "You're joking."
"I don't joke about supply costs." He straightened. "The training contract covers my time and expertise. It does not cover materials." He picked up his jacket from the back of the chair.
"Find the money or don't. That's not my problem." He moved toward the corridor that presumably led to wherever he slept. "You have until tomorrow morning."
"And if I don't have it by tomorrow morning."
He paused without turning around. "Then the training pauses. And the nine vessels continue anchoring. And the Dreadborns continue moving." A beat. "Your choice."
He disappeared down the corridor. I stood at the desk and looked at the list.
Eleven thousand eight hundred and forty dollars.
I found it at the bottom of my bag.
I almost missed it — it had worked its way under the lining somehow, a slim matte black rectangle that caught no light and had no visible markings except for a small embossed crest at one corner.
Rayne's card.
I held it between two fingers and looked at it for a long time.
He'd left it for me before everything. Before the body swap and the tribunal and the witches and all of it. Back when things between us were something I didn't have a clean word for but understood the shape of.
Using it now felt like something I hadn't decided I was ready for.
I leaned back into the couch, the card still in my hand, my eyes fixed on nothing in particular. At some point, the thoughts stopped lining up properly.
At some point, the room went quiet in a way I didn’t notice.
I didn’t remember deciding to sleep. All of a sudden, when I opened my eyes, it was morning.
Light stretched across the floor in pale lines. The card was still in my hand.
I stared at it for a moment longer. Then I slipped it back into my bag.
I stood. And went out into the morning to find a job.
The urban district was nothing like Valdon after all this was the higher level human district.
Every shopfront was polished. Every window displaying things I couldn't afford to look at directly.
I tried seven places in the first hour.. a café, a supply shop, two clothing stores, a courier service, a bookshop, and a place that sold enchanted household items whose purpose I couldn't entirely determine.
Seven rejections. All of them delivered with the same particular eyes moving over my clothes, over my bag, over the general presentation of someone who had come from somewhere they considered lesser, and the decision being made before I finished speaking.
The eighth shop was the Potion Emporium. It took up half a block. I decided that I was tried of looking for a job. The card was my only alternative.
Walking in, I saw the window display alone probably cost more than my family's house. I stood outside it for a moment, looked at my reflection in the glass grey world, grey clothes, grey everything and then looked at the list in my hand.
I went in.
The interior smelled of something layered and complex that I couldn’t identify without taste or smell functioning properly.
Display cases ran the length of both walls. Staff in matching uniforms moved with the specific efficiency of people who knew their products cost more than most people’s monthly income.
I handed over the list. The staff member glanced at it once, then again—slower this time.
He moved quickly after that. Items were retrieved from different sections, some from locked displays, some from behind the counter.
Each one placed carefully into a reinforced carry case like it mattered more than it looked.
By the time he was done, the case sat on the counter between us.
“Will that be all?” he asked. I hesitated for a fraction of a second.
Then I reached into my bag which was Rayne’s card.
I placed it on the counter. The staff member picked it up, already turning toward the terminal.
That was when I heard the laugh. I knew it before I turned.
Selene Marsh. We attended the same high-school. She stood near the premium display, dressed in the kind of effortless expense that made everything around her feel cheaper.
A man stood beside her, well-dressed. She was looking at me.
“I thought that was you,” she said, smiling without warmth. “Brea.”
I didn’t respond. Her gaze dropped to the case on the counter. Then back to me.
“What are you doing in here, genuinely?” she continued. “This isn’t exactly your price range.”
I said nothing. The staff member returned, setting the terminal down in front of me.
“Please enter your PIN.” I looked at it.
For a second, I didn’t move, I didn’t know the password.
But Rayne wasn’t careless. He wouldn’t leave something like this unprotected—or impossible to access.
I entered the only sequence that made sense to me after spending time with him.
I paused as I was unsure this could lead to my arrest. I pressed confirm after some contemplation.
Selene laughed softly behind me. “You really are committing to the performance, aren’t you?”
The machine processed. For a moment—nothing.
Then— Approved.
The staff member stilled. Looked at the screen. Then at the card, finally me.
His expression changed. “This…” he said slowly, “this is a Royal Credit Line.”
The air shifted. “It’s issued directly by the Nikolai bloodline.”
“She stole it,” Selene said immediately.
“Obviously she stole it. Look at her.” The staff member’s posture changed instantly. Two security guards moved in from the edges of the room.
Selene stepped closer. Her eyes locked on mine “You haven’t changed,” she said quietly. “Still pretending you belong in places you don’t.”
Her hand moved and slapped me before I tracked it. My head turned slightly with the force of it.
Selene drew her hand back to slap me again, but it stopped mid-air.
A hand closed around her wrist. He hadn’t been there a second ago.
He was putting on a black mask and dark jacket.
The entire room understood, instantly, that something had gone wrong.
He lowered the mask just enough. Selene made a small, broken sound.
“No one,” Rayne said quietly, “touches my her.” Everything froze. The guards stepped back.
The staff member lowered his device.
Selene didn’t move as she couldn't.
Rayne released her. She stumbled back. Then further. Then turned and left, fast—like staying even a second longer was no longer an option.
The man followed without a word. Rayne didn’t look at me. “The card is valid,” he said.
“Yes, my lord,” the staff member answered immediately.
Then Rayne looked at me. He took my arm—not roughly, just firmly and guided me to the far corner of the store.
Away from everyone as he finally let go.
“What are you doing with my card,” he said.
“Training supplies. I needed...I wan..”
“I don’t need the explanation.”
His voice was flat and controlled. Empty in a way that meant effort.
“I need you to not create scenes that involve my name.”
“I wasn’t creating a scene. She—”
“I don’t care what she did.” He looked directly at me.
“I don’t care what Drake does. I don’t care what choices you make or where you go or who trains you.”
“I care that my name and my card are not associated with public incidents that reach the court.”
I held his gaze. “Rayne—”
“We’re done here.” And then— He was gone.
I should have called him back, should have apologized, even if it meant falling to my knees.
But I let pride win and watched him disappear, I might never get another chance to see him again.