Chapter 57 The Book of the Traitor
CHAPTER FIFTY SEVEN
Rosanna's POV~
I was at the table, the battered one, where a single flame flickered, dancing, its shadows twisting like ghosts across the wall. My fingers worked their way along the spine of Eleanor’s journal, my daughter’s beautiful script a lifeline out of a past stolen by Galden’s avarice. My heart ached, a general ache, as I read, each word another splinter of her defiance, her love for Valenticia. Midnight hush shrouded the manor, a clock’s measured tick the only sound to break Seryne’s stillness, but my chest tightened with fear—Gregor’s treachery, uncovered within these pages, was a blade to my granddaughter’s throat. I stopped, my breath catching, as an entry jumped out at me: Gregor paid Marrow, 1999, for V’s serum—silence for power. I spoke with my voice as a shiver of sound, a whisper in the dark, “He betrayed my daughter.” Rage welled up in him, but it was quickly followed by fear—he was out there somewhere, tracking down Valenticia. "
Its glow was stark against the candlelight, and when I reached for it, my heart slamming with panic, I called Valenticia. “Child,” I replied as she spoke, her voice exhausted but alert, “the safehouse—you need to go in deeper. Eleanor’s journals dub it, Marrow’s used to be a hideout. It holds answers.” There was a catch of her breath, and I could almost see the fear in her eyes. “And what did you discover, Grandmother?” she said, her voice soft and tinged with a note of fear. My knuckles whitened as I clutched the journal. " Gregor paid Marrow," for your serum. He’s a traitor, Valenticia, and he’s not finished.” The safe house is your path.” She held a hard silence, then “I’ll find it.” I nodded as if she could see it, and my voice was steady, despite the pain. “Be careful, child. He’s watching.” Slamming down the phone, I clung to the journal, the recollection of Eleanor’s resistance—her glare when Gregor had whatever plot or garbage — filling me, powering my promise to protect her daughter, fire unbroken within my chest.
By morning, Marcus, my detective, sat in the library of the estate, all lean lines and shadowed eyes due to a sleepless night. He clapped photos onto the table, Seryne’s canal district in grainy black and white, and I felt that fear harden around its core—Gregor’s friends were getting closer.“Rosanna,” he said, in a grim voice, “Gregor’s got men in Seryne—Natasha’s heading them. They were tracking Valenticia.” My heart jumped with fear, cold as a fist, and I leaned forward and looked at the images: Natasha’s sharp profile, a man with a scar, their intentions obvious. “How close are they?” I asked, keeping my tone even despite the fear now coiled in my belly. There was a pause before Marcus spoke, his jaw clenched. “Too close—she was at the safe house yesterday. "They know she’s searching.” I straightened, fury blazing. “Then we move faster. Find Natasha’s base, Marcus. Valenticia needs time.” He nodded, tucking the images inside his coat, though his last words unnerved me: ‘Gregor’s in a bad way, Rosanna. He won’t stop.” Fear hung, but Eleanor’s courage, her undefeated spirit, hardened me and made my determination a shield for my granddaughter.
Back in the archives, I devoured Eleanor’s journals, candlelight flickering when noon’s sun proved no match for the room’s gloom. My fingers were shaking as they pried up an entry scrawled in cryptic shorthand: Antidote lab, coastal Seryne, Marrow’s refuge. I choked on my breath as hope flared:" Valenticia’s salvation. " I deciphered the cipher, heart beating in my chest, every symbol a gritty footstep being sent at the corpse in Gregor’s poison. The location of the lab — out on the cliffs by the old lighthouse — suddenly crystallized in his mind, and I texted Valenticia, my words short: Coastal lab, lighthouse. Antidotes are there. Stay sharp. Her response, a quick thank you, was a spark, but fear nibbled—"What if Gregor’s here? " I held Eleanor’s Bottega-jacket soft journal and remembered: her fierce whisper," We’ll protect her, Mother. My eyes burned, resolving to turn to iron in my heart. I would send Marcus in charge of scouting the coast, but Valenticia would lead—she was Eleanor’s heir, my firm’s heir.
A dark veil of velvet dropped over the estate and the silence had finally become too heavy in the archive, shattered by little more than the whinny of a candle. I stood, stretching my sore back, and began to pace, Eleanor’s journals a constellation of truths. Fear was a heartbeat, a deep thrum – Gregor’s fingers, Natasha’s brutality, the weight of the serum on Valenticia. I stopped, the tips of my fingers brushing against the silver locket I wore around my neck, a gift from Eleanor, the engraved rose warm against my skin. She opened them and gazed in, smiling with her young face, looking out at her. Valenticia’s eyes reflected in her own, and my heart twisted, love mingled with terror. I let you down once, Eleanor, I thought, but not your daughter. I sat, writing a letter to Valenticia, the words coming: You’re our legacy, child. The lab holds your truth. I’d send him with her, a torch to light her way, my maternal fire as a firebrand!
At the entrance of the archive, a creak in the silence pierced the night, the pavilion groaning like the wood giving way, and terror drove my heart out of its rhythm and into my throat. I stopped them both—candlelight flickering. "Gregor’s men? Eleanor’s locket was biting into the flesh of my palm and I clutched it in my hand, crying, “I’ll defend her,” and I would have, I promised to myself, that I would never let anything crush Valenticia, never.