Morning seeped into the city like infection—slow, poisonous.
London coughed beneath its own filth.
Coal smoke smothered the sky until rooftops and clouds blurred into one endless slab of gray.
Somewhere, bells tolled the hour, the sound cracked and tired from overuse.
At the breakfast table, Carmen Vale sat with a knife spinning slow circles between her gloved fingers.
The blade caught the wan light, flashing thin, sharp lines across the walls—like a lighthouse warning ships from a shore already drowned.
Julian watched her from the window, coat still slung over one shoulder, the hem dark with blood that hadn't entirely dried.
He hadn't slept.
He didn't need to.
Satisfaction hung around him heavier than exhaustion.
At the far end of the room, Vivienne sat stiffly, notebook perched on her knees, pen unmoving.
Three of them.
Breathing the same poisoned air.
But none of them pretending it tasted sweet.
A knock sounded at the door.
Three soft taps.
Measured.
Carmen didn't move.
Julian did.
He crossed the room in two strides, swung the door open without hesitation.
No surprise when Hargreave stood there.
Hat in hand. Coat dripping water onto the boards.
A man with more ghosts trailing behind him than years left ahead.
He stepped inside without invitation.
The air in the room shifted—tightened.
Julian closed the door behind him with a soft click that echoed too loud.
Hargreaves gaze swept the room—once at Vivienne, once at Carmen, and lastly at the slow-spinning knife on the table.
"You've made yourself a myth," he said, voice low and ruined from too many cigarettes and too little hope.
Carmen tilted her head slightly, the faintest curve of amusement at the corner of her mouth.
As if acknowledging a compliment in a language long since beneath her.
"You brought something," she said.
Not a question.
A command.
Hargreave pulled a folded sheet of paper from his coat and laid it carefully on the table.
No words.
No wasted movements.
The knife stopped spinning.
Carmen set it aside with a surgeon's precision and opened the paper.
At the top, a single name:
Adrian Morrow.
A shiver ran through the room—but none of them moved.
Vivienne's pen scratched faintly against her notebook, the sound fragile as moth wings battering a glass pane.
Carmen's gloved fingers hovered above the name.
She traced it once, lightly, almost tenderly.
A ghost touching another ghost.
"You know him," Hargreave said.
There was no surprise in his voice.
Only understanding.
Carmen did not look up.
"He's unfinished work," she said, soft enough that the fire barely caught the words.
Julian stepped closer, their shadows merging against the floor.
"And he's here," Hargreave added.
A grim smile twisted his face.
"Building something. Using your spiral. Loud. Sloppy. But the city's too drunk on fear to notice the difference."
Carmen folded the paper again, slow and deliberate, as if tucking a body into a grave.
She slipped it into her pocket without ceremony.
"Where?"
Hargreave shook his head.
"I don't know yet. He's smarter than most rats."
Carmen's eyes sharpened, flashing once like the blade still warm from its spin.
"Not smart enough."
Hargreave stepped backward toward the door.
"You want him dead, same as me," he said. "We just have different reasons."
Julian chuckled under his breath.
"You still think reasons matter?"
Hargreave opened the door.
The rain spilled in, slicing cold across the threshold.
He turned back, just once, and said:
"You're not gods.
No matter how many they worship."
Then he vanished into the rot-colored morning.
The door clicked shut.
Silence fell like a blade.
The fire crackled weakly, throwing up sparks that blinked and died.
Vivienne closed her notebook.
Her voice cut through the quiet, thin but steady.
"What now?"
Carmen turned toward the window.
The city sprawled beyond the glass—dirty, endless, gasping beneath its own weight.
She smiled.
This time, it was all teeth.
"Now," she said, "we finish what we started."
Julian fetched the knives.
Vivienne fetched the maps.
The Spiral tightened.
The city held its breath.
And somewhere in the dark, Adrian Morrow smiled.
Not knowing he was already dead.
Only waiting for his body to realize it.