The heat of the late afternoon hung heavy in the air, wrapping the countryside in a shimmering veil of stillness. Cicadas screeched in relentless rhythm, their voices rising and falling like an endless chorus of grief. The gravel road leading toward the ruined Tsukiyo estate lay half-overgrown, weeds sprouting in cracks where once proud retainers had walked in orderly rows.
A carriage clattered to a halt at the moss-stained gates. The wooden frame groaned as if protesting the journey, dust clouding the air.
The door creaked open. A pale hand emerged first, fingers slender, trembling slightly as they gripped the wooden edge. Then a young woman stepped down, her geta clicking sharply against the gravel.
Elena Kurosawa.
The butler—old now, his back stooped, his hair thinned to wisps of silver—bowed deeply as he received her. His voice rasped with age when he spoke.
"Lady Elena… you honor the estate with your return."
Elena inclined her head, but her throat caught before she could form a reply. Her eyes were drawn upward, toward the husk of the great house beyond the gate. The once-brilliant wooden panels were weathered, paint stripped by sun and rain. Cracks ran across the pillars like veins.
And yet, despite the decay, the place still breathed. She could feel it—an echo of laughter once shared, the weight of footsteps long gone.
Her chest tightened. I should not have come back…
But she had. Because Akiri had called.
* * *
The butler guided her through the gate, his steps slow but steady. The crunch of gravel beneath her sandals felt loud, almost sacrilegious in the silence. Elena's gaze flicked restlessly over the grounds. Every shadow seemed to watch her, every tree leaned close as if whispering secrets.
And then she saw her.
Akiri.
She stood at the edge of the engawa, wooden veranda glowing beneath the filtered sunlight. Her hair spilled down in long, inky strands that shimmered like liquid night. A breeze stirred, carrying with it the faint scent of cedar and smoke, brushing her sleeve against her slender wrist.
Elena froze. Her heart stumbled in her chest.
Eight years had passed since she had last seen that face. Back then, Akiri's eyes had been softer, filled with a girlish light, the laughter of shared secrets under the moon. Now those same eyes were obsidian mirrors, reflecting sorrow, fire, and something else—something forged in loss.
"Elena," she said, her voice even, calm, yet threaded with iron.
Elena's lips parted, but words tangled in her throat. "Akiri…" The name broke from her like a confession, fragile and small.
For a heartbeat, time dissolved. Elena was once more the child who had followed Akiri across the garden, who had carried dolls in her arms, who had hidden from scolding elders behind Akiri's skirts. But the illusion cracked. The woman before her was not the girl she remembered.
The weight of grief had sharpened her.
* * *
Memories struck unbidden.
A sunlit afternoon—two girls crouched in the dirt, drawing circles with sticks. Akiri laughing, her laughter like windchimes, as Elena tried and failed to mimic her kanji.
"You're holding it wrong," Akiri had teased, leaning closer to guide her hand. Elena's cheeks had burned red even then, though she did not understand why.
Another night—full moon spilling silver across the courtyard. The two of them wrapped in thin summer yukata, sneaking rice cakes from the kitchen, whispering promises that they would always stay together.
Always stay together…
The memory burned now like salt in a wound.
* * *
They closed the distance slowly, as though each step might shatter the fragile thread connecting past and present. Elena's chest ached with the desire to throw her arms around Akiri, to cry, to demand why the world had been so cruel. But she stopped herself.
There was an aura about Akiri—an invisible wall, sharp and forbidding. To break it would be to disrespect what she had become.
Instead, Elena bowed low, her ornaments clinking faintly in her hair. "I came as you asked."
Akiri's gaze lingered on her, unreadable. Then she nodded. "I knew you would."
Her voice carried no doubt, no hesitation. As though Elena's presence here had always been inevitable.
* * *
The two sat within the main hall. Tatami mats creaked under their weight, the faint scent of old straw rising with each movement. A tray of tea rested between them, steam curling upward, catching the light in pale tendrils.
Neither spoke for long moments. The silence between them was thick, heavy with years unsaid.
At last, Akiri broke it.
"You know why I called you."
Elena lifted the cup to her lips, though her hands trembled so much the tea nearly spilled. Her voice came out tight. "I can guess. But I want to hear it from you."
Akiri's eyes gleamed in the dim light. "I need someone who can stand at his side. Someone who can weave silk into chains. Someone who can let Salvatore Lucente believe he commands, while in truth he is being led."
The words dropped like stones into a pool, sending ripples through Elena's heart. She lowered the cup, porcelain clinking faintly.
"You want me to seduce him."
The bluntness of the word cracked the silence.
Akiri did not look away. "Yes."
* * *
Her breath caught. Her heart hammered so hard it hurt. Her skin prickled with cold despite the heat of tea in her palms.
"Akiri… he is the man who slaughtered your family. The man who ordered flames upon these walls. You would send me into his arms?"
Her voice quivered. She despised the weakness in it.
Akiri leaned forward, her shadow stretching long across the tatami. "Not into his arms. Into his mind. Into his secrets. You will not be his lover—you will be my weapon."
Her words were cold, but beneath them, Elena glimpsed the ache. The grief. The girl she had once loved like a sister, forced to dress her vengeance in cruelty.
Elena's throat closed. Her chest burned with unshed tears.
"You were always the one who could charm," Akiri continued, her voice softening. "Even as a child, you could draw every gaze without trying. Now I need you to use that gift—for me. For our clan. For every life stolen."
Elena pressed trembling fingers against her lap, nails digging into skin. She wanted to refuse, to scream that she could not. But when she met Akiri's eyes, she saw it—the unyielding fire. The vow that nothing else mattered.
And so, she bowed her head. "If this is the path you ask of me… then I will walk it."
Her voice trembled, but her resolve held.
Inside, though, her thoughts screamed.
Will you still see me as your friend when I give myself to him? Or will you look at me and see betrayal?
The steam curled upward, vanishing into the air. Like innocence dissolving, unseen.
* * *
That night, Elena lay in the guest room, staring into darkness. The ceiling beams stretched like ribs overhead. Cicadas shrilled faintly beyond the paper walls.
Sleep would not come.
Her heart twisted, caught between two faces: Salvatore Lucente, the ruthless Alpha she had been ordered to ensnare, and Akiri Tsukiyo, the girl who had once been her entire world.
Her chest ached at the thought of Salvatore's touch, of his gaze heavy upon her, of his hands claiming what was not his. The bile rose in her throat.
But worse was the thought of Akiri watching. Akiri commanding it.
She clutched her chest, nails biting her skin. A broken whisper slipped into the darkness.
"Forgive me, Akiri… If my body must be the currency of vengeance, I will pay it. But promise me you won't lose yourself to the fire you're chasing."
The silence did not answer. Only the cicadas screamed.
And with that, the first crack appeared in Elena's heart.
A wound that would bleed long before the plan was complete.