Chapter Nine
The cold bit at Aria's neck as she stepped onto the private airstrip outside Palermo. The hangar lights buzzed faintly, casting a dull halo over the sleek jet waiting on the tarmac. Nico was already inside, stowing the last of the weapons and forged documents into a false-bottomed suitcase.
She hesitated on the steps for a moment, one hand tight around the silver pendant.
Not a keepsake anymore.
Not a memory.
A weapon. A compass. A legacy.
Her mother hadn't died by accident. Elena had hinted at it. And now, this pendant—this key—was leading her to the truth Cesare had buried beneath empires and blood.
"You're thinking too loud," Nico said from the cabin, voice dry. "If you don't get on board, I'll take this jet without you."
She smirked and stepped inside.
The cabin was sleek and modern, outfitted with encrypted comms, hidden compartments, and two sleeping berths lined with Kevlar. She dropped into one of the leather chairs and buckled herself in. Nico sat across from her, an amused look in his sharp green eyes.
"You ready for Vienna?" he asked.
"No," she answered truthfully. "But I'm going anyway."
Meanwhile – Moretti Estate, Sicily
Cesare Moretti's breath fogged the inside of the glass as he stared out the panoramic window of his private conservatory. Rain tapped steadily against the panes, a soft rhythm that disguised the venom in his silence.
Enzo stood behind him, arms crossed, still in his black ops gear.
"You're certain they've left Italy?" Cesare asked quietly.
"Flight plan filed under a fake consortium out of Warsaw. They'll land outside Vienna in five hours."
"And Damiano?"
"Playing the obedient son. But he's been intercepting internal orders—rerouting our own men. I think he suspects you know."
Cesare's lip curled. "He always knew. He's just waiting to make his move."
He turned, and the light caught the ring on his finger—a black onyx set in gold, the family crest of the Moretti line. That ring had sealed a thousand contracts, sentenced a hundred men to death, and marked the beginning of every war he'd ever won.
"She was never supposed to get that pendant," he said, his voice low.
"But she did," Enzo said. "And now she's following it."
"Then it's time we stop following her," Cesare replied. "And start hunting her."
Arrival – Vienna, Austria
The snow was powder-fine as the private jet landed just outside the city limits. The estate they were headed to sat outside Vienna's central district, tucked into the snowy cliffs along the Danube, shrouded in secrecy and bought with old blood.
As they drove through the night, Aria glanced at the data Alric had sent before takeoff—schematics of the compound, satellite imaging, and a file marked "Suspected Guardian: Raphael Valenti."
Nico frowned. "Valenti. That name's familiar."
Aria scrolled further, then paused. A black-and-white photo showed a man in his early forties, tall, aristocratic, with shoulder-length silver-blond hair and bone-pale eyes.
Raphael Valenti. The broker of kings. The man who brokered off-the-books deals for mafia families, warlords, and European royals. If he was guarding the vault, they weren't just walking into danger—they were walking into an empire's nerve center.
They arrived at the Valenti Manor at dawn.
And the gate was already open.
Inside the Valenti Estate
Raphael Valenti was a presence more than a man—elegant, precise, and unnervingly still. He wore a black velvet coat over a silk shirt and moved with the calm menace of someone who'd long since stopped fearing death. His voice was crisp, British-accented, but laced with something far colder.
"You must be Aria Moretti," he said as if he'd been waiting for her his entire life.
Aria squared her shoulders. "And you must be the man who's kept my family's secrets buried."
He chuckled softly. "Child, I am the man your father trusted to keep his empire alive after he's long gone. And I'm also the only one who can open that vault."
She held up the pendant.
Raphael's eyes glittered. "Well, well. I suppose we're all dying to see what truths it unlocks."
Behind him, a woman entered the chamber—statuesque, with auburn hair, eyes the color of molten gold, and a cigarette perched between her fingers.
"Raphael, you're not introducing me?"
Aria's gaze narrowed.
Raphael sighed. "This is Dr. Selina Kaine. Economist, cryptographer, and—unfortunately—my niece. She's been protecting the vault's AI systems."
Selina smiled coolly. "And cleaning up the blood your family leaves behind."
Aria stiffened, but Nico stepped beside her. "Easy," he murmured. "She's trying to get under your skin."
Selina winked at him. "Oh, I could do so much worse."
Aria stepped forward. "I didn't come here to flirt. I came here to reclaim what was stolen."
Raphael opened the steel door at the end of the hall. "Then, by all means, Aria. Step into the past."
The Vault
The door was sealed shut behind them with a hydraulic hiss. Lights flickered on overhead, revealing rows of servers, biometric scanners, and old-style safes with reinforced titanium locks.
Aria stood in the center and inserted the pendant into the main terminal.
The screen lit up.
"MOR-LEGACY. VERIFIED."
"PRIMARY ACCESS GRANTED: Aria Moretti."
"Second Confirmation Required."
She frowned. "What second confirmation?"
Raphael's face paled. "It requires a familial match—either your father's biometrics… or your mother's."
"But my mother is dead."
Silence.
Selina looked away.
Aria turned to Raphael. "Isn't she?"
Raphael's lips parted, but the words didn't come.
A loud beep echoed in the chamber. Then the vault systems shut down.
Onscreen: "Second Match Detected."
Aria's heart slammed into her ribs. "What the hell does that mean?"
And then the lights flickered.
Above them, in the glass dome ceiling, a drone hovered. And from its speaker, a voice echoed.
Deep. Smooth. Controlled.
Damiano.
"You didn't think you were the only one with access to the truth, did you?"
The voice crackling from the drone sent a ripple of dread through the vault.
Damiano's voice. Smooth, restrained, but unmistakably amused.
"You didn't think you were the only one playing this game, did you?"
Aria's fingers curled tightly around the pendant still slotted into the vault terminal. Her knuckles whitened, her heart pounding, breath caught somewhere between defiance and disbelief.
"You tracked us," she whispered, more to herself than anyone else. "How?"
Nico moved closer, eyes scanning the ceiling as if expecting more drones to descend. "No. This isn't live surveillance. That message is preloaded. Triggered by her inserting the pendant."
Raphael's expression turned grim. "He knew you'd come. He knew you'd unlock it first."
The drone whirred slightly and began to descend. As it reached eye level, the screen on its front flickered to life. A pre-recorded video fed through—Damiano, seated in a black chair, a single beam of light highlighting one side of his face. Behind him: a Moretti crest scorched into stone.
"Aria.
You've always been the one wild card no one could play. Even Cesare couldn't control you—so he caged you. I knew you'd run when the chains cracked. I knew you'd follow the truth."
Her throat tightened. She didn't know whether to scream or cry.
"This vault doesn't hold what you think it does." His tone turned darker. "It's not a map. It's not salvation. It's a reckoning. Inside, you'll find the true terms of your family's blood bargain—the one sealed before you were even born. The deal that created the Moretti dynasty. And the cost?"
Damiano leaned forward.
"You."
The video ended. The drone-powered down and hit the floor with a soft thunk.
Silence gripped the room.
Selina muttered, "Well, that was dramatic."
Aria spun toward Raphael. "What did he mean? What deal?"
Raphael looked genuinely uneasy. "It's not just financial records in this vault. There's a sub-compartment. I designed it for your father myself—an archive sealed with biometric locks and neural encryption. It only opens to a genetic match."
"You mean a descendant?"
"More than that. It must be a direct link—blood that carries the original coding signature from the pact."
"The pact with who?" Aria's voice rose.
And that's when the third door in the chamber slid open.
It wasn't supposed to exist—Raphael's startled reaction made that clear. Behind it, a soft blue glow spilled into the room like mist. Slowly, Aria walked toward it.
Inside, on a single pedestal, sat a black leather-bound book and a vial of crimson liquid encased in glass.
A name was burned into the book's cover in gold:
"The Vow of the Nine."
Nico stepped forward slowly. "What the hell is the Nine?"
Raphael's jaw clenched. "The nine founding families. The original blood oath that created the foundation of the European underworld. Not just Morettis. Valentis. Descartes. Donovans. Kaine. Volkov. Orsini. Grimaldi. And—"
He stopped.
Aria stared at him. "And?"
"—and the Montalbanes," he finished, reluctantly. "Your mother's line."
Aria blinked. "My mother wasn't Moretti."
"No. She was the key to everything."
Raphael gestured to the pedestal. "The vial is what binds the vow. Blood mixed from all nine lines. The book documents the terms. The rituals. The enforcement."
Selina added, almost softly, "And the punishments."
Suddenly, it clicked.
"Cesare didn't marry her for love," Aria said hollowly. "He married her to secure power."
Raphael nodded. "And when she wanted to break free, the contract required her death. That's why she ran. Why she hid the pendant? She wanted you to finish what she couldn't."
The air turned thick with realization.
And then the screen above the vault flashed again.
This time it was live.
Damiano.
Not smiling now.
His eyes were cold. The kind of cold that made kingdoms fall and traitors beg.
"Aria. You have one choice. Open the full archive and swear the vow—or destroy it and make yourself a target of every founding family left standing."
She stared at him, breath shaking. "You're forcing me to choose between becoming one of them… or being hunted by all of them."
He nodded once. "Welcome to the truth."
Elsewhere – Sicily
Cesare stood in the ruins of Elena's burned office, watching as Enzo pulled a charred hard drive from beneath a floor panel.
"She knew the vow was still active," Enzo said.
"She thought the truth would save her." Cesare's voice was pure steel. "She never realized the vow was irreversible."
He looked out into the courtyard where smoke still clung to the air.
"Aria is about to learn that, too."
Vault – Final Sequence
Selina, uncharacteristically quiet, moved to the side. "You could walk away," she said. "Burn the book. Shatter the vial. Let it all die with them."
Aria looked down at her hands. They were trembling. Not from fear—but the overwhelming weight of legacy. Of betrayal. Of power, she never asked for.
But walking away meant she'd never stop running.
She thought of her mother—Elena's laughter echoing in childhood memories, the warmth of her hands, the quiet, burning sorrow behind her eyes. Aria had once believed her mother was too weak to run. Now she understood. She hadn't run from Cesare.
She had run from the vow.
"Do it," Nico said, his voice low and steady. "Whatever your decision is, I'm with you."
She looked at him. Really looked. Nico—gruff, loyal, broken in the same places she was—stood unflinchingly beside her. No demands. No expectations. Just allegiance.
Slowly, she reached for the book.
Her fingers brushed the cover. Gold lettering glowed faintly at her touch. The pedestal shuddered.
A hidden compartment below opened with a mechanical hiss, revealing a sleek black tablet already activated and running a decryption sequence. A biometric scan blinked at her.
"Initiate Bloodline Protocol," it read.
She hesitated.
"I don't want to become them," she said aloud.
"You won't," Nico answered. "You'll end them."
Her jaw tightened. A single drop of the blood from the vial was enough to activate the ritual. The code required her DNA. Her decision. Her vow.
Aria pricked her finger on a hidden needle embedded in the pedestal and let a drop of her own blood fall onto the sensor.
The screen pulsed.
"Vow recognized."
"Successor: Aria Montalbane Moretti."
"Terms unlocked."
The tablet displayed pages of ancient agreements, dark oaths sworn in blood, and punishments inscribed in arcane clauses that predated any modern legal system. One clause stood out in bright red:
"Should the ninth line awaken the Vow, all previous heads of the house shall be nullified."
Nico blinked. "Wait—does that mean…"
"Cesare's power dies the moment mine awakens," Aria whispered.
And then a second notification appeared.
"Opposing Executor Detected."
"Override Initiated by: Damiano Moretti."
Aria barely had time to curse before the lights in the vault shifted to red. Sirens started to echo. A countdown appeared on the screen:
"Vault collapse in 5:00 minutes."
Selina's eyes widened. "He planted a fail-safe. He knew you'd come."
"He wanted to see if I'd survive it," Aria growled.
The book, the vial, the system—they all began retracting into the pedestal.
Nico grabbed her arm. "We have to go. Now!"
Aria hesitated for one second more—and then she ripped the book from the pedestal before it could vanish.
The entire vault groaned as systems shut down. Steel slammed overhead, cutting off access routes.
Raphael led them to a hidden ladder behind a wall panel. "Emergency exit. Comes out in the subway ruins. Go!"
They ran. Concrete corridors echoed with the sound of collapsing stone and hissing gas. Somewhere above them, the drone chamber burst into flame.
Aria didn't look back.
She carried the book in one arm, Nico gripping her other hand, Selina just behind. Raphael stayed in the rear, sealing doors as they moved.
As they reached the surface—bursting out into a storm-soaked alley behind the opera house—Aria collapsed to her knees.
Rain washed the blood from her hand. Steam rose from the vents behind her.
She had made her choice.
And in doing so, she had just declared war on every living heir of the Vow.
Final Scene – Unknown Location
In a darkened wine cellar beneath an ancient estate, a tall man received a call.
He wore a tailored suit, his hair silvered at the temples, and his eyes—glacial and sharp—betrayed no emotion.
"It's done," came the voice over the line. "She's triggered the succession."
The man smiled faintly.
"Then activate the others. The Council must be summoned."
He raised a glass of red wine and clinked it softly against an obsidian chalice embossed with nine symbols.
"The ninth line has risen."