Chapter 1: Whispers in the Servants' Wing

“Keep your head down, girl,” hissed Mrs. Crowthorne, her breath sharp with mint and disdain. “Polish like you mean it. If Lord Hemsley sees a single speck—”

“He’ll dock our wages,” Erin murmured, cloth in hand, arm already aching from scrubbing the fourth chandelier that morning.

“No. He’ll dock our fingers,” the older maid snapped, but her eyes flicked toward the hallway. “And speak less. You never know who’s listening.”

Erin lowered her head. “Understood.”

She wasn’t here to speak.

She was here to observe.

From the corner of her eye, she noted the timing: 10:12 a.m. The boots of the east patrol echoed in predictable cadence—four guards, eight seconds apart. Perfect.

In the quiet between footfalls, Erin shifted toward the carved base of the candelabra and gently unscrewed the compartment underneath. Inside, a sealed vial. Pale green. Base agent 7F-13. She slid it into her apron pocket.

“Stop dawdling, Reena!” Crowthorne barked again.

Erin flinched, nodded once, and got back to work.

“Rumor says the Northern War God’s returning,” one of the scullery girls whispered as they lined up for noon rations. “General Ashton Drake himself.”

“Isn’t he still in a coma?” said another. “Shrapnel in the spine, they said.”

“No, no. I heard he woke. Some say it was a miracle. Or a woman’s voice.”

“A fiancée’s love can bring a man back,” swooned a third, barely older than sixteen.

Erin stayed silent, eyes on the broth slopping into her bowl.

Ashton Drake. The name hadn’t passed her ears in months. His file was locked behind seven firewalls, marked high-level clearance at the Institute. But she remembered the last time she’d seen his image—projected in a war-room briefing, cloaked in blood and frost, eyes as cold as the campaign he commanded.

And now… he might be coming here?

Back in the servants’ corridor, Erin pressed her hand to the wall beside the linen closet. A faint click. She slipped inside the narrow passage between panels—one of the few hidden service tunnels remaining in Southport Manor. Inside, she unwrapped the green vial and examined it under the flickering lantern.

Three more and she could begin testing again.

“Reena?” A soft voice. Carlos, the youngest footman.

Erin tensed. “What?”

“You missed roll call.”

“Tell them I was helping Mrs. Crowthorne.” She kept her tone flat.

Carlos shifted awkwardly in the shadows. “It’s just... you’re always disappearing. Some of the girls think you’re a ghost.”

“Then they should be careful not to speak ill of ghosts.”

A beat of silence. Then Carlos laughed nervously. “You’re strange, Reena.”

“I know.”

He lingered. “Do you believe in miracles?”

She blinked. “No.”

“But General Drake woke up. They said he shouldn’t have. That his fiancée sang, and he moved.”

“Then it wasn’t a miracle. It was a trigger.”

Carlos frowned. “You always talk like a doctor.”

Erin froze.

“I—I mean, like a smart person. That’s what I meant.”

She turned slowly. “Go back to the kitchens, Carlos.”

“Right.”

When he’d gone, she let out a long, controlled breath.

Too close.

Later that night, after hours, Erin stood by the greenhouse, now locked behind steel and outdated biometric pads. She waited until the camera blinked off—just ten seconds, as scheduled—and slid a duplicate fingerpad over the sensor.

Click.

She stepped inside. The scent of chlorophyll and faint antiseptic filled the air. She moved past the orchids and nightshade, stopping only when she reached the restricted shelf.

Mimosa cytol, gene suppressants, rapid clotting agents. All stolen from classified labs before the fire. Before they’d tried to erase her.

She had three minutes.

Her hands moved quickly, selecting and sealing vials, careful not to smudge the labels.

Then—

A noise.

Erin froze.

A shadow flickered past the outer glass.

She ducked, clutching the vials to her chest, every muscle poised to run.

Bootsteps.

Too heavy for a servant. Too slow for patrol.

She crouched, pressed against the wall.

The door handle turned—half an inch, no more. A pause.

Then retreat.

Whoever it was hadn’t come for the plants.

Still, her fingers trembled as she returned everything to her apron, wiped the floor of footprints, and reset the security sensor.

By the time she was back in her narrow quarters beneath the east wing, sweat clung to her spine.

She stared at her reflection in the cracked mirror: pale skin, brown hair tucked under a maid’s cap, freckles dusted across a face no one would look at twice.

Not the girl who once stood before parliament. Not the scientist who exposed Project Haven’s atrocities. Not the traitor the Institute had tried to burn alive.

She wasn’t Erin Vale anymore.

She was Reena.

And she would stay that way—until the last vial was complete, until the antidote was real, until justice tasted sweeter than revenge.

A knock.

Her door creaked open. Mrs. Crowthorne peeked in. “You’re needed upstairs. The steward wants every available hand on standby. A new guest arrives at dawn.”

“Guest?”

The woman’s lips curled. “Military. High clearance. We’re to make no mistakes.”

Erin’s pulse stilled.

She nodded once. “Understood.”

As the door shut, she whispered to the dark:

“So the War God walks after all.”