The rain had not been forecast. It arrived without warning—violent, cold, relentless—falling in sheets that slapped the palace walls and drowned the torches guarding the perimeter. It was the kind of storm that erased footsteps, blurred silhouettes, and swallowed the shouts of the living. A storm that favored fugitives. A storm that punished hesitation.
Rosalie did not hesitate.
She emerged from the shadowed corridor with the infant pressed tightly against her chest, her cloak soaked through, her breath trembling but controlled. The palace behind her—her prison, her gilded cage, her grave-not-yet-dug—remained deceptively calm. But she knew the silence was deceptive; Richard's rage always traveled faster than sound.
She tightened her hold on the baby. Aurore whimpered softly, sensing her mother's tension, but Rosalie kept moving through the garden, her boots sliding in the mud. She had rehearsed this escape in her mind a thousand times, but the reality was always harsher, more lethal, more suffocating than imagination allowed.
She was not afraid for herself.
That part of her had died long ago.
She feared only one thing:
that she might fail the child in her arms.
The scent of wet earth mixed with the metallic smell of her own blood—she had torn her shoulder open squeezing through a service grate—but she ignored the pain. Beastmen healed quickly, but not instantly, and she needed her arms steady tonight.
A thunderclap roared above her. For a moment, the storm illuminated the royal garden—towering hedges trimmed with military precision, black marble statues of long-dead kings, and at the center, the colossal stone effigy of the current monarch: Richard the Sovereign of Beasts.
Her former husband.
Her tormentor.
A predator who believed love was ownership and obedience was devotion.
Lightning carved his statue in white fire, distorting the carved regal snarl into a grotesque reflection of the man himself. Rosalie tore her gaze away, tightening her grip on Aurore.
"Just a little further," she whispered.
Not to reassure the infant.
To force her own voice to stay steady.
She reached the side gate—the gate no one used, the gate that rusted from neglect, the gate whose lock she had learned to pick during nights when sleep was too dangerous to attempt. She knelt, slid the small pick from her boot, and inserted it into the ancient lock.
The metal resisted.
She breathed slowly. The storm intensified, drumming on her back, the wind clawing at her hair.
"Come on," she murmured. "Not tonight. Please."
Aurore stirred. The lock groaned. Rosalie twisted the pick with trained precision.
A click.
The gate shuddered open.
She pulled it just wide enough to slip through, clutching Aurore against her chest. Her wet hair clung to her cheeks as she slid into the darkness beyond the palace grounds.
And then she heard it.
A roar—not of weather, nor of thunder—but of fury.
Richard had discovered the empty cradle.
Rosalie began to run.
---
Beyond the palace walls, the storm swallowed the city. Streetlamps flickered under the violent downpour, their halos trembling like dying stars. Somewhere in the labyrinth of alleys, a horn sounded—the alarm traveling outward, carried by Beastmen guards whose enhanced senses cut through the night like blades.
She sprinted down a slope toward the old industrial sector. Her breath came fast, but her stride remained long and purposeful. Her beast form—a deer lineage—was built for agility rather than direct confrontation. She could not face Richard's forces head-on. But she could outrun them.
At least, she hoped she could.
She crossed an abandoned bridge where rusted rails caught the rain like mirrors. Aurore whimpered again, a small, frail sound swallowed by the storm. Rosalie kissed her daughter's forehead.
"You live," she whispered. "Even if I burn for it."
The river below surged with violent current, pieces of debris slamming against the bridge pillars. She had planned to cross it at dawn, disguised among workers, but Richard's men would be heading straight for that place now. Plans meant nothing when the king himself was hunting.
Her boots hit the far side of the bridge just as a howl echoed somewhere behind her—low, guttural, unmistakable. Wolf-blooded. Loyal to the crown.
They had found her trail.
Rosalie darted into a narrow street, leaping over fallen crates. She slid behind a cluster of dumpsters, her breath forming pale clouds. She waited.
One. Two. Three seconds.
Footsteps approached—heavy, sure, trained. She pressed her back against the wall, shielding Aurore with her body. A shadow passed the mouth of the alley, massive and bestial.
The guard paused.
Rosalie held her breath.
Aurore shifted, but by some miracle, she remained silent.
The guard sniffed the air, growled softly… then continued on his chase down the wider path.
Rosalie exhaled, shaking.
She could not survive another close call like that.
A bolt of lightning streaked across the sky, illuminating the rooftops, the deserted marketplace, the industrial smokestacks beyond. The world felt enormous, violent, indifferent.
She stepped back onto the street and ran again.
---
She reached the old textile factory on the outskirts—the place she had chosen for the first step of her exile. A safehouse. A place where beast-scent was masked by decades of chemical residue. She pushed through the broken door, her clothes dripping, her hands numb.
Inside, darkness stretched across the vast abandoned floor. Rusty machines stood like carcasses. Torn curtains fluttered. The wind rattled the broken windows.
She was alone.
For the first time since leaving the palace, she allowed her knees to buckle. She sank to the ground, cradling Aurore.
"We made it," she whispered, though her voice cracked.
Aurore blinked at her with eyes too bright, too aware, too dangerously reminiscent of Richard's gaze when he wasn't wearing his crown of cruelty.
Rosalie swallowed hard.
"You will not become him," she vowed. "Even if I must tear down the kingdom to ensure it."
Thunder shook the building, dust drifting from the ceiling.
She forced herself to stand. She could rest for a few minutes—no more. Then she had to reach the transportation line before dawn. If she stayed, she would die. Aurore would die.
She crossed the factory floor and reached the break room, where she had hidden a small satchel days earlier. She retrieved it—a small amount of money, forged documents, a vial of scent-mask, and a single photograph.
Her wedding picture.
She should have burned it long ago. But she kept it for one reason: to never forget what he looked like when he lied.
The younger Rosalie in the picture had been smiling. The Richard beside her had worn the face of a devoted husband. A mask. A performance crafted for a court hungry for spectacle.
She tore the photograph in half.
She kept the half with her own face.
The other half—Richard's half—she dropped to the floor and crushed with her boot.
Aurore shifted in her arms, a small sound of discomfort. Rosalie rocked her gently.
"You'll never know him," she murmured. "Not as I did. Not as the kingdom sees him. And never—never as the monster beneath the crown."
She turned toward the exit.
But before she could take a single step, the factory door exploded inward.
Rosalie spun, instinct surging through her veins.
A silhouette entered—a tall figure, soaked from the storm, moving with predatory confidence. Not a guard. Too silent. Too controlled.
Then he spoke, his voice low and calm despite the chaos outside.
"You run well," he said. "But not well enough."
Rosalie's blood turned to ice.
Richard had sent his finest.
Simon.
The king's shadow.
The court's nightmare.
The assassin who never failed.
He stepped forward, his presence cold and precise, the rain dripping from his dark hair. His expression was unreadable. His eyes—sharp, wolfish—tracked her every movement.
Rosalie retreated instinctively, clutching Aurore tighter.
Simon stopped several meters away, his posture relaxed, almost casual, but there was death in the air between them.
"I am not here for the child," he said. "Not yet."
Rosalie's heart pounded.
He continued, "The king wants you returned to the palace, alive or dead. He did not specify which outcome he preferred."
Aurore whimpered. Rosalie stepped backward until her spine pressed against a rusted machine.
She knew Simon by reputation only. She had never seen him this close. She never wanted to. Beastmen whispered that he had no scent of his own—that he masked it so perfectly he moved like a void in the senses. A man without allegiance beyond orders. A sword without conscience.
Rosalie met his gaze. "You will not take her."
"I already told you," Simon replied. "She is not my target."
He paused.
"But you are."
Lightning flashed, illuminating the factory. His shadow expanded like a beast ready to strike.
Rosalie inhaled sharply. The scent-mask in her satchel. It could mislead him—if she could uncork it in time. But he was too close. Too fast. Too trained.
Behind him, the wind howled violently, rattling the broken door. The storm seemed to lean into the building, listening.
Rosalie took a deliberate step sideways. "Simon, listen to me. Richard is not the man you believe—"
"I do not believe anything," Simon interrupted. "I obey."
Rosalie's stomach twisted.
He moved forward.
Slow. Methodical.
His boots echoed on the concrete.
Rosalie's pulse hammered against her skin.
Not like this. Not now.
Aurore needed her. Aurore—
A crash thundered from the roof—a section collapsing under the storm's weight. Debris fell between them, dust exploding upward. Simon shielded his eyes for a fraction of a second.
It was all Rosalie needed.
She bolted toward the emergency staircase, leaping over fallen beams, her heart a violent drum in her chest. Aurore cried out at the sudden jolt, but Rosalie held her close and climbed the stairs two at a time.
Below, Simon's voice cut through the chaos.
"You cannot outrun a death already promised."
Rosalie reached the top landing, shoved open the rusted door, and stumbled onto the roof—wind slicing across her face, rain hitting her like needles.
The city sprawled below. Lights flickered, sirens wailed far in the distance. The storm raged without mercy.
Simon emerged from the stairwell behind her.
No more walls.
No more hiding.
Rosalie pressed her back against the far ledge, Aurore wrapped tightly against her chest.
Simon stopped several meters away, rain cascading down his coat.
"Give yourself up," he said calmly. "Make this simple."
Rosalie's voice broke into the wind. "There is nothing simple about murder."
Simon's jaw tightened. "It is not murder. It is order."
"Then disobey."
He shook his head once. "I do not disobey."
Lightning cracked between them. Rosalie felt the edge of the roof crumble slightly under her heel. Her entire body trembled—not from fear, but from brutal awareness.
If she fell, Aurore fell with her.
She lifted her chin. "You cannot have her. Whether I live or die tonight, you cannot have her."
Simon stepped forward.
Rosalie closed her eyes for a split second.
And then—
A blinding flash.
A roar of wind.
A violent shift of air.
A metal beam, loosened by the storm, snapped from one of the roof structures and crashed down between them, sending shards everywhere. The roof shook violently.
Rosalie didn't wait. She sprinted toward the rooftop access ladder on the opposite side. She descended so fast she nearly slipped, her fingers burning as they clung to the cold metal.
Below, she hit the ground running.
Behind her, Simon shouted her name—Rosalie, not "target."
His voice echoed with something disturbingly close to frustration.
But she did not look back.
Rosalie vanished into the storm once more.
With Aurore alive in her arms.
And the knowledge that Richard's deadliest hunter had seen her face.