Chapter 78

Alessandro

The dream began the way it always did—dark corridors, the echo of wet boots slapping against stone floors, and that stifling scent of smoke and blood soaked into the walls. I was twelve again, barefoot and trembling, while the fire was everywhere. I could smell it before I could see it. Thick, choking smoke curling through the corridors like a living thing, clawing at the walls, devouring portraits, furniture, memory, and everything else I could think of.

I was hiding behind the carved mahogany columns of the great dining hall, the place that used to smell of wine and garlic and my mother’s perfume. But now, it reeked of burnt wood and betrayal.

The Silvestri mansion, the old one, burned bright like a funeral pyre. My lungs begged for air but the smoke kept taking. My feet moved on instinct, dodging debris, slipping on ash-slick marble, the sound of screaming far behind me. Not strangers, not enemies.

My mother’s voice, my sister’s cry. The