Shadows in Velvet - Part 5

The night of the final masquerade came dressed in crimson silk and dying stars.

Verashtel glittered under moonlight, its towers painted in the colors of influence, peacock greens, mourning purples, blood-velvet reds. Gondolas drifted over the black-glass canals, their oarsmen silent, their passengers masked and magnificent. From balconies, laughter spilled like perfume, thick with tension, too bright to be sincere.

The Grand Seraphine Gala, the end of the season. The place where secrets came to dance.

Vaelin adjusted his collar, discomforted by the high court cut of his coat. Dark wine velvet, embroidered with shadows. A design Tovi swore would pass as noble fashion but felt like armor made of soft lies. His sword was hidden under a false scabbard, a blade of glass and whispersteel that could cut through wards and silk alike.

Elira walked beside him, transformed.

Her mask was obsidian trimmed with scarlet lace, shaped like a moth’s wings. Her gown whispered spells with each step, layered enchantments folded into its taffeta. A hundred hidden pockets carried traps, flares, and charms. Her presence turned heads, not because of beauty, though she had that in spades, but because she moved like something dangerous pretending to be tame.

And then came Tovi.

Resplendent in silver brocade, every button a tiny enchanted mirror, his hat plumed with a single raven feather. His mask was the only one smiling. Of course.

“I think I just saw a countess faint,” Elira muttered.

Tovi bowed. “Probably from joy.”

“She wasn’t looking at you.”

Tovi winked. “Let me dream.”

They entered the ballroom through mirrored arches flanked by masked guards. Inside, everything shimmered.

Dancers spun like illusion spells, laughter folded into harp strings. The chandeliers dripped crystal. The air buzzed with glamour and menace.

But beneath the masks, fear was rising.

The assassinations were supposed to happen tonight.

Three diplomats. Three kills. Each blamed on a rival house. War by proxy, masked as performance.

But they’d already taken out one of the assassin’s handlers. And with the Mask that Laughs neutralized, the real force behind the plot was cornered.

Tovi’s gaze slid through the crowd like a blade through velvet.

“Targets are here,” he murmured. “Ambassador Veyra, Lord Alton, and Dame Jisren. All in range. But none of them are the true prize.”

Elira’s magic whispered. “Something’s off. There’s a fog over the room. Magical, but layered. Like someone’s cloaking a presence.”

Vaelin’s jaw tightened. “The assassin.”

Then a voice rang out. Laughter. Familiar.

Stonehand.

Somehow, impossibly, he stood at the dais.

Alive. Unmasked. Grinning.

“I must thank you all for your attendance,” he said. “Tonight’s entertainment promises a surprise ending.”

Tovi swore under his breath. “He’s not the assassin.”

Elira hissed, “Then who?”

And that’s when she saw it.

A ripple of shimmer behind the glass chandeliers.

A figure moving without walking. Masked. Velvet-cloaked.

Hovering.

Tovi saw it next. “That’s not a person,” he said. “That’s a remnant.”

“No,” Elira said. “It’s what wore the Mask. The real assassin. The mask wasn’t a relic, it was a tether.”

The assassin landed silently atop the balcony rail, arms spread like a crucifixion, mask expressionless. It drew twin daggers that bled shadow.

Screams began.

Panic surged.

And in the chaos, Vaelin moved.

He dashed up the marble stairs, dodging nobles and guards. Elira went right, her voice rising in a chant that stripped illusion from the assassin’s form, revealing it not as a man, but as an echo fused with mortal flesh. A puppet turned puppeteer.

Tovi leapt onto a banquet table, kicked off a silver platter, and soared into the air like a mad circus god.

“Hello, darling nightmare!” he shouted, knives flashing. “Remember me?”

He hit the assassin midair.

They crashed into a hanging tapestry, tangled.

Vaelin reached them in seconds. His blade sang. The assassin parried, and the clash cracked the wall behind them.

Elira joined, her magic binding the creature’s feet.

It hissed, mask cracking.

Then it spoke.

“I watched your ancestors dance in flame,” it said to Elira. “I remember the blade you carry,” to Vaelin. “And you,” it sneered at Tovi, “I remember you running.”

Tovi’s grin didn’t falter. “And yet here I am. Not running.”

He stabbed the echo straight through the mask.

White fire erupted.

The creature howled, and the mask shattered.

It didn’t explode. It dissolved.

Every wisp of it pulled inward, consumed by the very echo it tried to anchor. A reverse tether.

It was over.

No applause followed.

Only silence, broken by distant bells and sobbing lords who realized they’d almost been caught in a massacre dressed in velvet.

Outside, dawn bled into the canal water.

Tovi sat on the balcony rail, nursing a bruised shoulder. “That went better than expected.”

“You nearly died,” Vaelin said.

“Twice,” Elira added.

“True,” Tovi sighed. “But did you see me flip?”

They said nothing.

He grinned. “You two are very hard to impress.”

Vaelin glanced at Elira, then back at Tovi. “We are impressed. We’re just very tired.”

“Also,” Elira said, sitting beside him, “you lied. You said the mask was just a relic.”

Tovi shrugged. “If I’d told the truth, you might have tried to stop me.”

“From what?” Vaelin asked.

Tovi looked out at the sun. “From finishing what I started five years ago. That echo, he killed someone I loved. I ran. I told myself I’d laugh about it. But the truth is… I just didn’t know how to face it.”

Elira didn’t speak. She simply put a hand over his.

Tovi blinked at it. “Gods, now you’re being nice?”

Vaelin smirked. “You earned it.”

They sat in silence a while longer.

Eventually, Tovi stood. “So. Shall we go stir up a new scandal?”

Elira rolled her eyes. “After breakfast.”

“Deal. I know a place. Best honeyed figs in the city. Poison-free, ninety percent of the time.”

As they walked away from the ruined gala, the masks left behind faded in the wind.

But three figures remained. Not as ghosts. Not as nobles.

Just as themselves.

Unmasked.

Together.

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All Parts of the Series

Shadows In Velvet Part 1

Shadows In Velvet Part 2

Shadows In Velvet Part 3

Shadows In Velvet Part 4

Shadows In Velvet Part 5