A Tithe Of Blood

The day before the masquerade broke like a sun-warmed blade gold at the edge, cold at the core. The estate had transformed overnight into a palace of whispered opulence. What once was stone and shadow now shimmered with movement and light.

House Calvorn ancient, brutal, proud had become a thing of beauty.

Banners of midnight blue and bloodred velvet hung from every arch. Ribbons trailed like ivy from balcony railings, catching the wind in slow, elegant waves. The scent of beeswax polish and ground cloves drifted through the corridors. Servants hurried past with armfuls of silks and trays of chilled glassware, their voices taut with purpose.

Elira moved through it all like a ghost with weight. She was no longer the village girl brought in under the shadow of the Blood Tax. At twenty-four, she had learned to carry her silence like a shield and her eyes like a blade.

This year for the first time she was allowed to attend the masquerade.

But not as a guest.

Not as herself.

She would serve.

And she would wear a mask.

She passed Marta in the south hall, the older woman directing two boys who struggled to carry a crystal candelabrum nearly as tall as themselves.

"Elira!" Marta called, snapping her fingers. "Tailor's waiting. You haven't been fitted yet, have you?"

Elira shook her head. "No, not yet."

"Well, hurry. I won't have that uptight bonebag screaming about hem lengths again."

Elira followed her down a corridor lined with fresh flowers—white narcissus, blue iris, and sharp sprigs of pine. Everything was beautiful, dazzling even. And yet she felt nothing.

Not since the market.

Not since Nicholas.

He looked happy. Clean. Free. Like the world hadn't broken him. Like he hadn't lost anything.

Elira hadn't been able to speak for the rest of the afternoon. Marta had noticed, but said nothing.

The image stayed with her like a thorn beneath the skin.

She had been gone from that world for seven years. She had been forgotten. No letters. No messages. Not even a whisper from her father.

Not even from Lilin.

Sometimes, she let herself imagine that Lilin had grown into a fierce young woman. Taller now. Smarter. Maybe even betrothed. Sometimes she imagined Lilin remembered her every day.

Other times, Elira feared she'd become nothing more than a whispered warning in her family's house. A name that brought silnece. A decision no one wanted to talk about.

Marta's voice pulled her from her thoughts.

"You'll freeze your bones up here," the older woman muttered as she entered, balancing a stack of folded chemises and stockings. "There's half a dozen dresses waiting in the west corridor, and I'll be damned if I let the tailor throw pins at my girls again."

Elira stood. "Sorry. I was just… thinking."

Marta gave her a look. Not unkind, but sharp. "You've been doing that a lot."

Elira smiled faintly. "Just three more years."

The older woman softened. She sat beside Elira on the ledge with a soft sigh. "It passes quicker than you think. Then you'll be one of us. Earning your own coin, living wherever you like. Maybe even renting a place in the lower ward. You could have a garden."

"A garden," Elira echoed, her voice flat.

Marta looked at her sidelong. "You don't have to stay in the estate once the contract ends. If the lord approves, you'll work on wages like the rest of us. And you'll get leave time, too. Three days each moon cycle, more in the winter. You'll be free to come and go."

Elira didn't reply for a long moment. She stared down at her hands.

"I used to think about going back," she said finally. "To see them. Lilin. My father. Even if just once. But now…"

"They haven't written?" Marta asked gently.

Elira shook her head. "Not once."

There was nothing Marta could say to that. She only stood, patted Elira's shoulder, and said, "Come. Let's fit you for your mask. It's going to be a long day."

Elira stood still as the tailor pinned the hem of her uniform. She barely noticed the needle prick her thigh.

It was black. The dress.

Satin-soft but sinister deep-necked, the bodice cut to lift and frame her breasts without modesty. The back trailed long, nearly brushing her calves, but the front ended mid-thigh, showing her gartered stockings in full view. Heels. Gloves. And a full black mask that covered everything but her mouth.

It was stunning.

And she hated it.

That night, her uniform hung at the end of her cot like a thing with a pulse.

She touched the mask once, fingers brushing the satin lining. It felt like a second skin.

When she slid beneath her blanket, she felt something crinkle under the edge of her pillow.

Another note.

The paper was thick. The handwriting is elegant and sharp.

"The mask reveals more than it hides. Look carefully, and you'll see them all for what they are."

—A

She stared at the words until the candle beside her hissed and died.

____________

The sun rose in a blaze of gold and frost, casting long fingers of light across the marble corridors of House Calvorn. Dawn spilled like molten metal through the high, arched windows, gilding the stone with a deceptive warmth.

Outside, the mist clung low to the earth, reluctant to leave the sleeping moors, while inside, the manor pulsed with restless energy.

Music had begun long before the nobles arrived.

First came the delicate murmur of flutes, threading through the air like ivy. Then the harps joined, plucking silken notes that dripped from balcony to floor like dew.

Tiny bells chimed from the fingers of enchanted servants as they swept through the halls, setting the tempo for the day. The great fountains had been drained and refilled with rosewater and red petals enchanted to catch the light like fragments of a dying star.

Even the chandeliers flickered in rhythm, as if the entire estate had taken one breath, waiting.

Every step echoed with intention. Every servant moved like a cog in a vast, glittering machine. And every face noble and lesser alike wore anticipation like perfume.

In a small, candlelit chamber far from the grand ballroom, Elira dressed in silence.

Her hands were steady, though her breath was not.

The corset cinched around her ribs with the precision of a snare, stealing the space where her lungs used to live. Her stockings clung tightly to her legs, whispering with every movement.

The shoes black satin with a blade-like heel clicked coldly against the stone floor, each step a quiet defiance.

The dress was deep crimson, the color of old blood and velvet wine. Its neckline framed her collarbones like a bruise. Its hem brushed the floor, though she felt bare beneath it.

And then the mask.

Simple. Elegant. Cruel.

Gold filigree framed her eyes, curling like vines, delicate enough to appear fragile though the metal cut against her cheek as she fastened it behind her head. When she dared to look into the warped mirror hanging beside the door, the reflection did not greet her with familiarity.

She did not see Elira

She saw the bloodmaid. The offering. The servant girl dressed in silk only to be forgotten. She saw hollowed eyes behind a veil of glamour. She saw obedience, duty, and silence.

She saw someone else's creation.

And tonight, she would step into the masquerade not as herself but as a ghost drifting through silk and shadow, watching never seen.

She inhaled.

Three years and that is all she had to endure.

The thought came to her like a sacred number. A spell. A shield.

Three years left in service to House Calvorn.

Three years until the blood pact expired. Until she could walk away from this world of velvet fangs and smiling monsters. Until she was free.

But freedom felt distant tonight.

Somewhere beyond the walls of her chamber, she could feel him.

Not hear him. Not see him. But feel him—like heat from a hearth that never showed its flame. Alaric.

Lord Calvorn moved through the estate like storm winds through treetops: invisible, but undeniable. Every servant had tightened their posture. Every breath had shortened. Even the music, lush as it was, seemed to soften in his shadow.

He would see her tonight.

That knowledge settled on her like a second skin.

She pressed her hand to her chest, felt the thud of her heart beneath the ribs the corset had claimed.

There was another presence quieter, far away, but impossible to ignore.

Not looming like Calvorn, but lingering.

Elira did not know why she thought of him now, or what had stirred the memory.

A flicker of dark eyes beneath a silver mask.

A voice like winter rain.

A man who had looked at her not as property, not as decoration but as if he recognized something she had forgotten about herself.

Duke Alaric Valtareon.

He had said so little. And yet, the weight of his gaze had unsettled her more than any of Calvorn's commands.

She had not dared to ask what he saw in her.

And tonight, he would be here too.

Some part of her, buried and starved and terrified, whispered that she wanted to see him again. That part betrayed her. That part should have been long dead.

But tonight, she would wear the mask.

She would be what they wanted.

She would endure.

Because tonight was not celebration. It was a performance. A gamble.A battlefield dressed in gold.

And all she had to do was survive it.