Steven’s POV
Stepping through the portal felt less like walking and more like being unstitched.
One second, the clearing was behind me—Florida heat, damp air, dirt under my shoes, Fang watching from the tree line.
The next, the world changed so completely my lungs forgot what they were doing.
Cooler.
Cleaner.
Thinner somehow, but not weaker.
My shoes hit stone.
I blinked hard and looked up.
Trees.
Deep green forest in every direction, tall and dense and far too still. Mountain ridges rose in the distance like dark shadows layered against the sky. The air smelled like pine and earth instead of salt and pavement.
This was not Florida.
Not even close.
My stomach tightened immediately.
Aqua stepped through beside me, still holding my hand, and went still for half a beat. Her expression sharpened—not with fear, but with recognition.
“This place is hidden,” she murmured.
I looked at her. “You can tell?”
She nodded once, scanning the air itself like she could feel a structure over it that I couldn’t see.
“There’s something over all of this,” she said quietly. “Concealment. Protection. Like a barrier meant to keep human eyes from settling in the right place.”
That should have made me feel safer.
It didn’t.
It just made me feel like we had stepped into the kind of place people only found when someone powerful wanted them found.
Then I saw the manor beyond the gates.
And every thought in my head stalled for a second.
A long drive curved through the forest toward a mansion that looked like it had been carved out of the mountain rather than built against it.
Three stories of dark brick and climbing ivy. Sharp rooflines. Tall windows catching the late light like polished glass in a museum. Nothing about it felt accidental. Nothing felt soft. The whole place carried the kind of age money got when it had been inherited, defended, and expanded for generations.
Not just rich.
Established.
The black iron gates standing open in front of it didn’t help. Their curling designs looked elegant at first glance, but the longer I stared, the less decorative they felt. Too precise. Too deliberate. Like the metal had been taught where to bend and where not to.
I swallowed hard.
“This feels like a place where people get politely murdered,” I muttered.
Aqua’s lips twitched faintly. “Or politely protected.”
I kept staring at the manor.
“Those two things are starting to feel a little too similar.”
The gates stood open.
Not welcoming.
Expecting.
We walked through them anyway.
The gravel drive was too neat. The hedges too trimmed. Even the ivy climbing the brick looked trained, like it had been allowed to live only where it flattered the walls best.
The closer we got, the worse the feeling became.
It wasn’t just a mansion in the mountains.
It felt like the mountains belonged to it.
My grip tightened on the strap of my bag.
Aqua noticed. Of course she did. But she didn’t say anything. She just kept walking beside me, calm as still water, like being summoned to hidden estates by powerful people was not entirely outside the realm of normal for her.
For me, every step made my skin feel more awake.
The front doors were massive—dark wood, brass handles polished enough to catch the light, the kind of height designed to make anyone approaching them feel smaller than they wanted to.
Before either of us could knock, one side opened.
A butler stood there as if he had been waiting in position for the precise number of seconds it would take us to arrive.
Tall. Grey-haired. Perfect posture. Not a wrinkle out of place.
And when he spoke, the accent hit me immediately.
British.
“Miss Aqua. Mr. Salvatore,” he said smoothly. “If you would.”
I blinked once and glanced at Aqua, but she was too composed to help me with my confusion.
So I followed him inside.
The air changed again.
Not temperature.
Pressure.
Like the whole mansion breathed through rules and expected everyone else to adjust around them.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
The foyer opened wide beneath a chandelier large enough to feel arrogant—crystal and gold scattering light across polished hardwood floors so clean they looked untouched by dust, shoes, or actual living.
No clutter.
No mess.
No softness.
Green accents threaded through everything. Emerald velvet drapes framing tall windows. A deep green runner with gold woven through it. Brass sconces that caught the light in a way that almost shimmered.
The ceilings rose high enough to make my footsteps feel too loud.
For a house this big, it was unnaturally quiet.
That was the part that got me.
Not the money.
Not the size.
The silence.
It felt less like luxury and more like discipline stretched over every surface.
Aqua moved beside me like she belonged in places like this—back straight, expression calm, every step graceful without trying too hard. She looked like someone used to courtly rooms and old authority, even if this wasn’t her world.
I, meanwhile, felt like I had tracked dirt in just by existing.
We followed the butler down a long hall and stopped at a set of double doors.
He opened one and stepped aside.
“The parlor.”
I didn’t know what I expected.
Something stuffy, maybe.
Something old.
It was both of those things, but it was also beautiful in a way I resented instantly.
A fire was already lit, though the air did not feel cold enough to need it. Green velvet sofa. Two matching armchairs. Dark wood tables. A rug in muted gold and forest green. A silver tea service sat steaming on a low table beside plates of pastries and biscuits too neat to touch.
Everything in the room was arranged with so much care that even comfort felt disciplined.
And seated in the armchair nearest the fire, as if he had been waiting there for years instead of minutes, was Fredrick Worth.
He stood when we entered.
Tall. Broad-shouldered. Dark blond hair slicked neatly back from his face. He looked somewhere in his forties or fifties, though in the cultivated way some people aged when power, money, and ruthless self-control sanded the years into something sharper instead of softer.
Forest green suit.
Crisp white shirt.
Black tie.
Polished black shoes.
And when he lifted one hand in greeting, the firelight caught on the rings.
A gold signet ring rested on his right ring finger—heavy, old-looking, stamped with four wands worked together into a W.
Family crest.
Authority.
Not subtle.
A plain gold wedding band sat on his left hand.
For some reason, that made the room feel stranger.
Big enough for a family.
Quiet enough to feel abandoned.
Fredrick’s gaze went first to Aqua.
Of course it did.
“Princess Aqua Waters,” he said, his British accent smoother and sharper than the butler’s. “Welcome to Worthington.”
Aqua gave the smallest nod.
“Thank you,” she said evenly. “Aqua is fine.”
Fredrick held her gaze for a beat, as if deciding whether to indulge that.
Then he inclined his head.
“Very well,” he said. “Miss Aqua.”
Courtesy.
Control.
The difference between them suddenly felt much smaller than it should have.
Then his eyes shifted to me.
“And you,” he said quietly. “Mr. Salvatore.”
Something about that made the back of my neck tighten.
Not because he was rude.
Because he wasn’t.
He sounded like a man acknowledging a problem he intended to study thoroughly before deciding what to do with it.
“Steven’s fine,” I said before I could stop myself.
Aqua’s eyes flicked toward me.
Fredrick’s mouth twitched faintly. Not amusement. Recognition.
“Very well,” he said. “Steven.”
He gestured toward the sofa.
“Do sit.”
That was not really a suggestion either, but the fire and tea softened it just enough to imitate one.
Aqua sat first.
I sat beside her, far too aware of my hoodie, my jeans, my cheap sneakers, and the fact that everything about me looked wrong in this room.
The butler stepped forward, silent as a shadow, and poured tea for all three of us.
The smell rose immediately—herbal, warm, old-fashioned.
British tea. British butler. British rich man in a hidden mountain estate somewhere far from anything I knew.
None of this should have been real.
And yet here I was.
Fredrick took his cup but did not drink right away.
“You are safe here,” he said.
The statement was too smooth.
I looked around the room. “From humans?”
“Among other things,” Fredrick replied.
Aqua lifted her cup with both hands, composed as ever. “This whole place is concealed.”
Fredrick nodded once. “Yes.”
His gaze settled on me.
“You are in the mountains of Georgia,” he said. “Worthington is shielded from human perception. People may pass within miles of our borders and never know we exist.”
That sat strangely in my chest.
Not because I didn’t believe him.
Because I did.
And because believing him meant admitting the world had been far bigger than I had ever allowed myself to imagine.
“You built a hidden town in the mountains,” I said.
Fredrick’s expression did not shift.
“Built is a simple word for a complicated legacy,” he said. “But yes.”
I looked toward Aqua.
She was calm. Watchful. Not relaxed, exactly—but far more comfortable than I was.
That made sense.
She had been raised around power.
Around rank.
Around the kind of people who spoke like every sentence had already been approved before it left their mouth.
I had been raised around school bells, beach weather, and trying to act normal.
Fredrick finally took a sip of tea.
Even that looked controlled.
Not stiff.
Practiced.
“I invited you because your current circumstances are unstable,” he said.
My jaw tightened.
“Circumstances.”
Fredrick’s gaze stayed steady. “If you prefer, we may call them by name: recent awakening, untrained abilities, emotional volatility, and exposure.”
The words landed one by one.
Not loud.
Still sharp.
Aqua’s voice stayed even. “You think Steven needs structure.”
Fredrick looked at her first.
“I think,” he said, “that what follows an unstable awakening is rarely private.”
Then his attention returned to me.
“And I would prefer it remain contained.”
Contained.
My fingers tightened around my cup.
That should have angered me more than it did.
Instead, it made me feel something worse.
Young.
Outclassed.
Aqua remained composed beside me, but I could feel the question hanging in the room before she asked it.
“And if we had not accepted your invitation?”
Fredrick’s expression remained calm.
“Then someone else would have noticed the flare eventually,” he said. “And not all who notice such things are as disciplined as I am.”
That made my stomach turn.
Aqua did not look surprised.
That was the part I couldn’t get over.
She looked wary, yes.
Watchful.
But not shaken.
Like she had expected the world to become more dangerous the moment my fire showed itself.
Maybe she had.
Fredrick set his teacup down carefully.
His gaze dropped to my chest.
At first I thought he was just looking at me.
Then I realized he wasn’t.
He was looking through the layers of shirt and chain and skin at something beneath them.
The room changed.
Not visibly.
But the air narrowed.
The fire, the tea, the velvet sofa—none of it seemed to matter anymore.
Fredrick’s attention had locked onto something, and whatever it was had just swallowed the whole room with it.
My stomach turned cold.
Aqua felt it too. I saw her go subtly still beside me.
“What is it?” I asked, and my voice came out rougher than I meant it to.
Fredrick didn’t answer.
He didn’t stand.
He didn’t even lean forward.
One second I was sitting on the sofa.
The next, invisible force closed around me and yanked me cleanly across the coffee table.
My breath punched out of me.
I barely had time to register what was happening before I was suspended in front of him, feet off the ground, body held still by something I couldn’t fight.
Aqua half-rose. “Fredrick—”
“Stay where you are,” he said quietly.
Not harsh.
Worse.
Absolute.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“What the hell—”
I couldn’t finish.
The chain under my shirt tightened.
Then the pendant slid free on its own, drawn out from beneath the fabric as if the air itself had hooked around it.
It lifted between us.
And the moment Fredrick saw it clearly, something in his face changed.
Not shock.
Not fear.
Recognition.
Old. Immediate. Serious.
My stomach dropped.
Because that was the first time he looked at me like whatever I had brought into his house mattered more than anything I had said since walking in.
His hand did not touch the pendant.
He only stared at it, expression sharpened into something colder and far less polite.
Then, just as suddenly, the force released.
I dropped back onto the sofa hard enough to jolt the cushions beneath me.
My pulse was a riot.
Aqua looked between me and Fredrick, tense and silent.
I grabbed at the necklace instinctively, breath uneven, trying to understand what had just happened and why the whole room suddenly felt different.
Fredrick’s gaze lifted from the pendant to my face.
“That,” he said quietly, “is not a necklace.”
My throat tightened.
“What?”
His expression did not soften.
“It is a prison.”