Chapter 10 - The Regent's Oath
The air in the cellar felt suddenly thin. Clara stared down at the crisp parchment, reading the dark cursive script over and over until the words blurred into illegible strokes.
“To the woman who washed my feet when my sons were plotting my funeral, and to the innocent blood she carries: I leave the foundation of this house. Let her choose whether to rebuild it or burn it to ash.”
Clara looked up from the will. Moreva was watching her, his dark eyes shadowed beneath his heavy brow. His gun hung loosely at his side, barrel pointed at the floor, but the tension radiating from his silhouette was suffocating.
"He left the empire to a maid," Moreva stated. It was neither a question nor an accusation; it was an impossible truth laid bare between them.
"I didn't ask for this," Clara whispered, clutching the paper to her chest as if to protect it from him. "I swear to God, Mr. Moreva, I only wanted to keep him comfortable. He was terrified every night. He knew they were poisoning him, but he couldn't form the words to scream."
Moreva took a single, deliberate step toward her. Clara didn't shrink away this time. The survival instinct that had kept her alive through months of Gable’s beatings and Julian’s cruelty flared hot in her throat. If Moreva intended to put a bullet in her head to take the inheritance, she would die looking directly into his eyes.
Instead, Moreva knelt.
He sank onto one knee on the blood-slicked stone floor, bowing his dark head before her. He reversed his firearm, offering the walnut grip to her with both hands—the ancient, absolute surrender of an enforcer to his ruling sovereign.
"I spent ten years in Palermo building a war chest to tear this family apart because I thought my father had discarded me," Moreva said, his deep voice vibrating through the damp cellar. "I thought he made Julian his favorite. I thought he was blind."
He raised his eyes, looking directly into Clara's pale, resolute face.
"He wasn't blind. He was waiting for someone worthy to protect what remained of our name. You stood over him while bullets tore through the door. You bled for him when his own blood was selling his breath for twenty percent."
Clara swallowed hard, her heart pounding against her ribs. "What are you doing?"
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"I am swearing fealty to the executor," Moreva replied fiercely. "Your child is my brother's flesh, but from this hour, he is my responsibility. His enemies are my enemies. His reign will be absolute."
Before Clara could find her voice, a deafening explosion shook the ceiling above them, raining dust and masonry down upon their heads. The mercenaries upstairs had breached the steel blast doors to the central wing.
