Several months before the storm.
Sylas didn't believe in loyalty by blood. Especially not the blood of ghosts. So when Cole, his old mentor's nephew asked to join the crew Sylas didn't roll out a red carpet. He watched, waited and when the kid didn't flinch under pressure, he gave him a slot. Not out of sentiment but of utility.
Cole had worked the streets, smooth-talking his way through brothels and alley deals like a rat who knew every crack in the wall. Jumpy, sure but sharp. Useful for now, if kept on a short leash.
Still, Sylas wasn't one to romanticize the past. The streets taught him fast, family didn't mean safe. Legacy didn't mean loyalty. He didn't care who raised you. He cared if you could finish a job and keep your mouth shut.
That week, it wasn't the newbie who slipped.
It was Lana. She was one of Sylas's lady assassins.
The job had been clean on paper, too clean, maybe. Eliminate a construction dealer who'd pissed off the wrong people. He'd been falsifying land claims, feeding forged documents to the city, and when that didn't work fast enough, he resorted to blackmail. His target? A young woman from a minor crime family, fresh on her first negotiation. The land was small, barely a speck on the map, and no one raised an eyebrow. But Sylas knew how men like that worked. This was just the start. If left breathing, he'd keep going.
The hit was set during the Rave Gala, a velvet-smothered nest of corrupt elites and whispered trades. A place where death could wear perfume and silk
And Lana was supposed to make sure he didn't.
But she left a trace, but just enough to raise eyebrows, just enough to make the wrong people start asking questions.
She was supposed to be a shadow. But something or someone caught her off guard. So, as she always does, she told Sylas everything.
Said she'd been preparing to move, her mind steady, her blade ready, when the man emerged from the far corner of the study room. Like he'd always been there, tucked inside the dark. Not walked in but appeared, like the shadows moved and there he was.
She said he was tall, lean, elegant in his stillness. Long silver hair fell loosely down his back, tied low, with a few strands falling around his face. His features were too refined to be overlooked, sharp, smooth, nearly androgynous, like he'd been sculpted from porcelain and kept in the dark for too long. His tailored black suit clung to him like memory, quiet and exact.
She said he didn't speak. Not at first.
His serene gray eyes studied her, not with suspicion but with a silent, unshakable curiosity. There was no fear in them, no urgency. Just quiet calculation. He looked at her like he was reading an unfinished sentence.
His gray eyes were soft but unreadable like clouds hiding the moon. He looked at her as if she was part of a puzzle he'd solved before even seeing all the pieces.
Then his gaze dipped.
To the faint blood smeared near her wrist.
She'd tried to cover it, but it was too late.
And that's when he smiled.
A soft, unbothered curve of the mouth. Not a threat. Not a kindness. Something far more dangerous, a man who already knew how this would play out.
He didn't raise an alarm ,didn't even move. He only said:
"The night will soon end. I look forward to the morning twilight… I'm sure it'll be beautiful. The dawn, that is."
Then he turned and walked away, silent as he came.
Not in haste. Not with menace.
Just a slow, deliberate motion, like a page turning in a book she wasn't meant to read. Like a shadow fading back into the dark.
His silhouette slipped back into the velvet darkness of the study, the soft glow of the chandelier catching in the loose strands of his silver hair. His footfalls echoed faintly on the marble floor, measured, composed, each step like the tick of a clock winding down to something inevitable. Not loud but impossible to ignore.
He walked like he belonged there.
No tension in his spine. No glance over the shoulder. As if this room, this mansion, this moment had always been his stage.
Serene. Yet dangerous.
Like the still surface of a lake hiding a beast beneath.
It was then Lana realized that this man wasn't caught off guard. He wasn't confused. He wasn't surprised by her presence.
He had been waiting.
He moved like someone who lived in the dark. Slept in it. Knew how to wear it like silk.
And as his figure vanished through the corridor, swallowed by the shadows as naturally as smoke curling into air, something clenched in her chest.
A chill. A quiet, sharp chill she couldn't explain.
In eight years of killing, she'd met all kinds of monsters, rich, desperate, cruel, cunning. She'd seen death up close, delivered it with her own hands, and laughed in the face of fear more times than she could count.
But she had never met a man like that.
Never felt a gaze that saw through her skin. Through her mask. Through her purpose.
She stood there for a long moment, the blood on her wrist suddenly feeling too warm, her breathing too loud.
He was gone.
But his presence lingered like the scent of smoke in a locked room.
Sylas found out the next morning, with a cigarette half-burnt between his fingers and the file laid bare in front of him.
He didn't yell. He didn't need to.
Mistakes like that didn't need noise.
They needed consequences.
Lana told him everything like she always does. She cares about the job more than her own stupid mistakes and shame.
Sylas found out the next morning, the file laid open like a wound on the table. A cigarette burned slow between his fingers, half ash, half ember. He hadn't touched his coffee.
The room was quiet, too quiet. Only the faint tick of the wall clock dared to speak.
Lana sat across from him, her voice low, each word dragging behind it a weight of shame. She didn't make excuses. Didn't dress it up. She laid the facts bare, the way killers do when they know they've fucked up and the cost might be their skin.
She waited for his wrath yet it never came.
Sylas didn't look at her. He flicked the ash onto the edge of the file, smearing it slightly with his thumb. Then, after a long drag, he said simply:
"One month. Stay low. No work. No heat."
That was all.
No yelling. No punishment. Just the quiet sentencing of a man who knew storms better than most.
She blinked. Hesitated but said nothing more. She knew better.
Sylas didn't move. Didn't breathe loud. His eyes stayed fixed on the words in that file, but his mind had already drifted somewhere else. Somewhere darker.
Like he'd seen this coming.
Like part of him had been waiting for it.
Outside, the city stirred. A wind swept through the alleyways and gutters, brushing past shutters and broken signs with ghostly fingers. The kind of breeze no one noticed until it howled.
But Sylas noticed.
He always did.
And in that still room, with Lana dismissed and the ash cooling beside him, he leaned back, just slightly, and muttered under his deep breath like a man talking to ghosts:
"I'm paying a visit to the church."
The church. The old boss's new home promoted, some said, to be with God. His mentor. The man who'd once ruled this bar and the streets beyond it.
Lana's eyes followed Sylas as he slipped out of the bar, his figure swallowed by the shadows of the cracked pavement and flickering streetlamps. Guilt weighed heavy on her chest, cold and unyielding. She bit her lip, the sting sharp, tasting like failure.
Marcel, leaning against the chipped wooden counter, lit a cigarette and exhaled a slow plume of smoke. His voice was low, rough from years spent in smoke-filled rooms and whispered deals.
"Look, Lana… shit like this happens, c'mon. Nobody's perfect. Boss knows the risks." He shrugged, trying to sound casual, but his eyes held a flicker of something darker. "But… when he talks about payin' a visit to the church? That ain't just talk. That means serious business."
Lana swallowed hard. The church, the old boss's new haunt after he'd been promoted, forced into God's hands. A place Sylas never mentioned unless the city's underbelly was about to shift.
She glanced back at the doorway where Sylas disappeared into the night, knowing the storm was closer than ever and that she might have just stepped right into it.
Sylas stood in the dim haze of the bar's dying light, the cigarette's ember glowing faintly between his fingers. His broad shoulders flexed beneath a worn black leather jacket, dark and utilitarian, made for function, not fashion. His raven-black hair was tousled, the kind of careless mess that only a man too burdened to bother with mirrors could pull off. The scar slicing across his left eye caught the faint glow, a stark reminder of a life carved from violence.
His square jaw tightened as his deep-set, tired eyes narrowed, haunted by something only he could see. The quiet strength he carried was like the calm before a storm, dangerous, unyielding.
Outside, his old chopper waited, a gleaming beast from another time, heavy chrome accents and a growl that promised power beneath the polished surface. The bike was as much a part of him as the scars on his skin, raw, relentless, and built for the shadows.
Sylas swung a leg over the seat, his muscular frame settling into the worn leather. The engine rumbled to life, a low, steady growl that echoed through the empty streets of New Orleans like a warning. He glanced once more toward the darkened bar, then twisted the throttle, sending the bike roaring into the night.
His coat flared behind him as the chopper cut through the fog, the city's faint lights flickering off the chrome. The streetlamps cast long shadows, but Sylas moved like a ghost , haunted, driven, and with a gut feeling that tonight, the storm wasn't just in the weather.
Something about that man Lana described gnawed at him. Too familiar. Too close to the edge.
The church awaited, and so did the answers.
As he rolled up to the church on his old black chopper, the engine coughed and groaned like a beast too tired to snarl. The morning air was gray, clinging to the city like smoke after gunfire. Sylas killed the engine and swung his leg over the bike.
It was the kind of winter morning that didn't belong to this city, bitter wind instead of jazz, smoke instead of steam, the iron-gray sky hanging low like a lid over a boiling pot. Even the old streetcars dragged their wheels slower down Canal Street, as if reluctant to start the day.
French Quarter balconies stood skeletal, their iron railings slick with frost. Gas lamps flickered against the chill, their light barely touching the pavement below. A drunk saxophone in the distance tried to wake the street, but even the music sounded tired, like it had been playing through too many broken hearts the night before.
Sylas's black chopper rumbled through the half-dead silence, the deep engine noise rolling over the wet cobblestones. He cut the motor just outside the old church, letting the cold settle around him like a warning.
He removed his helmet with one hand, jaw locked, eyes shadowed beneath thick brows. The cold didn't bother him, not really. He'd seen winters colder than this, ones that bit through your bones and left you hollow. But something about today twisted in his gut, the kind of feeling that didn't come from weather.
He stared up at the crooked cross atop the church steeple, exhaling a breath that fogged in the air.
"Still standing." he muttered, as if half-hoping it wouldn't be.
The church, once the city's dirtiest speakeasy under the guise of salvation, now stood clean and cold. Pews filled by repentants and ex-sinners alike. Saints carved into the stone walls, their faces worn down like they were tired of watching the city rot.
With a heavy sigh, he pushed open the door. Inside, it was colder still.
No incense. No choir. Just silence.
His boots echoed down the marble aisle.
The city might've been waking, but something else was turning in its sleep, deep beneath it all.
And Sylas could feel it.
At the far end, lighting a candle with fingers that used to grip whiskey bottles and bloodied cigars, stood Father Marlowe. No longer the man who once ran the dirtiest backroom in the city. Now cloaked in black robes and regret, pretending he traded sins for scripture.
"You always did show up when the wind changed," Father Marlowe muttered without turning.
Sylas stopped halfway down the aisle. "Didn't come to chat about the weather."
"Didn't think you did."
The voice rolled through the church like smoke, deep, worn, but still sharp enough to cut. The old man stood near the altar, back half-turned, shoulders still broad beneath his worn priest's coat. He hadn't lost the body of a fighter, even if the collar said otherwise.
He turned slowly to face Sylas, the winter light pouring through the stained glass painting deep shadows across his face. The years had etched themselves into his skin like dry riverbeds, hard-earned, merciless. His hair had gone mostly gray now, though it suited him. Like gunmetal.
But it was his eyes that still held power. Cunning. Clear. The kind that had seen too much, survived more, and now measured everything in silence before it spoke.
"Lana screwed up." Sylas said flatly. "But that ain't why I'm here."
He stepped forward, heavy like thunderclouds.
"I'm here because she described a man who doesn't belong. Silver hair. Calm eyes that cut through a crowd like glass. Talked like he was reading from the last page of a story he already wrote."
Marlowe's hand hovered over the flame, then slowly pulled back. His eyes didn't flinch, but the silence did.
"You think it's him."
Sylas didn't answer right away. He stared at the candle between them, watched the flame tremble like it knew something neither of them were saying.
"I think the wind's howling again." he said at last. "And some shadows don't move like they used to."
Marlowe exhaled, slow. "Some ghosts don't stay buried."
Sylas narrowed his eyes, leaning against the edge of the wooden pew like the weight in his chest was getting harder to carry. "Of all the times they could've slithered outta their gilded crypt, why now?" His voice was low, gravel rough. "That ghost Lana ran into… it wasn't a mistake. It felt planted. Like bait."
Marlowe didn't answer right away. He simply lit a cigarette near the altar, indifferent to the contradiction of it. The flame flickered in his weathered face—those lines, those eyes, they weren't the kind of age you got from time. They were the kind earned from seeing too many graves filled.
"Because he's moving," Marlowe said at last, the words slow, deliberate. "Your ghost with the silver hair... Elias fuckin' Rave."
The name hung there, cold and soft, like a whisper from behind a confessional wall. Then he smirked ,not the kind born of humor, but of knowing too much. Even dressed in his somber priest's collar. Marlowe looked more outlaw than holy man. Like a wolf in borrowed robes.
His eyes narrowed.
"He's been stirring things up the past few months. Quiet, calculated, like a surgeon carving out the rot beneath this city." Marlowe took a drag. "The old families? Half of them are in his pocket now, whether they know it or not."
Sylas's brow furrowed deeper. "What changed?"
Marlowe turned, letting the smoke curl between them like a veil. "A Dutch businessman. Big name. Clean on paper, but the kind of clean that hides filth underneath. Elias cut a deal with him not long ago. Rumor is, it wasn't just money. It was leverage. The kind that makes entire families kneel without drawing a single blade."
Sylas scoffed under his breath. "So he's not just lurking in shadows anymore."
"He's choosing them." Marlowe replied. "And the city's shivering under his boots. He doesn't just want control, Sylas. He wants order. His order."
Sylas felt a cold twist in his gut. The Raves had always been predators, but Elias… Elias moved like something older. Slower. Smarter.
And Lana? She'd stepped right into the eye of it.
He looked up at the faded stained-glass windows, morning light bleeding through like bruised halos. "You think it's personal?"
Marlowe gave him a long look, then muttered, "With that family? It's never not."
Marlowe crushed the cigarette under his boot heel, the ash grinding into old stone.
"There's more." he said, voice low.
Sylas didn't move, but the shift in his eyes said keep talking.
"Couple weeks ago, he bought a factory. Quiet deal. No press, no noise. Just changed hands like a whisper." Marlowe pulled a folded photo from inside his coat and slid it across the pew. "Old textile plant. Abandoned for years. Out on the edge of town, near the freight lines. You know the one."
Sylas took the picture without looking. "I know it."
"He's cleaning it up. Fast. Brought in private contractors, no locals. Trucks in and out at hours that don't make sense for cloth or grain. My intel says it smells military."
That made Sylas pause.
Not the kind of pause from confusion, he knew what that meant. It was the kind of stillness that came before something violent.
He finally glanced at the photo. Grey building. Chain-link fencing. New lights installed. And a single shadow caught just barely at the edge of the frame, tall, straight-backed. Unmistakable.
"I thought that fucker was all about clean hands." Sylas said, voice like steel dragging on stone. "Now he's playing with steel?"
Marlowe grunted. "Clean hands just mean someone else is holding the knife."
Outside, the wind howled softly down the street, rattling the stained glass above the altar. The city, even in daylight, felt like it was holding its breath.
Sylas didn't flinch. He leaned back slightly, arms crossed, the weight of his broad frame casting a long shadow across the chapel floor.
"Doesn't matter." He said flatly, eyes fixed on the distant altar. "We'll stay low for now. No noise. No heat."
Marlowe raised a brow, the hint of a smirk still tugging at the corner of his mouth. "Playing dead?"
"Playing patient." Sylas corrected, flicking a glance his way. "If Rave wants to dance in the dark, let him. We'll wait 'til he steps into the light."
He leaned forward, voice low and cold. "Let 'em crawl in the sewers, gnawin' at prey out of sight. That's what rats do. But even rats can drown if the flood's timed right."
Marlowe gave a low chuckle, rough like gravel under boots. "You always did stalk your prey 'til they bled fear, Rook. But this one…"
He paused, eyes narrowing with something between warning and amusement.
"Maybe this one'll circle you back. Taunt you into madness before you even realize you're chasing your own tail." He leaned back, the wooden pew creaking beneath him. "Wouldn't be the first Rave to drive someone insane. But maybe the first to enjoy doing it slow."
Sylas said nothing more. His silence spoke louder than any threat. Whatever Elias Rave was planning, it wouldn't stay buried long.
And when the dawn finally came, Sylas would be watching. Waiting.
---
A week passed.
The air over New Orleans thickened, colder, quieter. Winter crept in like a thief, biting at the corners of buildings and creeping through the marrow of the city. Even the street dogs barked less. Fewer sirens. Fewer lights.
Then, as the sun bled into the horizon and the city turned gold and ash, someone came to the church.
The heavy door creaked open around dusk, its echo curling through the empty pews like a warning. A figure stepped through the archway, boots echoing softly against old stone and wood. He walked slowly, purposefully, like he belonged in a place most men only entered seeking forgiveness.
He took a seat near the front, not at the altar but not far from it. Neither begging God nor mocking him.
His long silver hair shimmered faintly in the amber light slipping through stained-glass windows. Loosely tied back, a few strands ghosted along his cheekbones as he bowed his head in silent prayer. The tailored coat on his back looked untouched by the road, and even in the sacred hush of the church, he wore power like a second skin.
There was no sound but the soft rustle of his breath and the slow rhythm of his stillness.
He sat there calm, too calm.
As though this wasn't a sanctuary but a throne.
As though God was just a guest here, and he had come to inspect the house.
Father Marlowe had been sitting quietly in the shadowed corner of the church, the flickering candlelight casting long shapes across the worn wooden pews. He heard the heavy door creak open, and instinctively turned his head.
"Peace be with you, my son." Father Marlowe said softly, rising to greet the visitor.
The man met his gaze quietly, tilting his head with a subtle, practiced habit. His serene gray eyes locked onto Marlowe's without hesitation, a faint, knowing smile curling at the corners of his lips.
His voice was serene and low, like a chapel melody drifting through the cold air.
"It's a shame I don't have the time to visit the church more often." he said, his tone casual, small talk on the surface, but beneath it lay a quiet threat.
Father Marlowe continued with the small talk, his voice steady but cautious, weaving between pleasantries and subtle inquiries.
Then Elias rose slowly, the chapel's fading light catching the silver strands of his hair as he fixed Marlowe with that unmistakable, piercing gaze, calm, yet sharp as a blade.
"I'd watch your pups closely." Elias said quietly, his voice low and steady, like a warning wrapped in silk. "Keep them on a tight leash, Father. If you don't, that whole circus of yours might come crashing down before it even begins." He let the words hang in the air.
"Having my people running wild like that at that gala? It gets under my skin. Did you even teach them manners?" Elias's voice was low, sharp with calm eyes.
Father Marlowe sighed, steady and unshaken."God's will is constant. The passage of time flows onward. It's no one's fault."
Elias's grin twisted, cruel and sharp."That deal we once had? Now that my father's dead, it means nothing. I don't tolerate anything standing in my way, not even god himself."
Marlowe's voice was quiet, but cutting."Even if it was a raven?"
Elias's gaze froze , cold, calculating. A dark chuckle slipped through his lips."I despise those birds the most."
Without another word, Elias turned and left the church, his presence fading like a shadow swallowed by the dying light.
Father Marlowe cursed under his breath, the weight of the moment pressing heavy.
"Damn gangsters."
It was well known that Elias Rave was the heir to the Rave empire. But the man Father Marlowe met today wasn't the face Elias showed to the world, the polished, public figure often seen at high society events. That role was played by one of his cousins, a puppet carefully positioned to distract and deceive.
The real Elias Rave, the one who dealt in shadows and filth, the one who believed in ruling through calculated menace, was the one sitting quietly in the church pew. The one who pulled strings unseen, moving through darkness like it was his birthright. This Elias was far more dangerous, and far more real.
Father Marlowe's chest tightened with the memory. Liora, Sylas's mother had been his dearest friend, a rare light in a world shadowed by crime and betrayal. He had sworn to protect her with everything he had, a promise carved into his soul.
And yet, she was gone. The world had failed her once. He would not let it fail her son.
She was more than just someone he loved, she was like a sister to him, a soul he had always carried in his prayers within these very walls. Every quiet moment at this church had been filled with hopes for her safety, for her peace. Losing her was like losing a part of himself.
Father Marlowe closed his eyes, the weight of memories pressing down. In his mind's eye, he saw young Sylas, grieving alone, raw and silent, nowhere near his mother's grave, hidden away from prying eyes. But there was another boy, day after day, at that very grave. A boy with silver hair cut in a soft bob, too delicate, too beautiful to be just a child but an angel.
Elias Rave.