London did not smell of salt and cedar. It smelled of wet pavement, diesel exhaust, and the cold, metallic indifference of a city that moved on the gears of high-frequency trading and ancient, buried secrets.
Matteo stood on the South Bank, his breath hitching in the damp air. The glowing blue tattoo on the back of his hand had faded to a dull, throbbing silver, but the coordinates burned in his mind like a brand. He looked across the river at the silhouette of the City—the glass shards and steel needles that housed the modern masters of the world.
He was a ghost in a city of millions, his identity erased by the Vathek, his history liquidated into the Mediterranean. Yet, the phone in his pocket felt like it weighed a hundred pounds.
FROM: THE FOURTH HEIR.
TEXT: "The audit has only just
