Chapter 5 - The Vault of Tears
The explosion was a dull roar that shook the very foundation of the distillery.
Dust and acrid smoke filled the hallway,
blinding us for a few precious seconds.
I pushed through the debris,
kicking away pieces of twisted metal,
until I reached the interior of the vault.
It wasn't a bank;
it was a bedroom.
A sick,
twisted mockery of a sanctuary,
with silk sheets on a bolted-down bed and bars on the small ventilation windows.
And there,
in the corner,
shrouded in the shadows,
was a woman.
She was pale,
her skin almost translucent,
and her hair was a tangled nest of gold and gray.
She looked at me,
her eyes wide with a terror that broke my heart into a million pieces.
"Adriano?"
she whispered,
her voice a ghost of the woman I once knew.
"Is it really you?"
"I'm here,
Elena,"
I said,
dropping my weapon and rushing to her side.
I gathered her into my arms,
feeling how thin she had become,
how her bones seemed to be made of nothing but air.
She sobbed into my chest,
her hands clutching my blood-stained shirt.
"He took her,"
she cried.
"He took our daughter."
"I know,"
I said,
stroking her hair,
trying to ignore the tears burning my own eyes.
"I know,
my love."
"I’ll get her back."
"He said you were dead,"
she whispered,
her breath hitching.
"He showed me the photos of your funeral."
"He told me if I ever tried to leave,"
"he would kill Sofia right in front of me."
"I stayed for her,
Adriano."
"Eight years in this hell...
for her."
I pulled back,
looking into her eyes,
seeing the strength that had kept her sane through nearly a decade of captivity.
She wasn't a victim;
she was a survivor.
"We have to go,"
I told her.
"The building might be rigged to blow."
As we stood up,
I saw the walls of the vault.
They were covered in drawings.
Sofia’s drawings.
Pictures of a man with a silver wolf ring,
pictures of a house with a garden,
and pictures of a father she had never met but always loved.
Elena had kept my memory alive in that dark hole.
She had built a temple of me for our daughter.
"Marco!"
I shouted.
"Get her to the car!"
"Wait,"
Elena said,
grabbing my arm.
"He has a villa in the mountains."
"The 'Eagle’s Nest'."
"That’s where he takes the things he wants to keep forever."
"That’s where Sofia is."
I kissed her forehead,
a promise of a future I would die to protect.
"Go with Marco."
"I'm going to the mountains."
May you like
"I'm going to bring our daughter home,"
"or I'm never coming back."
