just how far
will I fall?

I came back to consciousness slowly.

The feeling was like the inverse of going to sleep under the influence of a drug, something I had experienced many times. My senses came back to me heavily, as if they were swimming through jelly. For a second, I sat there, confused, before the memories hit me like a stray wave.

Blonde, butterflies, traitors. The sound of a knife being unsheathed, a pool of blood, the sound of silence. Windows.

I jerked forward, only to find that I had been restrained by ropes. I knew I was sitting in one of the chairs from our dining table from years of practice. My eyes were covered by a dark strip of cloth, its rough surface scraping against the skin over my cheekbones. It must have been tied on pretty tightly for it to sting like that. I had been gagged, too, with foul-tasting cloth that dug into my cheeks.

The next thing I registered was the pain.

It spread out from the beginning of my spine, at the nape of my neck, and flared out over my shoulder blades, spreading down to my tailbone. The pain was dull, but sharp when I tried to move, and aching, spiking pain that told me I had been sitting in the same position for quite some time. My hands were tied behind the chair, and my shoulders had been pulled back so hard that the muscles around them hurt if I tried to use them. The skin of my wrists stung with the harsh surface of the rope that had been used to tie them, and multiple cuts or wounds had probably opened up there.

Whoever had tied me up had definitely done it without an ounce of mercy.

Realization didn't come to me immediately, and neither did memory—I sat there for a few moments, utterly confused and fearful—and then I remembered.

The fear of the unknown that had been sitting in my heart for the past few seconds became the fear of something much more real. My chest hurt with every breath that I took in, and I sat as still as I possibly could. I could see nothing through the fabric of the blindfold, only vague outlines through the light. I tipped my head back, and bones creaked in my neck.

Panic lit up inside me like a fire.

Stop panicking, I told myself, trying to find a focus point through the fogginess in my head. The eye of the storm, as Jungkook had told me. It's not helping.

I had no indication of which room I was in, but I was probably still downstairs, unless the killers had decided to drag me upstairs to waste their energy. Yes, I was definitely downstairs, because taking me somewhere else would waste too much time, and the killers were smart. They wouldn't waste time, if they knew that the racers could be back at any moment.

It had been dark outside when I had woken up, so it was either still before dawn or they had drawn the curtains. Maybe both. There was nothing I could do to protect myself. The hunting knife had been in my hands when I had been rendered unconscious, so I was weapon less. Not that that mattered. In the way I had been tied up, reaching for something was virtually impossible.

All right. What did I know about the killers? They were Lees, from the tattoos I had seen, and probably extremely good at their job. I had only seen two people, but there could have been more. Three? Four? There was no way of knowing. I could tell that they knew how to keep hostages, from the way I had been detained, and they probably didn't care if they hurt me. As long as I stayed alive.

But why?

That was the real question. As far as I knew, the Lee heir wanted to kill me. It was his foremost aim, because he had left every other objective behind in his hunt for me. It could be that he just wanted to torture me—something in me curled up and died at the thought—or he wanted something else from me. Information. Or help. No, no, that wasn't possible. He must have wanted to kill me, or how else would Minho have even dared to try to kill me in the club?

I had no idea where my dad was, again. Or even Taeyong. Lucas had been unconscious when I had found him, and he had either been killed or tied up like me. My heart hurt when I thought of these things, but I forced myself to keep going. If I refused to even think, I didn't have even a minute chance of survival.

I should never have given up, I thought, shivering outwardly with shame and bitterness. And yet, I knew that I never had a chance. Even if I had tried to fight back, what were the chances that I wouldn't have landed in the same situation anyway?

Someone groaned. I almost screamed.

The voice had been my father's. I strained against my bindings, stretching my muscles as far as I could afford to without tearing them. If they weren't already torn. My father was in the room, but not in a good state from the way he had groaned. He was probably tied up like me. Why? Frustrated tears gathered in my eyes, threatening to wet my skin which was already damp with sweat.

"She's awake."

I drew in a sharp breath when I heard the voice. It was the bleached-blonde man who had found me in Lucas's room, with the catlike features and the emotionless face. Footsteps sounded in the room, slow and deliberate, and my throat closed up—I wouldn't have been able to speak anyway.

I was conscious of a presence in front of me, from the oblique, shadowy figure that now dominated my sort-of vision through the blindfold. There was something very strong about it, an aura that was overpowering and dominating, almost like Jungkook's, except more openly sinister. I couldn't see him, obviously, but from the respectful silence of the bleached-blonde killer and the way the person was standing in front of me, I could tell that they were very important.

Who are you? I wanted to scream, and why are you doing this to me? Haven't you taken enough from me already?

"Hello," he said, and I stilled instantly. The voice was male, and had a depth which felt like gravity, grounding me to him instead of the earth, pulling me in—no, dragging me in. It was velvety and smooth, not ragged like I had expected it to be. It was almost beautiful. A dagger in a golden sheath. A siren's voice.

I stayed absolutely still, as if I were standing on a landmine, and a single move could blow me to bits. No one said it, but I could tell that this was the person who had been chasing me for all of my life.

The Lee heir.

"It's a pity I had to get you unconscious," he said, and the tone of his voice was almost apologetic. "Seoho tells me you didn't struggle, and I'm glad you didn't. I would have hated to hurt you more than was necessary." He paused, and when he spoke next, he sounded intent. "You're as sharp as they said you would be. You see, that's why I couldn't take the risk of setting you free."

I was trembling slightly as he finished speaking. The one-sided conversation gave me vertigo, as I hadn't expected the Lee heir to be like this. There was no savagery in his tone, none of the wanton asperity that Taeyong had spoken of. He wasn't wild or uncontrolled—in fact, he sounded like he was completely in control of not just himself, but also of those surrounding him. It was like he was slowly taking controlling of me, too.

In fact, he sounded almost too in control. Calm, unruffled, like he barely cared.

There was a momentary silence, invaded only by some shuffling and my heavy breathing. My father made a strange sound at the back of his throat, a cross between a sigh and a bellow, and I flinched, feeling guilt grab me again. I had almost forgotten he was there.

"I know you're wondering why you're still alive," the heir said, and my focused whipped back to him. "It's because I'm not here to kill you."

It was like the ground had been swept out from underneath me.

My eyes weren't visible through the blindfold, but the bewilderment must have been clear on my face, because he chuckled. It was a low sound, breathy, and made me feel as if the wind had been knocked out of me. The need to know was killing me; I was filled with the urge to rip off my blindfold and see who he was.

What do you mean, you're not here to kill me? was what I would have said to him had I been able to speak, it was what I would have screamed. It seemed like he was playing a cruel joke on me, dangling hope on a delicate string in front of me only to snatch it away when I tried to reach out. No hope for me. There was nothing for me in this.

"At first, it was what I had intended to do," he said musingly. "It helped that Hyojong agreed with me, bent on revenge for his brother. Yoongi, wasn't it? Yes." He hm-ed, and I sucked in my breath. "I sent out my best men to kill you, but you had already been brought under the protection of the racers by your father." He laughed. "The racers that your mother had been a part of. Ironic, isn't it? That they would fail you like they failed her. History does indeed repeat itself."

I was blind with rage, shaking from the force of it. The pain in my tendons and joints was barely transmitted.

"And then I found out Byun Baekhyun was with you," he said, sounding amazed. "Then Jeon's right hand killed him, my brother told me. You were devastated, isn't it?" His voice dropped to a purr, turning into gentle empathy, stroking my anger like adding gasoline to fire. "To find the person you cared so much had betrayed you?"

"It was then that everything became clear," he continued. "When I realized how exactly everything was connected, and the point it all intersected was you." My throat was parched, and I felt bile rise up at the bottom of it. "Byun Baekhyun, indeed. A perfect coincident."

Coincident? I had always known that Baekhyun had been an important player in the scheme, but how important was he? My skin crawled as I remembered what he had said to me once. Even if I could never escape myself, he had said, I want you to.

He had been talking about running from something. Something that was tied to my past. Baekhyun came into play here, but how? Who had he been trying to get away from?

"No, I don't want you dead, Hwang Y/N," the heir said quietly, and my attention snapped back to reality. The man leaned closer to me—I could tell by the way I felt his breath fanning my face, the top of my exposed collarbones. "You're too important for that. I realize that now. No," he said, voice soft and caressing, "I want you to join me."

Join you. Like hell I would join someone who had put me through all of this.

"But I knew you would take some convincing," he carried on, leaning away. I let go of the breath I hadn't realized I had been holding. "After all, a strong-willed player like you wouldn't change sides so easily. Nor could I overpower you, because I need you to join me willfully. I needed your influence," he said. "Your power. So, I decided to persuade you through action. I thought, what do you care about most? Not friends. Not even the racer you care so much about, not after he killed Baekhyun. Then I came upon the answer."

I heard the sound of a gun being cocked, and felt the cold metal edge of it trace the line of my jaw.

"Family," he breathed.

At first, I was perplexed. In my confused state, I couldn't make sense of his words, wondering why it mattered who I cared about. Then the answer hit me—no, it crashed into my chest like a truck, crushing my heart and blotting out everything else except itself, leaving my mind blank except for one thought.

My father. My father was in the room.

"Take this as a friendly warning, not as a threat," the heir said, as I thrashed about against my bonds. "I wish I didn't have to do this, but I know I have no choice," he said, and I felt the tip of the gun leave my face, and heard him step away.

No, no, no, no.

"If you don't agree, this will happen again." I could hear myself screaming through the gag, but everything felt like it was a thousand miles away, like I was listening to something on tape.

NO, NO, NO, NO—

My father said something, but it was lost in my panic. His words were slurred, as if he'd been drugged. My panic was building up to a high, like pressure being applied to something. Like I was about to burst. I was screaming, and the gun was being raised, and my mind was chaos. The moment felt infinite, and a split second, like I was trying to breathe in fire and choking on the smoke. There was nothing, and everything, and I strained against my bonds, trying to do something, anything.

I'll do anything.

"Say goodbye, little girl," the man said. Chaos spilled into my mind, melting, drowning, killing, breaking. Agony, pain, fear, panic, hate, hurt, rage, weakness, acidity, love, acceptance. Everything. Nothing.

NONONONONO

He pulled the trigger.