The smoke curled above the table like a noose. The echo of the last shot still vibrated in the room—a ghost that hadn’t yet realized it was dead. I slid down the wall, chest torn open—three rounds, center mass. Professional work. Clean, efficient. Except for the rug—twenty grand, handwoven in Naples, and I always hated that piece. I should’ve gone with the red one.

  Across the table, Vince lit a cigarette as if we were still at the club, still playing cards, as if he hadn’t just killed the man who raised him.

  “Can’t believe it,” I rasped, voice rough as gravel, each word scraping my throat raw. “You, of all people?”

  He didn’t answer. He didn’t even blink—just stared at the wall as if it held a million dollar painting (granted, it did).

  “Orders came down,” he muttered, barely loud enough for the dead to hear.

  I coughed—wet, sharp, spitting blood. “From who?” I spat. “I am the orders.”

  “You were,” he replied. “You were, Leon. Times change.”

  Something in me snapped. Not my heart—it had already been shot to hell—but something colder, something older: the part of me that still believed in loyalty.

  I laughed—a arsh, broken sound that hurt like hell. “I made you!” I screamed, teeth stained red with blood. “I took you in when nobody else would. Gave you my food, my name, your first button. You were nothing.”

  “Yeah,” he snapped, finally turning to face me, his eyes burning with a fire that wasn’t really his. “But you’re the one who started talking about family like it meant something—like this was more than just business.” His voice shook, cracked. “You forgot what this life really is.”

  I stared at him. Really stared—and I saw it: not a soldier, not even a traitor, but a scared kid in a suit too fine for him. Guilt, plain and simple, writhed in his eyes. It would’ve been easier if he had smiled, if he’d laughed, if he’d played the villain full-throated. But no, e looked like a kid who’d broken something he couldn’t fix.

  “No,” I whispered, “you did.”

  I saw it then—his old self, the boy I’d raised, weighed down by the cost of his choices. But it was already too late. Too damn late.

  I leaned my head back against the wall. The pain dulled; my fingers went numb. The world faded around the edges like cheap film burning in fire, and I thought, “This can’t be it. Not like this. Not alone on a goddamn rug I despised, gunned down by the closest thing I had to a son.”

  If there was anything left out there—God, devil, or whatever comes after—I was ready to deal.

  The pain didn’t stop—it just… wasn’t there anymore. As if someone had flipped a switch and left the light humming.

  Suddenly, I was somewhere else—floating between the bullet that killed me and the grave that was waiting to swallow me whole.

  At first, I thought it was a dream. But dreams have rules. This place didn’t.

  The world around me was… wrong. Shapes slid in and out of focus—a table without legs, a doorway opening into nothing but sky, shadows without a source. I was standing, but not on anything. Floating, but not moving. I looked down and saw nothing.

  Then I saw it.

  It hovered across from me, wreathed in a slow-churning mist the color of fresh blood. Not floating like a ghost, but present—like it had been here long before I arrived and would remain long after I was gone.

  At its center, suspended in the pulsing red fog, was a skull. Not bone-white, but blackened with age, scorched as if dragged through fire and forgotten. Cracks ran along its surface, glowing faintly with molten gold—as though someone had tried to stitch it back together with melted coins.

  There were no eyes—only deep sockets filled with red embers that watched me, weighed me, like a jeweler inspecting a flawed diamond. It didn’t wear a suit, but the red mist shifted around it like a tailored coat—sleek, fluid, constantly moving, as if trying to recall the shape of a man it once was, but failing.

  It smelled of scorched contracts and old cigar smoke.

  The skull didn’t walk. It didn’t need to. The mist moved as if it were breathing, coiling with purpose, drawing it closer, curl by curl. And its posture—the way it hovered, angled slightly forward, heavy with an unseen burden—was familiar. It carried the weight of a man who’d borne too many names, too many debts.

  The mist thickened. A warm, iron-scented fragrance slithered into my nose as it coiled around my feet.

  The skull, wreathed in that ever-churning red, drifted closer—close enough that I could almost hear the low rattle of breath it didn’t need. Or maybe that was mine. I couldn’t tell anymore.

  I stared back, jaw set, spine stiff, though my heart hammered in my ears.

  I’d faced death before—sent it to rest, even laughed in its face. But this… this wasn’t death.

  Then it spoke, its voice coming from everywhere at once—floorboards, ceilings, the very inside of my skull.

  “Leon Moretti.”

  The mist around the skull darkened, red pulsing like a heartbeat. Its sockets flared, casting long shadows that flickered with scenes—Vince as a kid, the first button I’d handed him, blood on a warehouse floor, a signature in a forgotten notebook.

  “You died bleeding. Betrayed. Alone. A king without a kingdom. Do you understand why?”

  I tried to speak, but my throat clenched—only air and fear emerged.

  It waited.

  “I trusted the wrong people,” I finally rasped.

  “You trusted the lie of loyalty. You confused power with love. You forgot that every family is still a contract.”

  The mist swirled tighter, wrapping around my legs until I couldn’t move.

  “I built something real,” I said, voice cracking. “Made a name that meant something.”

  “And it was taken. As all things built without balance must be.”

  “Balance,” I repeated bitterly. “You mean cost.”

  The skull drifted closer, its empty sockets burning like debts.

  “Everything has a price. Everything you had came at the expense of something you never paid.”

  I clenched my fists. “So what? You’re here to drag me under? Tear my soul apart? Send me to hell?”

  “I am not Hell. I am the Offer. I am the Witness. I am the record of every bargain made, honored, or broken. And I have come to give you a choice.”

  The fog pulsed like a heartbeat; my hands trembled even as I shoved them deep into my coat pockets.

  “…I’m listening.”

  “Another world. A place shaped by contracts. Ruled by power, by pacts, by price. You will be reborn—with your mind, your memory, your will intact. And me. Always me. You will have the power to deal.”

  My breath caught. “Magic?”

  “No. Authority. The right to bargain. The right to demand exchange. The right to rewrite your place in the world… one deal at a time.”

  I swallowed. My mouth was as dry as dust. “What do you get out of it?”

  The skull didn’t smile, but the mist did. “I get a vessel. A voice. A man who understands what it means to owe.”

  “And the catch?”

  “Equivalence must be maintained. Every gain must be paid. Every bargain leaves a mark. You may trade away more than you realize—even your own soul… piece by piece.”

  The words slammed into me like another bullet. But this time, I stood my ground.

  I thought of Vince, of the family I’d built, of a world that turned its back on me, of the power I had—and the greater power I’d never reached.

  Maybe this was damnation. Maybe it was a second chance. But I couldn’t turn away.

  “I want back in,” I said, voice steady.

  The skull drifted closer, its presence scorching behind my eyes. “Then speak it.”

  The air crackled with electricity. My lungs ached. But I said the words anyway: “I want to bargain.”

  The mist erupted in crimson light—and then the world went black.

  I woke up gasping.

  Air tore into my lungs like it had been waiting. My whole body jolted—limbs heavy, chest tight. My throat burned. I coughed and spat onto stone. Dark, wet, slick.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  The floor was cold beneath me—rough-cut stone, uneven. I braced my hands against it. They weren’t the hands I remembered. No, mine were thicker, scarred.

  I sat up slowly.

  The shrine around me wasn’t much. Whatever it had been—temple, tomb, sanctum—it had long since been abandoned. The stonework was stained, worn smooth in places by wind and rain. Pillars rose on either side, too many missing their tops. One leaned so far it had fused into the wall behind it.

  The roof was a patchwork of ruin. Beams jutted like ribs through shattered tile, and through the gaps above, the moon cast a pale, quiet light. It painted the whole place in silver and shadow. Dust hung in the air, caught like ash mid-fall.

  Vines crept along every surface. Thick, dark green, veined with red. Some bloomed with strange flowers—petals like parchment, brittle and curled. Statues lined the sides, half-consumed by moss. Weathered figures with blurred faces and twisted poses, hands raised or broken off. I couldn’t tell if they were saints or something older.

  Finally, at the far end, a broken altar. Cracked steps led up to a plinth where a stone pair of hands reached upward, frozen in offering. They held a rusted scale. One side gone. The other drooped low, stained dark—like blood had pooled there, long ago, and never washed clean.

  I stood.

  The bones in my legs felt younger than they should’ve. Stronger. No pain. No wounds. I pressed a palm to my chest out of habit. No holes. No blood. Just the steady beat of a heart that wasn’t supposed to be working anymore.

  I turned toward the shrine’s archway and stepped outside.

  The forest greeted me in silence.

  I didn’t go far. Just enough to stretch my legs. A dozen steps into the clearing, just past the cracked steps of the shrine. Tall trees loomed like old sentries, their trunks twisted, bark flaking like rusted iron. The sky above was a pale, washed-out gray, barely filtering through the canopy. I paused and scanned the treeline, like something might be watching. But there was nothing. Only the wind threading through the leaves

  I turned back.

  The shrine looked smaller from the outside. More broken. Statues, worn and faceless, lined the wall, their hands still reaching for something they’d never touch.

  I found a corner that hadn’t completely collapsed—just enough wall left to block the wind, with a slab of stone flat enough to sit on.

  I sank down slowly. The cold bit through the fabric, but I didn’t care. My body felt steady. Lighter, somehow. Even my thoughts had space to breathe for the first time in years.

  I leaned back against the wall. The damp moss pressed against my skin, and the scent of ancient stone filled my lungs. I closed my eyes, expecting no sleep—and yet, sleep came quickly, as though delivered by a sucker punch to the senses. No dreams, no noise—only darkness behind my eyelids and the soft hum of something ancient whispering at the edges of my mind.

  The first full day, I tried to play it smart.

  I marked the shrine with a scratch on the stone—two lines, clean and deep. Just in case I got turned around. Then I picked a direction and started walking.

  The forest didn’t open up. It swallowed.

  Every path looked like the last, like the trees rearranged themselves when I wasn’t looking. Moss clung to the bark in the shape of strange symbols. The leaves above let light through, but not warmth.

  I found a stream around midmorning. Cold, clear. I drank until I choked and splashed it over my face. I looked like hell. Paler. Younger. My stubble was gone. My old scars, too. I didn’t recognize the man staring back at me. Not really.

  I followed the stream uphill, hoping it would lead to some kind of road, maybe a village. Found nothing but stones, ferns, and mushrooms that pulsed faintly when I got close.

  By midday, the ache in my gut had turned to fire. My head was spinning. Everything tasted like copper. I hadn’t eaten in over a day—not in this body, anyway.

  That’s when the mist rolled in.

  It didn’t crawl. It didn’t whisper. It arrived—as if the trees had exhaled some ancient breath and let it out all at once.

  Red.

  Heavy.

  Familiar.

  I stopped walking the second it touched the ground. The air folded in on itself, thick like velvet soaked in oil. My skin prickled.

  "You," I muttered. My voice sounded small.

  The red mist pooled like blood at the roots, then rose—coalescing, twisting upward. A shape formed in the haze, slow and deliberate. A skull, grinning and silent, blooming out of the center like a flower made of ash. It wore the same black suit, not quite cloth, not quite real.

  “You are near collapse,” it said, voice low and layered like a thousand whispers stacked behind a door. “A bargain is available.”

  It sounded amused.

  I took a step back. “What the hell are you doing here? I thought we were done. I thought our deal was over.”

  The skull’s mouth didn’t change. Couldn’t. But somehow it felt like it smiled wider.

  “Do you not recall the terms of our agreement?” it asked. “You would be reborn—with memory, mind, and will intact. And me. Always me.”

  “Why?” I asked, jaw tight. “What do you want?”

  The skull leaned forward, inches from my face. There were no eyes—but I felt them sink into me.

  The skull leaned in close—its empty sockets burning like debts. “It is not what I want,” it replied, voice smooth as glass, “but what you need.”

  Before I could answer, the space between us split.

  With a sound like a quill dragging across parchment, a long, thin book unfurled in the air between us. It hovered in place, pages rustling though there was no wind. The cover was bound in something dark and too smooth. It bled light at the seams.

  “What is this?” I asked, hoarse.

  “The Ledger,” the skull answered. “The Ledger contains all contracts. All bargains made beneath this sky. Should you know a name, the record shall appear.”

  The pages turned, faster now—revealing contracts signed in languages I didn’t know, names I’d never heard. Some glowed. Others flickered like firelight. All of them thrummed with weight.

  I blinked.

  The skukk bowed slightly. “You carry my mark. The Domain of Bargain answers to you.”

  I swallowed the dryness in my throat. “And now you want another deal.”

  “Only if you require it.”

  It tilted its head, and the Ledger opened with a dry shhhhk, like paper catching flame in reverse. A fresh page turned itself, smooth and slow, and gold-red ink began carving across the parchment—alive, like veins spreading through skin.

  ? REQUEST: Sustenance & Covering

  ? COST: 900ml of blood, given willingly

  I blinked, then let out a slow whistle.

  “Nine hundred’s a damn specific number,” I muttered, wiping grit from my chin. “You got a measuring cup in there too?”

  No answer. Of course not.

  The skull hovered in the mist, unmoving, unblinking, as if this was the part it liked best—just waiting, watching, letting the weight of the deal settle in.

  I took a step closer, eyeing the page. The air around it felt different—heavier, like the humidity before a storm. And beneath that, something deeper thrummed in my gut. Familiar now. That same pressure I’d felt the first time: the itch behind the eyes, the pulse in the jaw. The deal was ready. It wanted to be made.

  The mist stirred, and the Ledger responded. From between the pages, a shape emerged—thin, floating, deliberate. A quill. Not a feather. This thing looked carved out of bone, polished to a shine. The tip gleamed wet and black.

  I reached out and took it. The quill was cold—smooth bone, carved and sharpened, no feather in sight. The moment my fingers closed around it, the Ledger shifted.

  ? SIGNATORY: Leon Vincenzo Marchesi

  ? REQUEST: Sustenance & Covering

  ? COST: 900ml of blood, given willingly

  ? STATUS: AWAITING COMPLETION

  The signature line glowed, stark and waiting. Nine hundred milliliters. Just under a liter. A pint and a half. Not fatal. Just enough to feel.

  “Fine,” I muttered. And I signed.

  My name flowed onto the page in thick red ink that shimmered like wine under a red light. Each letter curled perfectly, elegantly. I barely finished the last stroke when the page flared—crack—a clean, sharp pop that echoed in my ribs.

  Then it hit.

  The quill pulsed in my grip and suddenly I couldn’t let go. Something yanked inside me—hard. The blood didn’t spill—it rushed. Sucked straight from my veins like a valve had been opened somewhere deep in my arm. No wound, no pain at first—just pressure. Draining.

  I gasped, knees buckling. My heart lurched, like it had to sprint to keep up. Every vein in my body went tight with heat, then cold, then hollow. My vision swam—colors bleeding at the edges like the whole world was leaking out of me.

  The quill drew in everything. Blood ran up its shaft, not dripping but pulled, like gravity itself had turned traitor. It disappeared into the page, line by line, until every drop was swallowed.

  Then fire.

  Flames rippled across the parchment in gold and red. No heat, no smoke. Just hunger. They consumed everything—ink, blood, paper, even the space where my name had been. The air shimmered. The Ledger snapped shut with a soft thump, and the fire vanished, leaving only a thin coil of ash spiraling upward in silence.

  I staggered, catching myself on a nearby tree. My heartbeat was a drum in my throat. My skin went slick with sweat. A slow, heavy pressure bloomed behind my eyes like my brain was swelling to fill the space the blood had left behind.

  “Shit,” I muttered, grinding the back of my wrist against my forehead. My breath came short and sharp. My ears rang like I'd just stepped out of a firefight.

  I clutched the tree harder, waiting for the dizziness to pass. My body knew something was missing. It was scrambling to compensate, and it wasn’t doing a great job.

  Still. I was upright.

  Barely.

  The skull drifted backward, dissolving into the mist like a retreating tide. The fog peeled away with it, unveiling the reward—laid out neat, deliberate, like a display in a shop window.

  A cloak, thick and dark, hemmed in silver thread that caught the light like hoarfrost. Boots—scuffed leather, but solid, reinforced at the toes. A belt. A satchel, visibly heavy.

  I crouched—too fast—and the world dipped sideways. My vision thinned, edges darkening like burnt paper. I gritted my teeth and steadied myself with one hand on the dirt. The satchel's flap opened under my fingers: bread, cured meat, dried berries, and a full water skin. The smell alone almost made me keel over.. Like my body recognized salvation before I did.

  My stomach twisted tight, a knot of gratitude and dizziness. I hadn’t eaten in too long. I’d just lost nearly a liter of blood. My hands were shaking.

  I looked back up. The skull was still there, motionless.

  “So I can do this again?” I asked, voice thinner than I liked. “Any time I’ve got blood to spare?”

  The skull floated closer. Its voice slipped into the world like smoke under a door:

  “You carry my mark. You hold the Ledger. Speak what you seek—and name your price.”

  It lingered for a breath, as if letting the words settle, then began to dissolve. The mist pulled it back piece by piece—first the edges, then the shape, until only the voice remained.

  “What should I call you?”

  No answer. For a long moment, just silence. Then —

  “I am what you bargain with.”

  I snorted, lightheaded. “That’s not a name.”

  The mist curled once more, brushing past my face like breath. Then, closer than before, like it spoke directly into my ear:

  “Call me the Broker, if it helps. I am always nearby when the Ledger opens.”

  And just like that, the red haze pulled away, tugged off into the trees like smoke from a snuffed match.

  “Hell of a welcome wagon.”