The familiar blade of her dagger glowed in the moonlight as Liz tucked it into one of her shoes at the end of the bed, she snuggled back into Cole's relaxed arms and struggled to fall back to sleep.

Flashes of memories struck her, screams of anguish and mercy, blood spilling over her fingers warm and slippery causing her stomach to roil in anxiety and disgust.

It had been years ago, on a cold, stormy night. Elizabeth stood under the neon lights of a street-side bar, a gold mask covering the left side of her face as she scoped out the surrounding area for any signs of movement.

A tiny cough alerted her as she saw a huddled pair running across the street, lightening flashing and making a path for them to see.

Sliding her dagger into her boot like she always did when pursuing, she hoisted herself up onto a window that led to a clothesline connecting between buildings.

Using years of experience she scaled across the thick rope and dropped onto a nearby balcony that led to a fire escape close to the ground.

"Mom we need to go!" A young child's whisper said. "We don't know whose coming or when they'll be here! We just need to go!"

"Hello there." Elizabeth whispered, roaming her fingers over the blade. "You two have been in some trouble lately haven't you ?"

The boy shot away from her, grabbing his mother's arm and hauling her to her feet.

"We didn't do anything wrong I swear! André is lying he only said those things because he thinks my mother and I are a threat!"

Elizabeth smirked. "André doesn't make mistakes dear one, now hold still, this will take only a moment." She said, stepping towards him with her dagger outstretched.

"He said something about the Mastersons!" The boy shrieked, throwing his arms up to somehow protect himself from the knife.

Her dagger froze in the air, the humming coming from it suddenly frozen at the child's words.

"What about the Mastersons." She bit out, clenching the knife beneath his throat. "Tell me!"

"H-He said they were searching for the last swan! That's all I heard I swear! I'm just trying to help my mother get to safety." He sobbed, collapsing to the ground with her knife still guarding him.

She growled under her breath, pulling away from the boy and woman, sheathing her dagger and walking away.

"There's no such thing as the--"

A loud thunk, followed by a guttural scream echoed in Elizabeth's ears. She spun around to find the older woman laying on the ground with an arrow through her chest.

The boy was screaming, weeping over his mother in grief, her blood pooling next to her as he rocked her limp body in his arms.

"You always were weak." André muttered, dropping from the roof of an apartment across the street. "I told you to get the job done and this is what you do! Allowing one of them to escape. You never show mercy. That's the number one rule and you threw it away."

Elizabeth refused to meet his eyes, staring harshly at the ground and watching as the boy behind her brother whispered his last words to his mother, pressed a kiss to his fingertips to close her eyes, before running into the alleys.

André scoffed and ripped the gold mask off her face. "You are a weakling! You crave for love and kindness just like all these other fools, you are unfit to be a called a Steele, you are unfit to be an assassin and you are unfit to be a part of this family!"

In the blink of an eye, he whipped her dagger from her boot and slashed her across the side of her face, causing her to stumble back and fall to the ground, not making a sound, but shaking from the searing pain that coursed through her body.

André turned away from her and walked in front of the alley the boy had run into, before looking back to stare at her in betrayal.

"You will never be my sister." He said menacingly, sprinting into the shadows with one final glimpse of his bow.

Thunder boomed and Liz screamed shooting up in bed, looking down to see Cole still fast asleep, probably dreaming in a world far, far away from her.

She rubbed at her eyes in frustration, feeling the jagged grafts of golden skin  that her brother had scarred onto her so long ago.

The scar heated beneath her skin, warming her hand while also alerting her to the ever growing inferno over her heart.

She wrestled with her shirt and yanked it open to see the swan necklace bursting forth with a white light , illuminating the room and creating a harsh red burn where it sat.

Liz ignored the burning and watched as the numbers on the bedside clock moved from 11:58 to 11:59.

She raised her dagger up from her boot and held it directly over Cole's chest, her hands shaking with fear at what she was about to do.

"You need to kill the boy Elizabeth!" Her brother's  word rang in her ear, causing her to lower the dagger closer, but his harsh black eyes entered her vision as other words muttered. "You will never be my sister."

Tears spilled down her cheeks, tears that hadn't been shed in nearly 6 years, but as she lowered the dagger to pierce Cole's heart, another blade shot up from the bed to block her attack.

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