Osip's head is still dipped. From this angle, if you didn't look close, you could swear he was just some smart-ass teen who'd just been caught graffitiing something. "She was screaming at me, like I was some monster, some street rat." A muscle in his jaw tightens. "That she was going to tell the cops, tell anyone who'd listen about what I did. That I'd have to kill her too." His hands fist, then relax. "I could've killed her-but I didn't."

"Want a medal?" Ludmil quips.

"Enough," my lieutenant Radovan grumbles. "We've heard his side. Let's get this over with."

I twist my head his way. "That's for me to decide."

He scowls, but stays shut the fuck up.

I pace. Down here, the air is musty with stone. A single skylight opens to the air above-right over the red chair. Wind whistles through. It should rain, but it hasn't yet.

What I should do-must do-is obvious.

He broke the rule. The price for breaking it is his life. There has never been any debate over this.

And yet ... he's my brother. The last I have left of my blood. My only family. My Osip.

We came up together, we built this together, we swore we would rule it together. How can I abandon him to suffer alone? How can I wield the executioner's ax myself?

That red chair... it always does something to the body of whoever's sitting on it. Osip, always the strutter, the lax leaner-he has his legs splayed and tapping, but he's hunched over into himself, like someone's struck him in the gut.

The chair is curved red wood, inscribed with creatures, tortured humans crawling and screaming all over each other. It is not a pretty sight.

"Does anyone else have anything to say?" I ask the room.

"I was the one who had to help clean up the mess." Maksim makes a face. On his young features, the scowl is ugly. Out of place. "That wife's in the psych ward, and we just wasted a good ten grand paying off a variety of professionals to stay quiet. That should speak for itself."

Over the answering murmurs, Osip says, "What did I tell you idiots already? She wouldn't say anything. And I'll pay back the money myself. I wipe my ass with ten thousand. What is money to me?"

Silence.

"It's not just about the money," someone else blurts out.

Osip twists around, scanning the unsympathetic faces for the one who spoke. Not finding him, he rises, then sits back down again. "Forget it. None of you are gonna listen to me. You're all hopped up with your stupid, righteous rules. Hate to break it to you, but what I did is what we do every other day. You wouldn't lose sleep over a dead Skull King pledge, would you? And Skull Kings are lower than dirt! So why lose sleep over this bastard and his whore, who were even less than that?" He rises again, spreads his arms. "But if that's enough to make you crucify me, then so be it. Be my fucking guest. I won't beg for your mercy."

"You know the rules," I say for the hundredth time since Maksim first came to me with the news of Osip's crime. I speak only to Osip, hoping beyond hope that he'll hear me. Repentance is his only chance to survive this council. "We don't kill civilians, no matter what they do. No matter who they are. You know that."

Osip's hands are together in one clench. "Not like you've never come close."

He knows the answer to that already, though I say through gritted teeth, "Not the same."

Osip's voice rises, too loud. "Come now, Gavril, tell me-you've never come close to harming even one precious civilian?"

The room is rustling with what I'm wondering and the echoes of Osip's voice. How far Osip will push me before-

"Why don't you tell us about just how close you came?"

That's it.

The next second, I'm at the chair, kicking it over. Osip splays to the ground, laughing and cursing. I press my shoe into his throat.

"I've never killed a civilian," I tell the room quietly, "And I never will. No man is above the rules. Not even the boss."

Crumpled on the ground, Osip still manages to shoot me a look of pure disdain. "You're drawing an arbitrary line in the sand, a before and after-"

"One you agreed to yourself-"

"And those who don't blindly follow just get screwed over, is that it?"

He's doing it, what Osip always does the few times we've fought: jab and jab and jab at me until I crack. Until we scrap, punch, and rip at each other, until the fight's over, the grievance forgotten or solved.

But this time, things can't be solved like that. He has gone too far for such simple redemption.

"You know what you did," I repeat in an even tone. "You knew the rules."

"What difference does it even-"

"Make?" I close my eyes. Never did I expect to see the day when I'd have to explain this to my own brother. The one who founded the Bratva Syndicate alongside me and our brothers in cities across the continent, all those years ago. "It's what keeps us human beings. What makes us different than the Skull Kings or any of the other filth on the streets. Without it, we're no better than they are."

"Who wants to be better? Who needs a code that limits and hinders more than it helps?"

More murmuring. I should have cut Osip off long before. Days, weeks, maybe even years ago-this has been simmering.

Now, it's time to stamp it out.

What I say next isn't for him. It's for my men. "The Bratva isn't just about power. That's not why we formed it, or why all you men joined it. Nor is it just about the riches. Not merely brotherhood or family. No." I look at each of them. "We joined because we believed in a better world. Not one that was limited by the outside world's morality-but one of our own choosing. A world we could shape to our very own limitlessness." I bow my head. "But if we start disregarding the very laws we ourselves formed, if we start forgetting why we're even here or in this at all, then there's no point. We might as well break up and take what we can now."

Silence, broken only by Osip's bitterly muttered, "Your own brother."

I don't even glance his way. This isn't about him anymore. I'm not going to convince him of anything; I can see that now.

No, he is lost, but the others ... I scan the crowd again. All the cracks have sealed in. My men's faces are hard with trust in me.

"So," I say, "Does any man here agree with Osip? Does any man think our rules are outdated, limited? Does any man want to leave?"

Silence yet again. My men's faces are stiff with certainty. They know what the Bratva means to them, just as well as they know what I must do.

Ludmil clears his throat. He's right. That's enough.

Enough talk. Enough speeches. Enough sidestepping around the one thing that can't be sidestepped any longer. What we're all here for.

I stop before Osip.

It's time.

"Osip Vaknin," I say. "You have been accused of the murder and defilement of civilians, and as the don of this Bratva, I find you guilty. Your punishment is ..."

My voice trails off. The last word dies on my lips: execution is what I should say.

But I can't say it.

I swallow, try again.

No words come.

The murmuring is growing. There's a buzzing in my ears.

Do it. Just do it.

Osip is sneering up at me. I can't just let him go.

My own brother.

Please, Gavril, you have to look after him. I won't always be ... I'm not going to ... Please, Gavril...

My voice speaks of its own accord: "Your punishment is ... exile."

And then I stand there as the room erupts in stunned whispers. No less stunned than the shock waves in my head.

What have I done?

The punishment for breaking the rules is death. No exceptions.

After my brother broke one of our most basic rules, I've just broken another.

And still, Osip is unsatisfied.

On his feet now, Osip races for me. He's going for pity now. "Gavril, brother. Please. This is me. Your Osip. You can't."

My men get to him first, seizing his arms as he struggles.

"C'mon, guys." His head does another hopeful scan of the crowd. "It's me. How long have I been here?"

Nothing.

"I made this shit!" he yells into the silence.

I want to look away. I don't.

Even once they've got him in a full body-lock, eyes bulging, sweat-wet hair whipping every which way, my brother jabs ineffectually in an attempt to free himself.

That is Osip for you. A Vaknin. A man of the Bratva. A fighter, even to the very end.

I meet his hate-slitted stare. The rest of the words come easily, now that the decision's been made. "Radovan will take you to the bus station, with enough money to get you to Chicago. If you return here, I'll kill you myself."

Still, he makes those useless, almost insect-like jerks to free himself. As they lead him away, he strains his head around to glare at me. "Your own brother. Your own brother."

And then he's gone, his accusing stare still cutting into me somehow.

"That's all," I tell the others. "Leave now."

They file out quickly, quietly. Even a fool would know better than to disturb me now. In the next room, I can hear the conversation I cut short start up again.

I have made a mistake. One that may prove to be costly.

There is nothing more to be done now.

"Just promise me ..."

"We're gonna do it. You and me. Brothers, warriors. The Vaknin Bratva. It sounds good, doesn't it?"

No. Not the time to think of that, the memories crowding in my mind, threatening to break free and wreak havoc.

"Boss?"

I'm not alone after all. Ludmil has stayed behind. He is looking at me with his sad, too-light eyes like he already knows how little I want to hear what he has to say.

And yet, he has to. It's his job as my advisor: telling me things I don't want to hear. As my ears and eyes in the Bratva, what he does for me is vital.

"The others, they thought-we all thought-"

"I know."

I glare at the red chair. How to explain it, when I can't even explain it to myself?

"He's my brother, Lud."

Ludmil is looking at the red chair too. "Yes. But the rules-"

"No family, no friends. No exceptions."

My own words, turned against me.

I can still remember how intent we were, writing out those words on the paper, signing it with blood from our pricked fingers. How we put out hands on the document, one atop the other, saying the words, "I swear to follow the code, from now until the moment I ..."

"I won't lie to you," I tell Ludmil. "I couldn't do it." His quiet leaves room for more. All I have to add is, "Perhaps that makes me weak."

More quiet. Ludmil is an odd mix-a talker and a thinker at once. An asset, unquestionably. A friend. "You are not weak." His voice is loud with the force of belief.

I glance over. His bald head is a study in certainty. All hard angles, deep-set blue eyes.

A muffled shout farther off-Osip's, no doubt-reaches us.

Ludmil glances that way. "Do you really think-"

"Osip has always loved to flout authority," I admit, "but he's not suicidal."

Ludmil's brows leap.

"You can tell the men to kill him on sight-my orders," I tell him.

One mistake need not follow another. I let pity get in the way of reason once. Not again. I turn to look at the doorway where I saw my brother for the last time. Ludmil still lingers. "Everyone has their weaknesses," he finally says.

I nod. "Until they conquer them."

My gaze wanders. The council room seems smaller without the other Bratva men.

"Whiskey?" Ludmil offers. There's something at the corner of his lips. A sad smile that wants to shed the sadness.

I have to smile. "The contents of your official-looking leather briefcase revealed."

Ludmil grins full-out. "Got me. I figured, after a day like this ..." He takes a swig, passes it to me.

We stand there drinking, passing it back and forth. Until I tell him, "I can go, you know."

Ludmil hands me the Macallan M bottle back, takes a step away.

"You don't have to," I tell him.

"But you want me to," he says.

"Yes," I admit.

He nods. If that hurt, he knows better than to let it show. "Goodnight, don."

Yes, Ludmil really does know me well. And in his absence, there's another. Standing here, all alone ... No, perhaps not. It's just me and my memories after all.

I wander into the midst of the circle, and stop at the red chair. Long-forgotten voices crowd in my head.

So, we meet again.

I sit down, take a swig of the whiskey.

Your own brother ... We'll be kings of the city ... Promise me, please, Gino ...

Another swig.

Maybe, one day ...

No.

Exile is exile. I can never see Osip again.

And yet.

The whiskey is already working its magic on my brain. Thoughts are escaping me.

Like the idea that, perhaps one day, when we're old and tired-out and dying anyway, maybe I'll see him again. For an afternoon. An hour. A few minutes. A wave.

I rise, throw my gaze up.

Remaining here, drunk and alone, is a fool's idea. A coward's pastime. I should get up and go about my business. And yet, I can't force myself to leave. Not until I've sorted out this cancer of the mind.

Today, my own mind turned against me. My emotions got the better of my logic. I succumbed to weakness.

Osip always had to die; I knew that.

But now he walks free, because of what I did.