The Port of Dover appeared as a purgatory of mist and yellowish headlights. The air was saturated with salt and exhaust fumes—a damp cold that seeped beneath clothing and seemed intent on freezing even one's thoughts. Oliver drove his sedan with the caution of a man transporting a cargo of dynamite. Beside him, Maya nervously scanned every Port Security patrol, while in the back seat, Azzurra was immersed in a fitful sleep, her fingers convulsively clutching Alfio's pendant.
They were only a few meters from the boarding ramp for the ferry that would take them to France—the first step toward their definitive descent into Sicily—when a line of black SUVs cut them off with the precision of a firing squad.
Oliver slammed on the brakes. The smoke from the tires mingled with the fog.
"It's her," Maya whispered, her voice cracking with fear.
Erica stepped out from the central vehicle. She was no longer wearing the elegant attire of the Grand Gala, but a smoke-gray tailored coat that made her appear like a steel blade driven into the pier. Behind her, in addition to two security men, stood a London lawyer and a local police officer, visibly uneasy about the private nature of the intervention.
Erica approached Oliver's window and tapped on the glass with a lacquered nail—a sharp sound that rang out like a sentence. Oliver lowered the window, his golden gaze fixed on the woman's eyes, which were filled with bile.
"Get out of the car, Oliver," Erica said, her tone calm and lethal. "And you, Maya, go home to your parents while they are still willing to pay your bail. This farce is over."
Azzurra woke up, her breath coming in gasps. She opened the door and climbed out of the car, leaning against the bodywork for support. Her legs were trembling, but the visceral call emanating from Elia's awakening gave her a stability that did not belong to her muscles.
"Aunt, move," Azzurra said with a firmness that made the woman's confidence waver. "We have to go. Samuele is waiting for us."
Erica erupted in a dry, joyless laugh. "Samuele is ash, Azzurra! And your father is a vegetable in a Messina hospital. Your mother is an unbalanced woman who nearly caused a massacre in a national theatre. I am the only one who can save you from spending your days in an institution—or worse. I have the documents here certifying your instability and the need for immediate family guardianship."
The police officer stepped forward. "Miss, Mrs. Erica has filed a report for the abduction of a minor and danger of self-harm. We must ask you to follow us until the situation is clarified by the youth court."
"Minor?" Oliver intervened, stepping out of the car and positioning himself in front of Azzurra like a shield. "I am an adult, this is my car, and Azzurra is here of her own free will. You have no right to stop us based on the report of a related-by-marriage aunt."
Erica took a step forward, her voice laced with ancient venom. "I am the only lucid relative in this country! Belinda forfeited the right to decide the moment she began filling this girl's head with fairy tales of mud and curses. That villa, that fund... everything must be managed by capable hands, not by a visionary widow and a man in a coma!"
Just as Erica signaled her men to seize Azzurra, the police officer's phone rang. Simultaneously, the lawyer accompanying Erica received an urgent notification on his tablet.
The silence that followed was broken only by the cry of the gulls. The officer listened for a few seconds, then looked at Erica with a glacial expression.
"Madam, your documents are worthless," the policeman said, putting away his phone.
"What are you saying? I am her aunt; I have the right to intervene!" Erica shouted, her voice rising an octave in hysteria.
"You are the wife of Mrs. Belinda's brother—a relative by marriage with no legal claim to parental authority," the officer explained with extreme coldness. "An official communication has just arrived from the Italian Consulate. The girl's father, Mr. Elia, is awake, lucid, and has electronically signed—along with the mother—a formal restraining order against you. Parental authority is fully in the hands of the parents. You have no guardianship power over Azzurra. None."
Erica turned pale, her lips trembling. The house of cards she had built, based on Elia's absence and Belinda's fragility, had collapsed under the weight of a signature made thousands of miles away.
"Furthermore," the officer continued, as his colleagues moved closer to Erica, "there is a pending report. Mrs. Belinda has filed a complaint against you for harassment and attempted manipulation of a minor. You are to be removed from this area immediately. If you attempt to follow the car or contact the girl, we will proceed with an immediate arrest."
Erica tried to scream something, to cling to the last shred of that authority that had never belonged to her—she, who was not a blood relative of Samuele; she, who had never understood the bond that united that family—but she was taken by the arms and escorted toward her SUV.
Azzurra looked at her one last time. "Aunt, you tried to manage a life that wasn't yours because you didn't have the courage to live your own. Go back to London. The mud is not for you."
Without granting her another look, Azzurra got back into the car. Oliver started the engine and, with a decisive press of the accelerator, left Erica and her ambitions of control behind. The legal matter had closed just like that, with bureaucracy finally recognizing the power of blood and will.
As Oliver's sedan climbed the ferry ramp, Azzurra felt the bond with Sicily turn incandescent. There were no longer any human obstacles. No more greedy aunts or London lawyers.
"We made it, Oliver," Maya said, breaking into a liberating sob in the front seat.
Oliver did not reply, but he squeezed Azzurra's hand. He knew that Erica was merely the shadow that had to be dispelled. The real monster, the Draunara, was waiting for them in the heart of the Strait, and now there was no one left to act as a shield between them and destiny.
"Yes," Azzurra replied, looking at the black horizon toward France. "But now the real dance begins. Dad and Samuele have opened the door. It's up to us to walk through."