She shook her head. “He must have known,” she said. “Dad always knew this would happen. Mom’s dreams… He knew. He used to talk about a night that smelled like smoke and iron. He told me he might not walk away from it. He must have said goodbye in his head before he walked through that door.”
Her lips pressed against my palm and my heart twisted.
“Grace, I…” I started.
I wanted to tell her everything. That I had dragged Bael down for her. That I would do it again. That the sight of Virgil hanging in the air would never leave me. That I loved her so much it scared me more than Hell.
She opened her eyes and met mine.
“I know, Peter,” she said. “I love you too.”
The words settled in the space between us. Simple and true. No rituals or spells between us, just a fact laid bare in a room that still held the ghost of her father’s last breath.
I let out a long, shaking breath. Her thumb stroked my cheek. My other hand rose to her waist, fingers curling into the fabric of her shirt, needing to feel that she was real and warm and here.
Behind her, Seraphine bowed her head over Virgil’s body on the floor. For that small stretch of time, I stayed in the basin withGrace’s face above mine, her cheek in my palm, her words in my chest.
Hell could keep its screams. I was exactly where I needed to be.
GRACE
The funeral felt so long, and the church was full. Royal Bastards lined the pews, all wearing their cuts. Old friends from the Quarter, people who owed my father their lives. My mother sat in the front pew with her hands twisted around a worn handkerchief, her shoulders shaking. The closed casket rested under a spray of white lilies. My father would have hated it all. I smiled as I thought of him whispering in my ear, telling me the flowers smelled like a hospital.
I sat beside my mother, our arms pressed together as we heard stories and memories of my father were shared by friends and family as they each took their turn at the podium. No one said the word, demon. No one mentioned possession. They talked about sacrifice. They talked about a calling. They talked about a stubborn man who never quit on anyone. They did not talk about how he died with Bael’s power around his throat or how it was my fault.
After the service, the burial passed in a blur as the coffin was lowered into the ground. Someone handed me a rose, I don’t remember who, and I dropped it onto the polished wood and watched it disappear as more dirt was shoveled onto it.
The clubhouse wake had already started by the time we made it back to the property. The music was low. The bar was open. People spoke in soft voices, laughter breaking here and there but it was quiet, as if they were afraid of it and needed it at the same time. Food filled a long table, most of it untouched.
I stood near my mother under the shade of the big oak for as long as I could. Barythaya’s eyes were red, but there was a steadiness in her that I recognized. She had seen death before. She had seen worse things than coffins. She held me as if she wanted to fold me back into herself and never let go.
“He said goodbye before he left,” she whispered against my hair. “Your father. He kissed my forehead. He held my hands. He told me to let him go if it was his time. I did not want to hear it, but I heard it. I think I knew.”
Fresh tears burned my eyes. “I could have stopped him,” I said. “If I had just… if I had fought harder…”
She pulled back and cupped my face in her palms.
“No,” she said. “This is not your fault. You were fighting for your own soul, Grace. He knew what he was walking into. He made his choice, like he always did. Your father loved you more than his own life. This was how it was always going to end for him. In a fight. Doing what he thought was right.”
“He died because of me,” I whispered.
“He died for you,” she said. “There is a difference. Do not twist it into something ugly. Do not let that thing win twice.”
She pulled me back into her arms. We stood like that for a long moment, swaying slightly, the murmurs of the crowd moving around us. When she finally let go, she kissed my forehead.
“Go breathe, baby,” she said. “Go find your man. I see the way he looks at you. He needs you too.”
I gave a small, broken laugh and kissed her cheek, then drifted away. I wandered through the clubhouse yard, throughthe clumps of people who stopped me with soft words and sad eyes.
“I’m so sorry for your loss.”
“He was a good man.”
“Your daddy saved my boy once. I will never forget it.”
“He was proud of you, you know that?”
I nodded. I thanked them. I smiled where I could and listened where I had to. Their sympathies slid over me without meaning, my grief just settled in deeper.
