It’s not much.
But it’s a start.
And for the first time in millennia, I think that might actually be enough.
THIRTY-FOUR
LAUREN
Waiting isits own special kind of torture, and right now, I’m pretty sure I’m in hell.
Not the fire-and-brimstone kind—more like the sitting-in-a-vampire-den-while-the-man-you-love-fights-literal-space-monsters kind. Which, ya know, wasn’t covered in any of my anxiety management therapy sessions.
I pace back and forth across the stone floor, my sneakers making soft squeaking sounds that echo in the cavernous room. Hannah and I have been taking turns entertaining Raven, who’s been flying loops around the ceiling for hours now. The only way to keep the kid quiet was to let her drop the glamour, and honestly, watching a tiny demon-child do barrel rolls is oddly soothing when you’re trying not to completely lose your shit.
We haven’t seen the vampires since they fled to whatever underground panic room they have. Smart. I’d hide too if giant space creatures were headed for the sun.
The news plays on an endless loop—footage of the Devourers flying toward space, over and over and over. I ran out of nails tobite about an hour ago, so now I’m working on the skin around my cuticles. Attractive, I know. Mom would be horrified.
Stop it, I tell myself.He’s fine. They’re fine. They have to be fine.
Except I have no idea if that’s true, do I? Because I let them fly off into actual space without me, and now all I can do is sit here like some damsel in a goddamn tower, waiting and hoping and?—
The door bursts open.
I shoot to my feet, heart in my throat.
It’s just Layden. He’d disappeared earlier to monitor things on his laptop—whatever “things” means when you’re tracking apocalyptic space creatures.
“The runes are gone!” he announces dramatically, like he’s delivering the final line in a play.
I look around, confused. Is this supposed to mean something to me? But everyone else reacts like he just announced Christmas came early.
“How?” Kharon asks, his deep voice cutting through the chatter.
“I don’t know,” Layden says, already typing furiously on his phone. “They just disappeared. The whole angelic AI—gone. Like it never existed. Which shouldn’t be possible because it was a learning entity. There’s no way to just scrub it?—”
“Look—” Hannah interrupts, pointing at the TV.
I spin toward the screen. A banner reading “Breaking News” scrolls across the bottom. Hannah grabs the remote and cranks up the volume.
The newscaster’s perfectly coiffed hair doesn’t move as he speaks. “We’re now receiving information from official sources that everything we’ve witnessed today was due to an incredible coordinated internet hoax, complete with deep-faked videos?—”
“Bullshit,” Layden mutters, eyes glued to his phone.
The newscast continues its government-sponsored gaslighting routine. Shelter-in-place orders. National Guard deployments. Everyone struggling to make sense of what they all saw with their own eyes that the news is now telling them didn’t happen.
I tune it out.
Because none of it matters. Not the conspiracy theories, not the government cover-up, not whether the world believes what happened.
All that matters is: where are they?
My heart pounds a double rhythm that sounds like their names.Remus. Romulus. Remus. Romulus.
The newscast drones on. Layden and Phoenix burst in with updates about the AI disappearing. Abaddon arrives and everyone starts arguing about what it all means, whether the threat is really over, whether Remus actually succeeded.
I can’t listen to this anymore.
