The consumed souls Harlow told us about must be here, under the place we called home.
"We can't do this with just the two of us," I say, gesturing for the both of us to return. The shadows press in behind us immediately, bolder than before, the thin screaming sound following us up through the tunnels, growing louder with every turn until we burst out into the courtyard at a dead run.
We find our other mates there, along with Dante who looks even paler than when we arrived earlier, if that’s even possible. "What did you find down there?" Dante asks, his face twisted up with concern.
"Where the corruption is rooted," Rumi says, tumbling over his words as he catches his breath. "There’s old tunnels and it feels like Dmitri has been building in them for a long time. There's a chamber full of consumed essences,thousandsof them."
Dante closes his eyes, letting out a heavy sigh.
Skye drags a hand through his hair before taking a moment to look at all of us. “Then we go tomorrow into the tunnels, find out where he’s anchored himself, and destroy it. Burn it out. I’m not even sure. I just know that to end this, we need all six of us.”
"We're not ready for a full confrontation," Ambrose says. "The combination is still incomplete—"
"If we wait, he consumes everyone here,” Skye explains, reaching for Ambrose’s hand. “I’m not sure we have a choice but with three of you traveling for the last few days, we don’t have enough strength. So tomorrow morning, we’ll go down there. It might be the last chance we have to stop this.”
16
Ambrose
Nobodyeatsmuchthenext morning. Jade made breakfast from whatever he could scrounge in the sanctuary kitchens, though it sits on the table between us mostly untouched while we don't avoid talking about what's coming. Skye is the only one eating, forcing fuel into his body because he knows he'll need it later.
I've been running numbers in my head since before dawn. Not the sanctuary corruption rates or the barrier integrity calculations. Those I finished hours ago, and the answers aresimple enough that I don't need to run them twice: we go today or the damage becomes permanent.
The numbers I can't stop running are the ones that don't have answers. Probability of the combination succeeding. Probability of all six of us surviving what's in those tunnels. Probability that the consumed essences in the chamber can actually be freed, or whether three centuries of compression has dissolved them past the point of recovery.
Every calculation comes back incomplete because the variables I need don't exist yet. I don't know what the combination will cost. I don't know what Dmitri is capable of when he's cornered. I don't know if complete surrender means losing ourselves in the process of becoming something larger, or if we come back from it as the people we were before.
I have been alive for centuries. I have written thousands of contracts. Every single one of them had terms. Conditions, costs, boundaries, clauses that defined exactly what was being exchanged and what the price would be. I find the cost, I name it, I write it down, and then the parties involved can make an informed choice about whether the price is worth paying.
There is no contract for what we're about to do. No terms to negotiate, no price to name in advance, no clause that guarantees we get back what we put in. The combination requires complete surrender, and complete surrender is the antithesis of everything that I am, even embodying darkness itself and the essence of a Crossroads Keeper. You don't sign a contract with blank terms. You don't agree to a deal when the cost is "everything, possibly including your life, with no guaranteed return." That's not a contract. That's a leap of faith, and I have spent centuries building a life specifically designed to avoid leaps of faith.
Skye finishes eating and pushes his plate back. "How are the barriers?"
"Holding. The network contributions stabilized them overnight, and Dante's been reinforcing the anchors since dawn." I pull up a monitoring thread and check. "The eastern dormitories are still the weakest point, but the students have been moved to the western wing. We've done what we can from up here."
"And below?"
"Below is a different question entirely."
He nods, and the look he gives me is the one that always makes my chest tight, the one that sees past the calculations and the contracts and the centuries of carefully maintained composure to the person underneath who is scared and trying very hard not to show it.
"We'll be okay," he says.
"You don't know that."
"No. But I believe it."
The difference between knowing and believing has never felt wider. I deal in knowledge. Verified, contractual, binding knowledge with penalties attached for breach. Belief is Skye's territory, the unquantifiable conviction that things will work out because the people involved are worth betting on. I've watched him lead with belief for months now and it still unsettles me, the way he makes decisions based on trust instead of data, the way it keeps working even when the numbers say it shouldn't.
He reaches across the table and covers my hand with his, but he doesn't say anything else, knowing more words won't help.
Jade collects plates and stacks them on the counter, his tail flicking behind him with the restless energy that means his hunger is running high. He catches my eye as he passes and presses his palm flat against my back for a moment without breaking stride. The warmth of the contact spreads through my shirt, and I feel a pulse of refined energy flow from him into me, the same trick he used on the trail when I collapsed. He's beendoing it in small doses since we arrived, feeding me strength he converts from the ambient anxiety permeating the sanctuary. He never asks if I need it. He just gives it.
"Thank you," I say.
"Don't mention it." He pauses. "Actually, do mention it. I like being appreciated."
Stellan laughs, the sound cracking something loose in the room. The moment falls back into silence before Skye stands, stretching a little and then gestures for us to go. No one says anything, each of us sharing a glance and a nod before heading through the sanctuary toward the tunnel entrance.
