Thorne’s gaze goes distant for a moment, as if he’s hearing Delia’s voice in his head. Then he smirks. “If you do go, prepare yourself. They have something called traffic. And bagels. The bagels are worth the traffic.”
“I do not know what either of those things are,” I say.
“You will,” he replies.
The idea lodges in my mind like a pebble in a streambed—not large, but persistent. The kind that catches other bits of debris and slowly builds a dam.
New Jersey.
A realm of salt and steel and bright, stubborn mortals who shout at one another in crowded streets and still manage to send their bravest into burning buildings.
A realm that has already given Nightfall three viyellas who have changed everything.
I look once more at the bonds shining between my brothers and their mates, at the way the light threads through them, down, down, into the bones of the realm itself.
The crown is still silent.
The SoulTakers still gather in the cracks.
The war is not done.
But perhaps…
Perhaps there is still room in all this ruin for one more miracle.
“Do not get your hopes up,” I tell my own treacherous heart, setting my tankard aside. “We go to strengthen the wards in the morning.”
“After that?” Kael asks.
I roll my shoulders, wings flexing slightly beneath my cloak. The stone under my boots hums with anticipation I refuse to acknowledge.
“After that,” I say slowly, “I might look at a map.”
Alaric grins. “I have one labeled Earth Realm Eastern Seaboard.”
“Of course you do,” I mutter.
Thorne lifts his goblet toward me in silent toast. “To Dagan. May his thunderhead finally find a place to strike.”
I snort.
But I raise my own cup.
“To Nightfall,” I say. “To the Vein. To the worlds we keep from breaking.”
I pause.
The words taste odd as I add the last.
“And… to Jersey,” I say grudgingly.
Kael whoops. Alaric laughs. Thorne nearly chokes on his drink.
Above us, the stone ceiling gives a soft, approving rumble.
The earth likes the idea.
I pretend I do not.
