The line between fear and desire had blurred last night.
It won’t happen again.
Why did those words disappoint him?
He needed to clear his head. “I’m going to do a few sprints to wake myself up,” he said.
Ada hesitated.
“I won’t go far,” Yiran assured.
Before she could say anything, he took off.
The wind sang in his ears as he ran. But when he stopped and turned around, the mist had swallowed up his crew. Still, he thought he could hear Ada’s footsteps and the faint humming from Eddy.
The cold had woken him, but it didn’t put to rest the ghost of Yuki’s kiss. It lingered on his lips, haunting his thoughts. He wanted to scour the feel of it from his flesh, exorcise the thought from his memory. Why hadn’t he reported Yuki’s trespassing? Was it the guilt of letting the Hybrid leave unscathed that was stopping him? Or was it the shame of wanting to see Yuki again?
Yiran wrinkled his nose. The smell from the marsh was getting stronger. Maybe he’d wandered farther than he thought.
It took him a second to notice it had gotten quiet. Eerily so.
And it took him the next second to realize he could no longer hear Eddy’s song.
47
Rui
...he is waiting beneath the stairway to heaven...
There was only one place in the city that fit that description: the new office tower at Outram. And the only thingbeneathit was the old subway station. Nikai had picked a strange meeting place, but maybe he had his reasons.
The shuttle off the island came quickly, and soon Rui was on her way into the city. She had studied the network of subterranean tracks once when she got curious about the underground magic community. An easier way to Outram would be to take the train to the stop after and backtrack on foot, but the faster way was going through the tunnel itself. Nikai was waiting for her with news of the vessel—news that could help her fulfill the end of the bargain with Ten. She wasn’t going to keep him waiting.
Rui sprinted to the subway gantry and slipped into the train as the doors were closing. It emptied out at the next stop. Stroke of luck. No one to witness what she was about to do.
She made her way to the door between compartments, waiting anxiously as the train rumbled on for the next few stops. As it curved between stations, she pried the door open and jumped. Dusting herself off, she crept northward alongside the tracks. Gradually, her eyes adjusted to the orange light cast from occasional lamps attached to the graffitied walls.
There.A fork in the path ahead.
The stench of sewage was strong, and the old tracks damp. Water from small puddles splashed beneath her boots, wetting the hem of her jeans. Rats and other creatures scurried out of her way as she crashed through, not bothering to hide her presence. Something caught her eye. She shone her phone light at the scratched-up metal sign hammered to the wall. She was almost there.
Another left turn and Rui found herself at the abandoned station. Built in a time when subway trains had fewer cars, the platform was shorter than what she was used to and there was no barrier between the tracks and the platform. Panting, she heaved herself up from the tracks.
“Nikai?” she shouted. “I’m here!”
The place was in a state of disrepair. Dirty scuffed-up floors, tiles falling off in places to reveal concrete, mildewed ceilings dripping with runoff... But the electricity was still running, and half the lights were flickering.
Rui peered into the broken windows of the stationmaster’s office. There was nothing but old cabinets and machinery and what looked like a decades-old burger wrapper.
There was no sign of the Reaper.
“Nikai?” Her voice echoed. Did Seven send her to the wrong place, or had Rui misunderstood her instructions?
Something red edged into her vision.
Rui looked up.
A tall, slender figure was moving gracefully toward her. But in that grace, something darker lived.
