I collapse forward, my forehead thumping against the old man’s bloody chest, my sweat mixing with his tears. I am spent, hollowed out, and reborn.
Ryker drops the iron. It clatters onto the floor, hissing in a puddle of blood. He leans over both of us, his shadow swallowing the chair whole.
“The baptism is complete,” Ryker says, his voice a dark benediction. “Now, let’s go see if the city is ready to meet its new gods.”
The sub’s engines change pitch, a deep, stomach-churning vibration that signals our ascent. I’m still slumped over the man who used to be my father, my chest heaving against his cooling skin, the slick heat of Jex still pulsing inside me. The metallic tang of the air has become a living thing, thick enough to swallow.
Jex slowly withdraws, the sound a wet, visceral slide that makes me whimper at the sudden hollowness. He doesn’t pull away completely; he stays close, his sweat-dampened chest a furnace against my back. He reaches around, his fingers—still stained with the dark crimson of our father’s tongue—tracing the curve of my hip.
“Look up, Hallow,” Jex rasps, his voice a jagged edge of pure adrenaline. “Don’t close your eyes now. We’re almost to the surface.”
Ryker is already at the hatch, his silver mask gleaming like a polished skull in the red light. He doesn’t look back at the ruin in the chair. To him, the old man is already a ghost, a piece of equipment that’s outlived its usefulness. He grabs a heavy, matte-black tactical coat from a locker and tosses it over my shivering shoulders.
“The thermal charges are set to detonate the moment we breach the waterline,” Ryker says, his eyes fixed on the depth gauge. “The Cathedral of Oakhaven will be the first to go. Then the courthouse. Then every houseon the hill that looked the other way while they bought and sold us.”
I pull the coat tight, the heavy material scratching against my raw, sensitive skin. I look at the man in the chair one last time. He’s barely a man now—just a mangled collection of sins and fading pulses. He tries to look at me, his eyes wide with a final, pathetic plea for mercy.
I lean in, my mouth inches from his ear, whispering through the low roar of the rising sub.
“You told me once that blood is the only thing that matters,” I hiss, my teeth baring in a predatory grin. “You were right. It’s the only thing that stains this deep.”
I reach out and flick the final switch on the armrest of his chair. The restraints don’t loosen—they tighten, the motorised winches groaning as they pin him even harder against the metal.
The sub hits the surface with a violent jolt, the pressure equalising with a deafening hiss. Ryker throws the hatch open, and the scent of the city hits me—not salt and ozone, but smoke. Burning rubber. Terror.
Above us, the sky is an angry, glowing orange. The first explosion ripples across the water, a shockwave that rattles the sub’s hull. The Oakhaven Cathedral, the crown jewel of our father’s “pure” city, erupts in a fountain of white-hot thermite and shattering stained glass.
Jex hauls me up the ladder, his hand firm on my waist. We stand on the narrow deck of the submersible, the black water of the harbour churning around our boots. In the distance, the city is a jagged silhouette of fire.
Ryker stands at the prow, the silver mask reflectingthe burning skyline. He turns to us, the wind whipping his hair, the light of the destruction making him look like a god of the end times.
“Welcome home, siblings,” Ryker shouts over the roar of the flames. “Let’s go claim our inheritance.”
Behind us, inside the dark belly of the sub, the Father is left alone in the dark, watching the city he built turn into a funeral pyre.
Chapter
Thirty
RYKER
The air on the surface doesn’t taste like freedom. It tastes like the end of the world.
I stand on the narrow, slick deck of the submersible, the silver of my mask drinking in the orange glow of Oakhaven’s funeral pyre. Behind me, the harbour water is black and churning, reflecting the jagged teeth of the skyline as it begins to crumble. The Cathedral is gone—nothing but a skeleton of glowing ribs and falling stone.
I can feel Hallow behind me. She’s leaning against Jex, her body mapped in the blood of the man we left in the dark below. She looks like a wraith birthed from the soot, her eyes wide and reflecting the beautiful, chaotic heat of the city’s collapse.
“It’s louder than I thought it would be,” she whispers, her voice barely carrying over the roar of the fires.
“That’s the sound of a vacuum, Hallow,” I say, notturning around. I watch a secondary explosion ripple through the Financial District—the Choir’s work is surgical, beautiful. “When you remove the head of a beast, the body thrashes before it dies. We’re just listening to the nerves snap.”
I turn to look at them. Jex has his arms wrapped around her, his chin resting on the crown of her head. He looks satisfied—the primal hunger in his eyes replaced by a cold, sharp clarity. He’s a soldier who finally found a war worth winning.
“The extraction team is at the North Pier,” Jex growls, his gaze shifting to the burning docks. “But we have a problem. The Council’s private guard didn’t retreat to the bunkers. They’ve barricaded the bridge. They’re looking for a body to pin this on.”
I feel a slow, predatory smile spread behind my mask. “Good. I’d hate for this to be easy. A throne isn’t worth sitting on if you didn’t have to wade through a river of shit to get to it.”
I walk toward them, my boots clanging on the metal deck. I reach out, my gloved hand cupping Hallow’s jaw. The blood on her skin has dried into a dark, cracking mask of its own. She looks perfect—a ruined god for a ruined age.
