Chapter 30
THIRTY
LAUREN
“What’s happening?” Remus’s impatience crackles through the air, echoing my question.
“Goddammit, Remus.” Abaddon’s voice carries the weight of someone who’s had to repeat himself one too many times.
“You and Romulus need to figure out whatever’s off between you two because it’s really fucking obnoxious to have to say everything twice.
The end of the world meeting we had this morning? It’s happening.”
The words hit me like ice water.
End of the world meeting?
My heart lurches into my throat as I sprint across the room to where they’re huddled at the door. Wait—this morning? When I was stewing in my feelings for Remus like some romance novel heroine, they were planning for the actual apocalypse?
“Stay here.” Remus’s command is gruff as he steps through the doorway, one massive hand already shoving the door closed in my face.
Oh, hell no.
“Are you kidding?” I jam my body through the narrowing gap before he can shut me out completely. The door’s edge catches my shoulder, but I don’t care. “He just said end of the world! I’m not just staying huddled in a dark room like some damsel waiting to die!”
My voice comes out sharper than I intend, but honestly? After everything—after finally getting Remus to open up, after pouring my heart out—now he wants to lock me away while the world ends?
Not happening.
Movement catches my eye down the hallway. The other women are pushing out of their doors too, babies swaddled against their chests in makeshift cloth carriers that look like they were fashioned from bedsheets and sheer determination. These women aren’t going to sit around waiting either.
“Where you go, we go.” Ksenia’s voice is iron wrapped in silk, and it’s the kind of tone that says she’s had this argument before and won.
“We don’t have time.” Abaddon’s curtness would be intimidating if his eyes weren’t already tracking to Hannah, the woman beside Ksenia. His whole body angles toward her like a shield, protective and desperate all at once. “And I need to know you’re safe.”
“Are any of us safe?” Hannah grasps his massive forearm, her fingers barely wrapping halfway around. The gesture is tender despite the urgency crackling through the air. “Better not to be separated.”
Abaddon looks like he wants to argue—his jaw works, his nostrils flare—but something in Hannah’s expression makes him relent. “Follow me.” The words come out like gravel. “And stay close.”
We do. Our group becomes a tangle of monsters and mortals, hurrying down the hallway in a chaotic rush that feels both purposeful and panicked.
The women clutch their babies. The brothers move with predatory grace even in their urgency.
And me? I’m half-jogging to keep up with Remus’s long strides, my mind still spinning.
End of the world. They said end of the world.
We’re heading back toward the large central courtyard where we first entered—where the helicopter landed what feels like days ago but was probably only hours.
My sense of time is completely shot. Are they planning to evacuate again?
Load us all up and fly somewhere else? Is there anywhere safe left to run?
“Do you know what’s going on?” I ask Hannah as we rush forward, trying to keep my voice low enough not to sound completely terrified.
She clutches her toddler tighter against her chest, and when she shakes her head, I see real fear in her eyes. “I overheard something about rogue spirits and a prophecy or something? I don’t know.” Her voice wavers. “I’m sorry, I don’t—”
We spill out into the cloudy light of the courtyard, and whatever she was about to say dies on her lips.
Holy shit.
In the distance, in the very center of the massive courtyard, I see a young woman bent over with chalk in her hand.
Her burnished red curls whip in a wind that doesn’t seem to be touching the rest of us yet.
Next to her, another woman—this one with lighter hair—works frantically on the ground, both of them drawing symbols that make my eyes want to slide away when I try to focus on them.
“That’s Phoenix,” Hannah whispers beside me, following my gaze. “The vampire’s granddaughter.”
Right. The vampire. Vlad. I’d almost forgotten about the ancient creature who’d looked at me earlier like I was an interesting specimen. Phoenix must be... what, hundreds of years old herself? But she looks barely out of college, all fierce concentration and desperate energy.
Several fire pits are set up at four points, creating a giant circle around where Phoenix and the other woman work.
The ground inside is covered in chalk symbols—runes, maybe?
Sigils? I don’t even know what to call them.
They’re intricate and purposeful, covering every inch of cobblestone in a pattern that makes my head hurt to follow.
Layden—the brother who can apparently do magic, because why not add that to today’s impossibilities—runs around the circle.
I jump back when light suddenly springs from his hands like he’s shooting laser beams, illuminating the chalk runes on the ground.
They glow electric blue, pulsing with energy that makes the hair on my arms stand up.
This is real. This is actually real magic.
“What’s happening?” Abaddon’s demand cuts through my shock.
Layden doesn’t stop moving, doesn’t even slow down. Light keeps pouring from his hands into the circle as he shouts back, “We finally figured out what the AI’s doing, and there’s no time!”
“Well?” Vlad’s shout makes me flinch. The ancient vampire appears at the edge of the circle like he materialized from shadows, his voice carrying centuries of command. “What is it?”
He moves forward, one foot lifting to step into the circle—
“Don’t!” Phoenix’s scream splits the air as she launches herself at her grandfather, shoving him back with both hands. He stumbles—the vampire stumbles—and I realize how much strength it must have taken for her to move him.
His face twists with fury, the kind of rage that probably toppled kingdoms once upon a time. But he stays back.
My eyes dart to Remus, some instinct making me check on him. After our fight—after everything he said about wanting chaos, about his nature—is he in the mood to do something reckless? To throw himself into whatever dangerous magic they’re conjuring?
But he’s still. Watchful. His eyes dart around the scene, cataloging everything with an intensity I’m starting to recognize. He’s not charging in blindly. He’s thinking.
Maybe he really has changed. Or maybe he’s just waiting for the right moment to cause some beautiful disaster.
“The circle’s almost complete.” Phoenix’s explanation comes in breathless rushes as her eyes track between Layden and the other woman—the one with lighter hair who’s still frantically chalking lines. “And we just saw the AI start the sequence to launch nuclear codes in Russia and China.”
My stomach drops through the ground.
Nuclear codes. Nuclear. Fucking. Codes.
“It doesn’t want to control the world,” Phoenix continues, and her voice cracks on the words. “It wants to destroy it.”
The ground tilts under my feet. Remus’s hand shoots out, steadying me before I realize I’m stumbling.
His palm is warm and solid against my lower back, and I lean into it shamelessly because holy shit, nuclear war.
The AI—the thing they’ve been fighting, the reason we fled across the ocean—it’s not trying to take over.
It’s trying to end everything.
“That will never happen.” Abaddon’s growl vibrates through the courtyard, more feeling than sound. It’s the voice of someone who’s fought Death itself and won. Or... wait. Isn’t he Death? No, no, that’s Ksenia’s husband, Kharon. Abaddon’s just another of the Horsemen?
My brain is spinning too fast to keep up with the mythology.
“We have an idea to stop it.” Layden’s shout pulls my attention back. “But you have to trust us. Together.”
I watch the silent exchange between the brothers.
Abaddon looks to Kharon—the big silent one who apparently carries souls to the deathly plane or something equally nightmare-inducing—and then to Remus.
Neither of them look thrilled about trusting their younger brother.
There’s history there, layered and complicated in a way I don’t have time to unpack.
But what choice do they have? They can’t punch an AI to death. Can’t bomb a digital enemy that lives everywhere and nowhere at once.
Phoenix moves to the center of the circle, and something about her posture changes. She’s not just a young woman anymore. She lifts her arms toward the sky, and power radiates off her in waves I can feel against my skin.
The other woman—the one I don’t recognize—runs forward with a knife.
“Wait, what—” I start, but Hannah grabs my arm.
“It’s okay,” she whispers, though she doesn’t sound entirely convinced. “Phoenix knows what she’s doing. Probably.”
Probably?
The woman slices along Phoenix’s palm, quick and efficient. Blood wells up, dark against pale skin. Together, they drip it in a careful line at Phoenix’s feet. The blood hits the chalk and sizzles, steam rising where it lands.
“Well who’s that? And oh god,” I breathe. “Is this—are they doing actual magic? Like, blood sacrifice magic?”
[“Looks like it.” Remus’s voice is tight beside me. “And that’s Sabra. Phoenix’s best friend. A human witch.”]
Layden offers his hand next, and Sabra repeats the process. More blood. More sizzling. The metallic scent hits my nose, mixing with something else—ozone, maybe? That electric smell before a lightning strike.
Sabra and Layden take positions in front of and behind Phoenix, forming a triangle. Sabra starts chanting in a language I don’t recognize. It’s guttural and ancient, words that feel heavy with meaning even though I can’t understand them.
Phoenix lifts her arms even higher, and I swear her fingers are trembling.
“What is this?” The question escapes me in a bewildered whisper.