Chapter 12 #5
"Make sure she gets some food—if she wakes up before I’m gone.
It seems like they need another message not to fuck with Noctis," Rhyden ordered, walking into the hall and locking the door behind him—from the outside.
And if he stole one more glance at Vesperin as she slept…
well, that was a secret just for the vampire.
The warehouse of LunCo loomed in the foggy darkness of Lunar City, tucked near the harbor, with a shipyard filled with metal crates and a large, deteriorated parking lot, lined with a tall electric fence. All to keep what lay within secure.
Everyone who was anyone in Lunar City knew LunCo dealt in more than just medical supplies.
And they were stealing business from Noctis.
No matter how many workers Rhyden had left broken as bloody warnings on LunCo’s doorstep, it didn’t matter. They showed no sign of stopping.
He guessed they needed a more explosive warning.
And maybe he was still a little fucking angry and pent up. Who could blame him? He parked his motorcycle right at the front gates of LunCo, and the guard in the small guardhouse didn’t even stir from his sleep as Rhyden stood before it. Useless.
He clapped his hands, the sound ringing in the night. In the distance, water splashed, seeming to echo in the maze of crates.
Fire sparked in Rhyden’s palms as he called forth his Stella, burning hot and vengeful.
He threw his hands out in a sweeping arc, and flames roared to life, eating up the entirety of the fence, blue electricity crackling as flames encased it. He kept it controlled, burning only the fence.
The hellish red glow of the flames pierced the night. The security guard still slept, even as Rhyden left, alarms sounding while red sirens flashed and people poured out of the warehouse.
The whole ride back to his base, he could think of nothing but who awaited him on his bed.
Auren had been working in the shadows, like he did best.
The Soul Searcher knew now. Everything. Most things, at least.
The pieces were coming together as he used his connections to search, to understand.
Something greater was at work here than just them. Auren was sure of it.
Just as he was sure that his Soulbond’s memories had been tampered with, and that the doctor he had confronted knew more than he was letting on.
The fabric of their fate was being woven by hands much more powerful than theirs.
Vesperin. The doctor. Auren. And even him—the one who no longer lived:
The one in the picture frame on her dresser.
Auren weighed the photo in his hand, feeling how cold it was even through his white gloves.
Vesperin’s apartment was empty—it had been easy to break in while she was away. The one called Xara was not around, and Auren tried not to let that get to him. Something wasn’t right with that one.
As Auren set the photo back down on Vesperin’s dresser, right beside delicate blue flowers, sorrow filled him.
He was so sorry for his love, so anguished on her behalf, that she had to live in the wretched grief of being the last one standing—of being forced to live while the one you loved no longer inhabited the planet on which you resided.
It was a feeling Auren had experienced before, when he had been forced to reap Vesperin’s Soul.
He would not wish it on anyone.
There was nothing else in this apartment for him, for she was not here, yet, her scent clung to everything—along with a faint trace of a foreign Soul. Peculiar.
Auren lifted his scythe, cutting it through the air in a slow arc as he thought of where he needed to go next.
The shimmering portal revealed a dark office, and he stepped through the tear in the air, shivering as he walked straight into the office on the ninth floor of Solar City General Hospital.
The doctor was there, face pressed against his desk, paper strewn around him, and a cold cup of coffee resting on a coaster.
Auren’s gloves groaned as his fingers wrapped around the handle of his scythe.
Lucien Quenlan.
Auren hadn’t known the first time he had seen the man, but now, he did.
Vesperin’s other Soulbond—the same man who was working for Blackfall Industries. Though, his motivations were not as evil as Auren had originally, erroneously assumed.
Still, the Soul Searcher had left a clue for Vesperin at the hospital that day, hoping she would search deeper into the secrets being kept from her, hidden nearly in plain sight. Practically begging to be discovered.
Auren had been watching her, waiting for the moment she followed the trail he left for her.
Finally, it was all in motion. He prayed to the Celestials that she would see the deceit before her, that she would come to realize what had been stolen from her.
But all the days and nights Auren watched her, he felt like he was not the only one paying close attention to the Aetherborn Hunter.
The end of his scythe scraped the desk, and Lucien jolted awake, tired green eyes growing wide at the sight of Auren standing before him, dressed in all white, the hood over his head concealing his soft blonde hair, but not the tiny Star etched under his eye.
The doctor fumbled into action, green vines twisting from his outstretched palms.
Auren held his scythe out with ease, blocking the vines as he murmured, "We must talk, Lucien Quenlan."