Epilogue
Ines
Six moon cycles later.
The dining room of the compound is chaos.
I count the bodies around the table without really meaning to, it’s an old journalist habit.
Chief is at the head. Scar to his right.
Texon is beside me, one claw resting possessively on the curve of my six-months-pregnant belly under the table.
Cannibal and Roxy across from us, with Zora between them trying to feed a piece of purple-root to her stuffed creature doll.
Heavy and Jana are at the far end, Rux in the high chair, Jana already pregnant again.
Claws and Lila with Argylia between them, Lila’s belly heavily rounded.
Hook and Leah have come to visit from employee housing.
Leah’s second pregnancy is starting to show.
Chief and Naomi next to them, Naomi so pregnant at this point that she’s stopped pretending she can sit comfortably.
Rook is at the foot of the table, eating quietly and watching the room the way he always does.
“So Kryzon’s moved,” Scar says suddenly, forking something purple onto his plate.
Chief grunts. “When?”
“Yesterday. They transferred him from the peacekeeper holding facility to the prison colony on Arkell-Seven. He’ll serve the rest of his sentence there. Two hundred rotations, no parole.”
“Good,” Heavy mutters.
“Has he talked?” Jana questions.
Scar shakes his head. “Not one name. Not one faction. Not one Chronos contact. The peacekeepers have offered him everything — reduced sentence, better facility, protection — and he refuses. Whoever he’s afraid of is scarier than a prison colony.”
“That says a lot,” I note.
“It says everything,” Scar agrees.
“And Grytel?” Cannibal asks through a mouthful of food.
All eyes come to me.
I swallow my bite. “Cooperating fully. He’s been briefing me for my next piece. He’s been briefing Scar too, separately. He’s not our enemy. He never was.” I glance at Chief. “He wants to help. He wants to know what happened to your parents as much as you do.”
Chief’s jaw works. It’s still hard for him — giving up the villain they’ve had in their heads for rotations. But he nods. “Then we work with him.”
“Weird,” Lila says. “Grytel helping the Fever Brothers.”
“Four sectors is a weird place,” I say.
“Cheers to that,” Roxy says, and lifts her glass.
Everyone drinks. Even the kids, with their sippy cups.
The knock at the front door comes just as Jana is setting down dessert.
Everyone goes still.
The compound does not get visitors. Ever.
Rook stands up without a word. He’s been on perimeter duty for rotations. He slips out of the dining room and down the hallway toward the front door.
I hear the door open.
I hear a female voice, small and exhausted, say something I can’t make out.
I hear Rook’s voice answer, low.
Silence.
Longer silence than it should be.
The brothers start rising one by one. Chief first, then Scar, then Claws. Every male in the room is on his feet before I’ve fully registered what’s happening. Footsteps in the hallway. Rook’s heavy ones. Someone else’s, smaller and lighter.
Rook fills the dining room doorway.
And behind him, peeking around his arm like she doesn’t quite want to be seen, is a small, drenched human female.
She has dark red hair plastered to her face from the rain. Light skin and freckles. She’s clutching a battered travel bag against her chest and wearing clothes that are two sizes too big for her. She can’t be more than five feet, two inches tall. She is shaking, from cold or fear or both.
Her eyes are huge and watchful and they are fixed on Rook’s back like he is the only safe thing in the universe.
The entire table stares.
Rook clears his throat. His voice is tighter than I’ve ever heard it. “She’s human,” he announces. “And I scented her.”
The dining room goes absolutely silent for a full three seconds.
Then Cannibal drops his fork. “Oh hells,” he breathes.
“Another one?” Chief questions.
“Another one,” Rook confirms.
“That’s seven of us now,” Leah laughs, delighted. “Seven humans. How do you all keep attracting so many of us to this planet?”
“Welcome,” Lila calls out to the small female, her voice warm and huge.
The human flinches a little at the volume. Rook shifts instinctively, putting himself more fully between her and the room, like he is physically blocking the noise from hitting her. “She stays,” Rook growls.
“She stays,” Chief agrees without missing a beat.
“Obviously,” Scar responds.
Everyone else is nodding in agreement.
The small female blinks. She looks up at Rook — way up, because he’s so much taller than she is — with an expression I can only describe as bewildered. Then she looks at the rest of us. Then back at Rook.
“I — “ she starts. Her voice is hoarse from either crying or not speaking for a long time, I can’t tell which. “I have information. About Chronos. I didn’t — I didn’t know where else to go, and someone said — someone said the Fever Brothers would — “
“You are safe here,” Rook says, quiet and immediate.
She looks up at him again. Her eyes fill. “Okay,” she whispers.
My journalist brain is doing cartwheels. Chronos. Information. She came here specifically, by name.
Jana stands up briskly. “Right. Food. You look like you haven’t eaten in two days.”
“Three,” the human admits in a small voice.
“Three. Okay.” Jana is already moving. “Rook, bring her in, sit her down. Somebody get the med kit. Lila, a clean towel. Naomi, there’s a blanket on the back of my chair, pass it over. Move, people.”
The compound erupts into the familiar choreography of taking care of someone new. Exactly the way they took care of me, six months ago.
Rook guides the human female into the dining room with one enormous claw at the small of her back.
He is so careful with her. So careful. I watch his face as he settles her into the chair Jana is gesturing to, watch the way his eyes track every micro-expression of hers.
He immediately positions himself between her and the rest of the family without even seeming to think about it.
He also makes sure not to touch her bare skin.
She sits down, still holding her travel bag against her chest like someone might take it from her.
Rook crouches down beside her chair so he is no longer looming over her. “I am Maxon of Twenty-Four,” he tells her quietly. “My crew name is Rook.”
“Rook,” she repeats.
“What is your name?”
She swallows. Looks at him for a long moment. “Hallie,” she finally says. “Hallie Longwell.”
“Hallie Longwell,” he repeats back to her. “You are safe here now.”
She exhales shakily.
-Rook Takes Queen, Book 7, continues the Fever Brothers saga.