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They passed a room labeled CONTROL ROOM 8B. Through the open door, Darien spotted two guards sitting in front of a collection of screens, all with live security footage. They turned to look at him as he passed. They were wearing headsets.

About another ten minutes went by before they pushed through a door and down a hallway lined with swampy green lights.

Glen stopped at a door on the left and gestured for Darien to enter. “After you,” he said with a bow and a flourish of his hand.

Darien gave him a heavy, hateful look as he passed, not liking this one fucking bit. He walked into the room?—

And froze when he beheld who sat behind the table, an ankle crossed over a knee.

Gaven Payne’s lips curved upward with a cold smile. “Hello, Darien.”

There was a small cage on the table. Inside was a Hob, his tiny fingers wrapped around the spell-protected bars. When he saw Darien, his red eyes—brimming with fear—widened, and he let out a little, lamb-like bleating noise of recognition.

Darien was so distracted by Mortifer, he didn’t see Glen as he came up behind him and punched a knife into his side.

108

Financial District

YVESWICH, STATE OF KER

The groundbeneath Travis’s boots quaked. Stones clacked. Buildings vibrated. His teeth rattled in his skull.

He shared a look with Jewels. Max.

Deeper in the city, closer to where the portal was located, monsters roared and screeched.

The darkness began to spread like spilled ink.

“Holy shit,” Dallas breathed. The shadow?—

It was moving this way.

“Back up,” Malakai commanded. He grabbed Aspen by the arm.“Back up, back up.”

Together, they backed up. Backed away as the darkness crawled toward them, engulfing so much of the street it pushed them away from Lucent Enterprises by one whole block.

“Shit,” Jewels said as they kept walking backward. “Should we run?”

“No,” Aspen gritted out. “No, it’s slowing down—see?”

Indeed, it was. The rumbling stopped, and so did the spreading of that pitch-black wall. They stopped walking, tipping their heads all the way back as they stared up at the towering mass of blackness. It was so high, it scraped theforcefield. Magic sparked and sputtered as the forcefield fought to contain it.

Travis turned, his breaths thinning out as he looked for the Control Tower.

Still visible. Barely.

His phone buzzed with an incoming call. He loosed the breath in his lungs and picked up. “Atlas?” he gritted out.

“We have a problem,” Tanner said.

“Yeah, you’re telling me. Where the hell’s Darien, man? We’re freaking out over here?—”

“I’m going to try to guide you through.”

“How?” Travis asked, panting, heart pounding. “You can’t even see us?—”

“I managed to get the spell feeds for Lucent Enterprises up on my computer. They’re hella glitchy—they look like they might go out at any second, but we can’t wait any longer. We need to do this now, or you’re going to run out of time.”