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South Financial District

YVESWICH, STATE OF KER

Loren Calla metdeath when she was only a child. As a human living in a world of monsters and godlike immortal beings, her mortality was simplythereall the time—as constant as her shadow.

At the age of five, Taega and Roark had sat her down and explained to her the unfortunate truth about her life.You’re different,they’d said. While others stopped aging, she would continue to grow old, forever careening toward the end of a too-short existence. As the years passed, the pain of this harsh reality had dulled from the sharp pang of a fresh cut to the periodic ache of a bruise. Eventually, she’d even come to accept it. Death was simply a part of her life, and nothing would ever change that fact. Yet despite how many years she’d spent preparing for her end, being told she had less than ten months to live was a surprise she hadn’t seen coming.

As unsettling as it was to know there was a strong chance she wouldn’t make it to her twenty-first birthday, her biggest concern lay not in her own heart ceasing to beat, but Darien Cassel’s. The man who’d tied his fate to hers. The incredibly selfless leader of the Seven Devils, who was somewhere out there right now, in this dark city, hopefully,hopefullystill breathing.

She clung tightly to her faith that she would see Darien again—tighter than she clung to Malakai Delaney’s hand—as she navigated predator-infested streets. Her strange magic allowed her to see with vision similar to a hellseher’s, but even so, maneuvering the ruins of the city was difficult. The buckled roads, the shattered sidewalks, the dust choking the air… It was endless. And they were a long way from home.

As she walked with Malakai, she tried to keep her feet from shifting too loudly in the rubble, while the Reaper used his magic to mask their human and hellseher scents. Monsters lurked on every road, hunting for prey. Most of these breeds were unable to see in the dark—a blessing that had kept her and Malakai alive this long, though Loren shuddered at the thought of what might happen if they ran into one that could.

“Any idea where we are?” Malakai asked, speaking quietly.

She scanned her surroundings, her all-white eyes gritty from exhaustion and burning from the smoke. The buildings in this area were aglow with rows of colorful symbols, though most were weak and flickering, the spell systems hanging on by a thread.

“There’s a mall over there—to your right,” she said, using her Sight to read the magic flickering weakly through the sign. The patchy words justbarelymanaged to spell outStarling Shopping Centerin sky blue and cherry red.She still wasn’t used to seeing the things she hadn’t been able to see before. The colors burned to look at, as if she were staring directly at the sun, and sometimes they all bled together into a muddy mess. “Starling Shopping Center.” She blinked to ease the stinging in her eyes. “Can you see the sign?”

Malakai’s frustration was tangible, his hand tightening slightly around hers. “Where am I looking, exactly?”

“Umm…one o’clock?”

A beat of silence. And then: “Fucking barely.”

They kept walking, moving more carefully as they passed the mall—past a pack of monsters chowing down on something near the entrance. Loren didn’t want to know what—or who—they were eating.

Although her powers had kept the Well replica from razing all of Yveswich to the ground, she had failed to save the city in its entirety. The destruction had snuck through the apertures—of which there were many—carving Yveswich apart like a snowflake. While some streets and neighborhoods had been completely pulverized, others had stayed mostly intact, save for perhaps a shattered window or a few overturned cars. It had no rhyme or reason. But then again, not much in her life made sense these days.

Instead of trying to understand her magic, her past, and her life in general, she focused on her goal: get back to Roman Devlin’s house and find the others.

FindDarien.

“You’re thinking about that asshole again, aren’t you?” Malakai’s question was nearly drowned out by a guttural growl from somewhere behind them—one monster scuffling with another for control over a food source.

She sighed, the exhale wobbling from the cold. Her fingers were so numb, they felt permanently frozen to Malakai’s hand. “I’m always thinking about him. And he’s not an asshole.”

“He is, actually. He’s just not an asshole toyou.”

Rock clacked as Malakai suddenly tripped, stumbling blindly. With her hand in his, Loren stumbled too, her arm jerking about as he nearly took them both down.

“Fuck, man,” he grumbled, regaining his balance. “I can’t wait till I can see again.”

Neither could Loren. It wasn’t that she was bothered by his tendency to trip on the many obstacles strewn about the streets, but if they were attacked right now—something they’d managedto avoid thus far—Malakai would be just as likely to shoot her in the head as he would a monster. He couldn’t see the many creatures slinking through the dark, could justbarelysee the faint colors on the buildings that still had partial protection. It was strange; Loren was the farthest thing from a hellseher, and yet she could somehow see better than anyone.Howwas simply another of the maddening questions the universe had tossed her way these last approximately six months.

She tried not to consider what this might mean for the others. How they could ever find their way back to safety if they couldn’t see. Couldn’t protect themselves.

If they were even alive.

She banished the horrible thought from her head. They were alive—she wouldn’t settle for anything less.

“How do you feel about the wholeyou-die-he-diesthing, anyway?”

“Pissed,” she admitted, a shiver shaking through her. She shut her eyes, remembering the look on Darien’s handsome face when she’d told him that she hated him. “Hurt. Betrayed.” Hurt and betrayed—exactly how he, too, must have felt in that moment. He had certainly looked hurt and betrayed.

Malakai merely grunted. Such noises seemed to be a frequent response for him. But she wasn’t complaining; she would take his grunting over his smart and oftentimes crude comments any day, though she’d spent enough time with him to notice that he took it slightly easier on her with his jests than he did the others.