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“I have something here that you lost.”

He made an impatient snort, like he didn’t believe I had anything worth his time.

“A rogue goddess by the name of Parisa,” I added.

Silence hissed from the phone for a few seconds. Then Faris said, “I will be right there.”

And he wasn’t kidding. The next moment, the front door opened, and Faris stepped through.

“Do you have a djinn in your service? Or immortal artifacts that allow you to teleport?” I asked as he strode toward me.

He didn’t answer me. Instead, his gaze flickered to Parisa, then to me. “Where did you find her?”

“Not on the prison moon you exiled her to,” I replied. “But I suppose you already knew that?”

“I know everything.”

“Well, apparently not everything. Otherwise you wouldn’t have asked me.” I lowered my voice to imitate his, intoning, “Where did you find her?”

Faris looked less than impressed by my imitation of him.

“Nero, his parents, and Harker snatched her from a world called Dayne,” I said. “So, now that the cat’s out of the bag—or I guess I should say that the crazy goddess is out of her prison—maybe you can finally stop lying to me, and we can work together to find a solution to this shit-fest we’ve found ourselves in.”

“I have a solution.” Faris drew his gun and pressed it to Parisa’s head.

“Wait just a minute there, cowboy.” I gently nudged his gun-wielding hand away from Parisa. My gaze snagged on the runes engraved into the smooth metal. “Is that an immortal artifact?”

“Yes.” He raised the gun toward her again.

“Ok, so you could shoot her…”

Faris gave me an annoyed look. “I do not require your permission to dispense the gods’ justice.”

I sighed. “Or, instead of killing this valuable source of intel,” I said, waving my hand toward Parisa, “we could, I don’t know, maybe interrogate her and figure out what she’s planning?”

Faris frowned at me. He didn’t lower his gun.

“Just a suggestion,” I said, lifting both my hands in the air as I backed up.

His gaze shifted between me and Parisa. He did that a few times before he finally put away his weapon. Of course that’s the moment Nero and his parents teleported back into the room with a rather loud bang—and lots of smoke. So Faris naturally grabbed his gun again.

“He’s very twitchy, isn’t he?” Damiel commented.

“What did you find?” I said quickly, before Damiel provoked Faris into shooting him. That was not my idea of family time.

“The prison moons are empty.” Cadence said it like she was speaking over a grave.

I only hoped that grave didn’t turn out to be a mass grave—with all of us piled up in it.

“All eleven of them?” I asked.

“Yes. Regin and all his offspring have escaped,” said Cadence. “They are free.”

I turned to Faris. “Did you know?”

This time, he didn’t profess to know everything. “No,” he said, and he sounded pretty shocked. “We only knew about Solarian. And Parisa. They have not been subtle or quiet. It’s been a real pain for the council to keep their activity a secret.”

“I’m not sure it’s even a secret.”