Page 22 of Beasts of Shadows #1

Monterey, CA

Ravi lived two blocks over. That morning when I set out, a fog was rolling through the streets, casting the otherwise bright seaside in ominous gray. The image would be more sinister out on the water, but a haze like this was common in Monterey, as thick and foreboding as Carpenter’s The Fog.

I tightened my jean jacket over my limbs, wishing I’d opted for pants instead of shorts.

But I’d been in such a hurry that I wasn’t thinking straight.

The bucket cap on my head barely contained my curls.

The mist would wreak havoc on my frizz later, but I didn’t have it in me to worry.

Not when saving Ravi was the utmost priority.

I turned onto his street just as it struck.

Another vision.

At first it felt like vertigo, like the world tipped sideways and my stomach couldn’t keep up. I grabbed the stop sign to steady myself, but then my feet left the ground entirely.

The air fractured—glass panes crashing inward. Time cracked.

I was somewhere else.

A city skyline split in two like a jaw cracking open. Buildings wept fire. Bridges collapsed in slow motion, elegant as dancers. A white sun pulsed in the center of it all, blinding and unnatural, like a hole had been torn in the sky itself.

And in the middle of the chaos, on his knees, was Ravi.

Head thrown back. Screaming.

Not from pain—something worse.

Rage. Regret. Power that didn’t want to be wielded but couldn’t be stopped.

A woman reached for him—maybe me, I couldn’t tell. Her face dissolved in the light before I could see.

Then the light screamed back.

I saw bodies scattered on stadium steps. Children trampled. Blood soaking the white robes of priestesses. Cities drowned. An ocean bubbled over like a pot, swallowing coastlines like they were sugar cubes dropped in water.

And over and over—Ravi at the center.

Sometimes older. Sometimes monstrous. Sometimes missing. But always him.

The gods were gone.

The world was broken.

And Ravi had broken it.

Not by accident.

Not entirely.

But because he was made to.

#

I gasped, clutching my chest. The ground reassembled under my shoes, Monterey’s sleepy street coming back into view. My palms were bleeding from where I’d scraped them against the sidewalk. My breath came in ragged gasps, my throat raw from a scream I hadn’t realized I let out.

I wiped my hands on my jacket and stumbled the last half-block to Ravi’s house, heart pounding louder than the surf. I didn’t know when it would happen or how. Only that he was going to be responsible for death on a catastrophic scale.

I had to stop him.

I had to slow him down.

He trusted me. Maybe too much. If I could just dull him—keep him drifting instead of running toward whatever fate had him in its crosshairs—I might buy us time. Maybe even keep those people from dying.

I knocked, and when he answered, barefoot and sleepy-eyed, I held up the joint I’d swiped from Azalea’s stash.

“Beach day,” I said with a crooked smile. “You in?”

He grinned. “Always.”

And just like that, I led him straight to the sea.

#

The beach was nearly deserted, muffled under the weight of the mist—the kind that made the rest of the world vanish. Just Ravi and me. Just the waves. The endless, quiet sea.

He pulled off his shirt and shoes with a grin, bare feet kicking up wet sand. “You’re sure about this?”

I nodded, though my throat felt like it might collapse. “Yeah. Come on. Let’s just… float for a while. Like we used to.”

He followed me in without question. Without even the slightest hesitation. The water was icy, and his breath caught in his throat with that first full-body shiver, but he laughed through it. The joint had relaxed him—just enough to make him careless.

We walked until we were waist-deep, then deeper still. Our toes barely skimmed the seafloor. Ravi let himself fall back and floated, arms stretched wide, gazing up into the void.

“It’s like we’re suspended,” he murmured. “Like, if I let go, I’d just keep going. Drift right off the planet.”

His silky hair clung wet to his forehead. His eyes fluttered closed. His fine chest gave a slow lift; there was a quiet trust in his posture. He didn’t see it coming. He never would.

“Don’t fall asleep,” I said softly, barely above the lapping water.

“I’m not,” he whispered. “Just thinking.”

“About what?”

He smiled, eyes still shut. “How lucky I am you’re here.”

I didn’t answer.

Another wave rocked us. He drifted a little farther from me. Just a few feet. Then more. I could have reached for him. Pulled him back. Anchored him.

Instead, I let the current carry him.

He floated farther, head tilting back, mouth open to the sky. The fog thickened—swallowed the horizon, the dunes, the path we’d taken. The water lapped between us, steady and cold.

He began to struggle when the undertow caught him.

His arms flailed for a moment. “Mutt?”

He still didn’t open his eyes.

“Nari…Hey—.”

His voice cracked.

I didn’t move. I stood still as a tombstone, a stone’s throw away from the sand.

He went under.

Came up gasping.

“Shit—it’s pulling me—.”

I took one step forward. Then stopped. My arms hung at my sides. Useless.

Necessary.

He looked right at me. In that final moment, he understood. I think he did. His expression broke—not from fear, but betrayal. Like something deep inside him shattered. Not because he was dying.

Because I let him.

Then, the ocean took him under again. And this time, he didn’t come back up.

I stood there until my teeth chattered. Until my legs went numb. Until the silence pressed in like the deep.

And then I turned, and walked back to shore alone.