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SERAPHINE

P ortland smolders.

Not all of it. Not yet.

But the streets are cracked open, smoke twisting into the clouds, and magic still sizzles under the pavement like blood refusing to dry.

We’ve been moving nonstop for sixteen hours.

Putting out fires—literally and figuratively. Wards reinforced. PEACE agents pulled from skirmishes. Supplies redirected. Shifters relocated. Vamp clans bribed or threatened into silence.

It’s barely working. But it’s something. And something is all we have left.

Jackson’s with me every step of the way—blood on his jaw, shirt torn down one side, still moving like he’d crawl across a battlefield just to reach me.

I hate how much I need that. I hate how much I need him.

Halbrook calls while we’re patching up a witch compound that took a direct hit.

I put him on speaker.

“I need you to do something I hate asking,” he says, voice hoarse. “I need you to reach the underground.”

I freeze.

Jackson glances at me.

“Which one?” I ask slowly.

“The real one,” Halbrook growls. “The old lines. The one that you control, or controlled. The ones that run beneath the city and between factions. You want this city to survive? You’ve got to own it again. Take it back.”

I close my eyes. Then nod once, even though he can’t see.

“Fine,” I say. “But once I take the leash, don’t ask me to hand it back and do you anymore favors. If I run it again, it’s how I know it needs to be ran.”

Silence before a reluctant, “I won’t.”

The old underground network isn’t a place.

It’s a language.

A promise passed in blood and silence, through the old magic that predates PEACE, the Council, even the Veil.

I was raised with whispers of it and grew to be feared in it. The Underboss. Then this case took over and I lost my hold. The more I worked to help PEACE, the more they lost respect for me.

My mother used to trace the sigils into my palms when she thought I was asleep. My father made me swear never to repeat them unless the world was falling apart.

Well, the world’s falling apart.

So I go. And they answer. The old packs. The fringe covens. The shattered bloodlines that never bent to the new laws. They show up one by one in the shadows of the wardline—hooded, masked, veiled, wary.

Until I speak.

“I’m not asking for obedience,” I say, voice echoing off the concrete. “I know better than that. And I know a lot of you have connections above that feel betrayed by me. But I’m asking for alliance. We either hold this city together now, or we let it fall to the flames. And to something much worse than humans.”

“Why should we follow you? ” someone growls.

And then, out of the shadows, Lio steps forward.

Yeah. Lio.

In a leather jacket two sizes too big, dirt on his cheek, and eyes that carry too much for someone still technically a teenager.

He raises his chin and says, “Because she saved me. And she didn’t have to. And so did he. Because they’re the only ones who’ve fought for all of us.”

The room stills.

He points to me. Then Jackson.

“They’re bonded. They could’ve run. But they stayed. And you know it. You all know it. You felt the magic rip the fucking sky apart when it happened. And you know what it means now that they are. Most of you do and that is something worth protecting, dying over even. And this human you all hate so much and allowed yourselves to turn on her because of it, he’s her mate. You know there’s no control over something like that.”

No one breathes.

Then… someone bows.

One by one, they follow.

And just like that, Portland’s supernatural underworld belongs to me, The Underboss.

“What do you need us to do?”

We don’t get to celebrate.

There’s too much to do.

Supply routes. Protection networks. Safehouses restructured. Faction leaders meeting under veils of truce I barely trust.

I don’t sleep. Neither does Jackson.

We’re fire and shadow, blood and bullets, walking symbols of a future no one asked for but everyone’s starting to believe in.

Sometimes, he pulls me into him without a word—just breath and heartbeat and the quiet ache of skin on skin.

He never asks for more. He doesn’t have to. Because we’re all in. Even if it kills us.

Later that night, I find Lio curled up on my porch steps, hoodie up, hands in his pockets.

“You okay?” I ask.

He shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Why’d you speak for me?”

He looks up, something fierce and soft in his eyes. “Because you’re not just trying to win. You’re trying to save what’s left.”

Then he leans back, gazing at the dark sky above.

“Besides,” he adds, “it’s kinda cool, being part of something. I’ve never had that before.”

I sit beside him, shoulder to shoulder for a moment.

“Have you eaten yet?” I ask, nudging him. I know I owe him a lot, and this is the best I can do for now.

He smiles at me, flashing his canines quickly before saying, “I could definitely eat.”