Page 24 of Hellfire to Come (Infernal Regions for the Unprepared #5)

Chapter Twenty-Four

DOMINIC

I couldn’t believe our luck when we finally convinced the shaman that Brooklyn was well enough to travel back to the house.

The trees parted around us like old sentinels, letting us pass without fanfare or farewell as if they too couldn’t wait for us to be out of that place.

The path away from the reservation was narrow and overgrown, dappled in soft shafts of morning light that pierced the canopy above.

Each step we took away from Laughing Crow’s home felt heavier than it should have.

Not because of exhaustion, though gods knew we were both bone-deep tired, but because of what waited for us on the other side.

Or what might not wait for us.

A lump formed in my throat the size of a fist.

Brooklyn walked just ahead of me, silent, her posture rigid with frustration she didn’t bother hiding. The wind caught her hair now and again, lifting it like strands of dark flame. She hadn’t said a word since we passed the last set of wards.

I watched her shoulders rise and fall with each breath, the tension in her muscles as tight as a drawn bow. Her silence wasn’t the kind that invited comfort. It was the kind built from self-blame, from fire that couldn’t be cooled with logic. She carried her guilt like armor, welded to her bones.

“You’re thinking about Rowan,” I said gently, catching up to her side.

“I’m thinking about all of them,” she answered without looking at me. “But yes. Mostly Rowan.”

Her voice was low, bitter with guilt. I could feel the weight of it in her words, like ash clinging to the back of my throat.

“I know it’s not rational,” she continued, finally glancing my way. “But I can’t help feeling like we should’ve done more. Pressed harder. Forced the shaman to say more than just that cryptic bullshit.”

“She didn’t lie to you,” I said carefully. “She said you’d know when the time was right. That’s not the kind of thing you can drag out of someone before it’s ready.”

Brooklyn stopped walking. Her boots crushed a patch of moss beneath her, and her fists clenched at her sides.

“I know Alice is awake and recovering. And don’t ask me how I know that, it’s freaky enough as it is to feel the certainty without trying to explain it.

But Rowen? He’s still unconscious, Dominic. Every hour we spend away from him…”

“Is another hour he’s still breathing,” I said quietly.

She exhaled harshly through her nose, jaw tight with unspoken anguish. There was no salve for this kind of hurt. No spell or charm to soothe the gnawing doubt in her heart.

Her jaw twitched, but she didn’t argue. Just turned her face back to the trees, like the bark might offer some wisdom we hadn’t found yet.

“I know you want more answers,” I went on. “Hell, so do I. But we’re not going back empty-handed. Alice is alive. The curse is broken. That matters.”

“But what if I traded one life for another?” she whispered. “What if saving her means Rowan doesn’t wake up?” She faltered for a second then on a heavy sigh rubbed a hand over her face. “And I could never feel guilty for saving Alice over someone else. Which makes me a shitty person.”

I stepped closer, placing a hand on her shoulder. She let me, though her body was tense beneath my palm.

“You didn’t trade anything,” I said. “The spirits took what they wanted. They would’ve taken it whether you begged or not.”

“I just… I can’t help thinking she knew. Laughing Crow. She knew Rowan needed something. But she wouldn’t say what.”

“She didn’t say it,” I agreed. “But maybe she didn’t have to. Maybe it’s not her place. Maybe it’s yours.”

That made her pause.

The trees creaked around us, as if leaning in to listen. Somewhere far behind, a bird called. A lonesome note that faded too quickly. I watched her blink against the light filtering through the leaves, as if trying to push away her thoughts, but they stuck to her like burrs.

“I don’t know how to save him,” she admitted, and the cracks in her voice nearly undid me.

“You don’t have to yet,” I said. “Not today. Today we go back. We gather our people. We heal what we can. The rest... we’ll face it together.

” Taking her hand, I pulled her to a stop so she had to look at me.

“You’ll be able to think better after you see with your own eyes that Alice is on the mend.

Yes? And then the three of us will figure out how to help Rowen together. ”

For a moment, she was still. The forest quieted with her as if listening.

And then she nodded. “Together,” she echoed. “I think you are right. I do need to see she’s okay with my own eyes before I stop panicking internally.”

We started walking again, this time with less silence between us. The wind picked up behind us like a sigh, and I felt, if only faintly, the shift in the world. Something waiting.

Whatever it was, we’d face it side by side.

Still, I couldn’t shake the unease tightening my gut.

The same sense I’d had in the mansion, the feeling that something had touched us and left its mark.

A presence that hadn’t shown its full face yet.

It clung to my skin like shadow. Maybe it was Rowan’s lingering magic, or something worse.

I didn’t know. But I knew better than to ignore it.

Brooklyn noticed my pause and looked over her shoulder, the early sun outlining her like firelight. “What is it?”

“Nothing,” I said automatically, then corrected myself. “Just... keep your guard up when we get there. I don’t think our troubles stayed behind.”

She gave me a tired smile, one that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “They never do.”

We walked the rest of the way to the waiting car with weapons sheathed but ready, hearts heavier than any sword.

The gravel crunched beneath our boots in a rhythm that should have been comforting, steady, familiar, but instead echoed like a countdown.

Each step toward the vehicle felt like an inch deeper into something unknown.

Brooklyn said nothing more, and I didn’t push her.

We both knew the moment we opened that car door, the world would be waiting to bleed us again.

The reservation faded behind us with each step, the trees thinning, the powerful, watchful hum of the land giving way to the brittle tension of the human world.

But the magic lingered. In our bones. In the silence between us.

In the bruised sky above, just starting to flush with the heat of early sun.

The car was right where we’d left it, dust-swept and quiet, as if it had been holding its breath for our return. I opened the door for her, fingers curling once on the handle before I forced myself to let go of the hesitation clawing at me.

Brooklyn paused just before slipping into the passenger seat.

Her hand hovered at the doorframe, her jaw tight with unspoken truths.

She wasn’t just worried. We were past worry.

She was preparing. Bracing. For grief. For questions.

For the possibility that the time we’d spent away had cost us more than we could afford.

She glanced up at me. “This feeling… What if Alice is not awake...”

“Then we do what needs to be done,” I said softly, finishing the thought she didn’t want to voice. “One step at a time. If she’s not awake we go find Frederic and force him to help her.”

Her throat bobbed as she swallowed hard. Then she nodded and slid into the seat, her silence more eloquent than anything words could’ve offered.

I got behind the wheel, started the engine, and let the low rumble fill the void between us.

We didn’t speak for miles.

But the silence wasn’t empty.

Brooklyn’s fingers fidgeted in her lap, the only sign of the storm beneath her skin. I didn’t blame her for it. I felt it too. That unsettled edge like something was waiting for us, crouched in the shadows of the future, teeth bared. The kind of tension you couldn’t place until it pounced.

At one point, I glanced over at her.

She was staring out the window, but not really seeing anything. Her mind was elsewhere, probably curled up in the safe house hallway, trying to will Rowan’s chest to rise. Her knuckles were white against her thighs.

“I hate this part,” she murmured eventually.

“What part?”

“The not-knowing. It’s like being halfway through a nightmare, trying to decide if you’ll wake up or sink further into it.”

I reached over and laced my fingers through hers. “Whatever’s waiting…good or bad…we face it together.”

She squeezed my hand once before letting go, then exhaled. “I know. I just... I’m scared it won’t be enough.”

I didn’t say it, but I was scared too. Not of the fight. Never that. But of what it would cost her. What more the world might ask from someone who had already given so much.

The sun climbed slowly behind us, gilding the tips of the pines in pale gold. The kind of light that should’ve meant hope. But to me, it felt more like the quiet before the next scream.

When we finally turned down the familiar dirt road toward the safe house, the knot in my gut pulled tighter. The house came into view slowly, too slowly. And still, nothing moved.

No sign of Echo.

No sign of Chester.

No sign of the wolf.

Brooklyn sat up straighter, hands braced on the dashboard. Her breath hitched.

I slowed the car, every muscle in my body coiled like wire.

We exited the car silently and started for the door but Brooklyn stopped and picked up something from the long steps leading to the front patio. When I reached her, I found her holding Alice’s glasses, turning them between her fingers before she glanced at me.

“Why would she leave her glasses here?” a line deepened between her brows.

“Maybe she was sitting here waiting for you and forgot that she left them on the steps?” It sounded dumb even to my own ears. Alice couldn’t see enough to walk without them, why would she leave them behind?

The expression on Brooklyn’s face said she was thinking the same, but she didn’t want to voice it. “Yeah, maybe she was waiting,” she muttered instead and moved toward the front door with purpose. We both knew one thing for sure.

Something was waiting in that house.

I just prayed if it was something bad, that it was something I could kill.

That would make my day for sure.