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“brEE… WAKE UP, please.”

I gasp awake—and immediately close my eyes against the swimming, murky vision overhead.

A trio of relieved sighs echoes in my ears.

“Thank God.”

“Is she okay?”

A warm palm at my chin. A deeper voice. Nick’s whispered kiss on my brow. “I’m right here, Bree.” Nick’s here. I’m okay. Not safe, but okay.

Then I’m shifted, adjusted, my head lolling to the side. The voices fade.

When I open my eyes again, I see Mariah’s face bent over mine, delicate brows pressed tight together behind her wide-rimmed golden glasses. “Hey, Bree-Bree,” she whispers. “Awake for real now?”

“Maybe,” I croak, then wince at a clanging sound. “What is…?”

“They’re trying to get us out.”

I blink again, my eyes dry as sandpaper, and follow her eyes to the source of the clanging.

We are in a small, dark room with dirt floors lined with concrete blocks stained with damp, and on the opposite wall is a row of iron floor-to-ceiling bars. Bars that both Zoe and Nick appear to be attacking vigorously.

“We’re—” I begin.

“Underground,” Mariah says with a sigh. “Imprisoned. The warlocks caught me and Zoe pretty quickly after I ran out of gas, and by then, you and Nick had already been knocked out by Lawson.”

I push at the dirt floor beneath my hands, and Mariah’s legs shift beneath me as she moves to help me sit up. Beside my knee are my and Zoe’s small overnight bags, straps still drawn tight from when we’d secured them before the auction. I don’t care about our dirty clothes, but I’m relieved that Zoe still has access to her meds.

“How long was I out?”

“Half an hour,” Mariah answers. She leaves a hand steady at my spine as I curl forward. “Slowly…,” she advises. “You’ve got a goose egg.”

My fingertips float up to my temple, where a tender lump has sprouted at my hairline.

“We were outside, away from the warlocks and Collectors, and chasing Gabriel,” I say. “Why would Lawson attack us?”

“Because rules change,” a low voice says from beyond the bars.

Nick and Zoe back up simultaneously, speeding to the center of the room to stand in front of me and Mariah. Beyond them, in the corridor outside the prison cell, a figure shrouded in dark green aether appears.

“Lawson,” Zoe snarls. “You rotten warlock. Did Bianca send you to gloat?”

“So quick to judge, Zoelle,” Lawson says.

Zoe and I both freeze. She helps me rise to my feet before we peer closer at the figure. “What did you just call me?” she asks.

“Your name, Shadeling.” The voice in the shadows shifts from Lawson’s low baritone—to one more familiar. The dark green aether transforms into a crackling black cloud, and out of that cloud steps Erebus Varelian. “Zoelle.”

Zoe snarls, blurring to the bars to clench them between tight fists. “You did this!” she shouts. “You were that warlock this entire time?”

I understand her fury, but I don’t share it. Instead, my eyes fall shut, every moment of the past three days rushing behind my lids like a nightmare. The ward, trapping us in Penumbra. The worry about what Erebus might do to us. The mistaken identities, then the claimed ones. The library. The communions. The confessions. All of it, while the Shadow King watched.

“Did you really think I would let you and Briana completely out of my sight?”

“Goddamn you, old man!” Zoe shouts. “We thought we might die in there. We came here for you—”

“No, Zoelle,” Erebus says. When I open my eyes, he’s surveying each of us, one at a time, until his gaze lands on me. “You came here to try to free Rootcrafter girls whom you believed I was devouring.”

“Did you spy on us?” I ask, stunned by the calm and measured tone of my own voice. “Listen in on what we were saying? Watch us struggle and strategize and… worry we’ll get caught?”

“No.” He shakes his head. “Believe it or not, not everything revolves around a group of exhausting, tortured teenagers. Not even when one of those teenagers is you, Briana.”

“So what did you do?” Nick says, crossing his arms over his chest. “While we were tormenting ourselves for your amusement?”

“I was needed as Erebus much of the time, Nicholas.” A bit of Lawson’s smile bleeds into Erebus’s face, spreading his mouth wide as he surveys Nick. “And I did not find your torment amusing, Scion of Lancelot. I found it exquisite.”

Nick flushes. “Glad I could entertain.”

“Even now, your hidden rage is palpable and rich,” Erebus says. “I won’t need to feed for weeks.”

“Why?” I demand. “Why?”

“Quests within quests. Secrets within secrets.” Erebus sighs.

“No more riddles,” I snap. “Tell me why, right now.”

“Demands even here, Briana?” he says. “I’d be careful with those.”

“Answer her,” Nick says. He gestures around the cell. “You have us imprisoned. You watched us become trapped in this estate. You can’t tell me you did all of that and never anticipated your grand reveal. You are a chaos creature after all, Arawn.”

Erebus’s eyes narrow. “Careful with names, Scion. You know not of what you speak.”

“Well, now I see how your name gets under your skin,” Nick says, eyebrow quirking. “So that’s one thing I know.”

Erebus eyes him for a moment longer, fingers twitching at his side. “Merlins have been killed at an increasing rate over the past several months. The Council had no leads, much to everyone’s frustration, including my own. When young Nicholas here suggested at his curia that the Morgaines were likely suspects, it was something we had not, in truth, considered. After he, the Scion of Gawain, and Guard Douglas departed, the Regents—Aldrich, Gabriel, and Cestra—began meeting in undisclosed locations at odd hours, refusing to share their whereabouts with their Seneschals.” He sneers. “Silly, short-lived creatures scurrying off in their private jets to preserve their triumvirate of human power.”

“That must have annoyed you to no end,” Nick says, “seeing as you had to keep up appearances as the subservient mage.”

Erebus glares at him, ignoring his jab. “I suspected that the three Regents may have created a plan to pursue the Morgaines themselves, not trusting a Merlin or a child”—he smiles pointedly at Nick—“to do the job. But I had no proof, and Morgaines are notoriously difficult to find. I did not trust them to be successful. ‘Lawson’ began to investigate back channels.”

His gaze falls to me. “But then, one day, Briana questioned me about hiring warlock mercenaries and kidnapping Rootcrafters—an odd inquiry. The next day, I was informed that my ward Elijah had heard a rumor from a desperate goruchel that my crown had been stolen by a warlock from the very Morgaines who had hidden it from me for fifteen centuries. Warlocks stealing Rootcrafters, warlocks stealing the crown, Morgaines undoubtedly seeking their stolen trophy… It was all too much to be coincidence.” He paces away, humming in thought. “All it took was an order from me barring the twins and Briana from seeking Daeza out to motivate them into doing just that. I knew that they, with Briana’s impulsive displays of power, could interrogate and persuade my Shade to share what she knew much more easily than I. After Daeza connected the crown to Mikael and one of his distasteful Collectors’ Galas, it was simple work to use ‘Lawson’ to help monitor and move things along.”

“So what I’m hearing,” Nick mocks, “is that you’re not really having any luck getting your Shadow Court back together.”

Erebus grits his teeth. “You are, somehow, more infuriating than your Kingsmage.”

“How is Sel, by the way?” Nick asks.

“I wouldn’t know,” Erebus replies. “I have considered that he may be behind the Merlin deaths, but, again… no proof.”

Nick’s jaw works back and forth.

“No clever retort to that, Scion?” Erebus says, smiling. “Where is that shining, sanctimonious Lancelot faith now?”

I cross my arms. “Sel’s not a murderer.”

“You have no idea who Selwyn Kane is, and yet you defend his integrity?” Erebus tuts. “I taught you better than to trust a demon.”

“You can turn into a warlock, who are exactly the type of magic users you told us you ‘despise,’ by the way,” Zoe mutters. “Why didn’t you just go after the crown yourself?”

“Because while I can mimic many things, I cannot trick a Morgaine enchantment.” Erebus sighs. “And simply recovering my crown is not enough for me to reclaim it.”

Zoe nods in annoyed understanding. “You needed a Morgaine to remove the lock they placed on it.”

“Exactly,” Erebus says.

Zoe scowls. “So you waited until Mikael threw one of his fancy auctions—”

“Yes, and?” Erebus prompts. Like he’s teaching us again.

“And you used the auction to flush out a Morgaine who could undo the demon-proof ward,” I say.

“Correct,” he says. “If you set your bait strategically and be patient, the mice will come to you from beneath the floorboards and behind the walls, even if it means they are crawling to their own destruction.”

Zoe groans, pacing away. “That’s why you sent me and Bree, isn’t it? So we could retrieve the crown ourselves, just in case a Morgaine never showed.”

“When you live as long as I do, you create plans within plans. Sending two of my own agents who could touch the crown when I cannot, and who have bonded over their shared interest in seeing the crown in my hands, was a safeguard in case a Morgaine never made an appearance—or ran before I could force them to undo their magic.”

“If you’re still here, that means you lost Ava,” I say. “Let me guess, you were so busy playing ‘Lawson’ that she bolted before you could catch her?”

“Unfortunately,” Erebus says. “She scampered away before I could trap her, leaving the crown in its case behind. I convinced poor Santiago to secure it on my behalf.”

“So you retrieved your crown but lost your Morgaine?” Nick says. “Pity.”

“Not ideal,” Erebus replies to Nick. “But also not a total loss. As I said, plans within plans. Over time, I have discovered that the true prize in any war is information . Information—about you, for instance, Scion of Lancelot. Your abilities and skills. What you are capable of when pushed. What you can see and do, as it is always a surprise with the Scions of your Line.” He spreads his hands. “And I have gained insight about the Regents and what they have been whispering about in places where I cannot overhear. I did not expect to witness a visit from Gabriel at Penumbra, and I certainly did not anticipate discovering that the Regents are not only pursuing Morgaines, as I first thought, but Rootcrafters as well. It is an unexpected change in their strategy. The Order has long been too self-obsessed and foolish to understand what demonkind has always inherently known.”

“And what knowledge is that?” I ask.

His eyes flash. “That true ancestral power lies in the hands of those who craft root, not within the silver-spoon-fed Scions the Regents ply with praise and false honor. Goruchel know that Rootcrafter prey are far more valuable alive than dead, but taking a Rootcrafter captive instead of killing them outright is nearly unprecedented in Order history.”

“We’re not prey,” I spit. “We’re people.”

“Perspective,” Erebus says, then his eyes turn to me and Zoe, eyes warming. “It was a bonus that I was able to test the loyalty of my most powerful protégés along the way. Well done, both of you. I could not be more proud.”

I turn away in disgust as Zoe pounces. “What about Elijah? Everything he does is for you! You tricked him. Used him.”

Erebus’s fangs flash. “Elijah’s desire to please me limits his growth. I do not wish to be pleased. I wish to be strengthened !”

“You aren’t strengthened by me and Zoe,” I say. I step closer to the bars, tipping my chin up to meet his ruby gaze. “Even if Ava had gotten your crown, we decided not to pursue it once we saw the vials of root. We may have come for the crown, but it wasn’t for you. It was for the missing girls.”

“No, I don’t think so. You did it for yourself.” Erebus’s voice turns dark and taunting. “Did you become impervious, Briana? Are you ready for your next lesson?”

“What’s my next lesson?”

He smiles. “To become ruthless.”

A desperation to defy him rises in my chest. “I’ll never be what you are.”

“No,” he says. “You will become something much more fascinating.”

When I stumble back from the bars at his statement, Erebus only laughs.

Shadows begin to creep in around his ankles, filling the space outside our prison cell. “I must attend to this matter of the Regents and the Rootcrafters with urgency, as I do not know what Gabriel is planning, whether he is working in secret with any of my Mageguard, or where the seller sent his helicopter. As I must pursue the matter as Erebus, the situation requires some… bureaucracy.”

“You can’t just leave us here!” Zoe shouts.

“Oh, but I can. This prison is designed to hold demons. You won’t be able to break out of it, but,” the King says, as the shadows close around him, leaving only two glowing red eyes behind, “I do invite you to try.”