Splintered Gates, page 28
The drive took us beyond the city limits into rural outskirts where development gave way to forest and farmland.
“Turn here,” Matthew directed at an unmarked gravel road. “There’s a service access point about two miles down that provides a view of the main complex without crossing into the security perimeter.”
“You’ve been here before?” Marcus asked.
“Several times. Lang’s security has deliberate blind spots designed to channel unwanted visitors along predictable paths where they can be intercepted.”
“But you know how to avoid them,” Nadia observed.
“I helped design some of them. Before I understood what this property was really being prepared for.”
The road dwindled to a rutted track. Matthew directed us to a clearing concealed by overhanging branches. As we got out, I felt a subtle shift in the magical atmosphere—a heaviness suggesting accumulated energy patterns unlike anything I’d encountered.
“You feel it?” Nadia asked quietly.
I nodded. “Like static electricity, but deeper.”
“Boundary pressure,” Matthew explained.
We divided equipment and set off on foot, following what might have been an animal trail. Thilly occasionally whispered observations. “Many metal-things in trees,” and “Magic-circles under ground,” and most concerning, “Shadows watching but not seeing yet.”
We reached the ridge just as the sun dipped below the horizon. The vantage point was good, high enough to see the entire complex but far enough to stay outside detection range.
Before us, Blackridge Valley stretched open like a vast natural amphitheater. Instead of industrial buildings, the landscape revealed carefully preserved wilderness, forest surrounding a central clearing where natural rock formations jutted from the earth in patterns too regular to be coincidental. Seven distinct features ringed the valley floor in an unmistakable septagram pattern: a towering old-growth oak, a natural spring, an exposed quartz deposit, a lightning-scarred boulder, a sinkhole filled with dark water, a cave entrance, and a natural stone arch.
I joined Nadia at the ridge’s edge, extending my own senses. The various energy signatures emanated from the valley in a discordant symphony that set my teeth on edge.
“The central clearing,” I said, pointing. “That’s where the main circle will be established.”
Matthew nodded. “Those seven features aren’t natural. Lang’s been modifying them for years. Even planted that oak, positioning it precisely.”
“He said it was his backup. The Scar—”
“Might have always been a distraction,” Matthew said.
I could see that. Even when Lang told the truth, some things were still not real. I scanned the valley again. “Seven outer sites, one central point. Each natural feature tapping a different elemental source: earth, water, air, fire, life, death, and transition.”
“The septagram creates a self-reinforcing pattern,” Nadia said grimly. “The longer it exists, the more stable it becomes. And the harder to disrupt.”
Marcus had finished calibrating his scanner. “I’m detecting significant energy fluctuations across the entire valley. According to these measurements, the network is already partially activated.”
“That’s not possible,” Matthew said sharply. “The ritual is designed to activate at the celestial timing.”
“The data doesn’t lie,” Marcus insisted, turning the display so we could see. “Pre-activation sequences are already in progress.”
A cold certainty settled in my stomach. “Lang changed the timetable. He’s accelerating. I suppose the question is how, but considering what he’s done to get to this point, I shouldn’t be surprised that he has come up with some strategy.
“Why rush it now?” Nadia asked. “After nine years?”
“Because he knows we’re coming. My meeting with Mercer, bringing Matthew to the Agency… Lang must have been warned. We need to get closer,” I said, “and see the ritual.”
“Closer means crossing that perimeter,” Marcus pointed out.
“Not if we use the right approach.” I turned to Nadia. “Can your threadweaving identify weak points in the defensive network?”
“Any security system has connection points that can be temporarily disrupted. I’d need to trace the energy patterns more closely, like within a quarter mile of the perimeter.”
“How long?”
“An hour, maybe two.” I weighed our options. “We split up. Nadia can map the security gaps faster if she’s not also monitoring the broader energy patterns; that’s what Marcus’s equipment does. And Matthew, you’re the only one who can interpret changes in the activation sequence in real time. If something shifts, you’ll know what it means before Marcus’s readings can tell us.”
Matthew looked like he wanted to object but saw the logic. “Be careful. Lang’s security is designed specifically to detect—”
“I know. People like me.”
“Not just like you. You.”
“We’ll stay beyond the active perimeter,” I assured him. “Reconnaissance only.”
I turned to Marcus. “If you can’t reach me, call Alison.”
“I will,” he promised.
Thilly emerged from my pocket. “Cal-friend, doorway magic growing stronger. Hungry magic, eating boundaries.”
“I know. That’s why we need to see exactly what’s happening.”
“Thilly come too. Can find small spaces, see things big peoples miss.”
Nadia nodded. “She might notice patterns I would miss.”
We descended toward the valley floor by a different route. As we drew closer, the heaviness in the air intensified, pressing against not just my body but my magical senses. The boundary pressure created subtle distortions that made distances shift unpredictably.
“The temporal anchors,” Nadia whispered as we paused behind a fallen tree. “We should activate them now.”
I pulled the pocket watch device from my jacket and gave it three quick presses of the crown. The mechanism clicked and immediately the world snapped back into focus.
We continued until we reached a small clearing about a quarter mile from the perimeter. Nadia held up a hand.
“This is close enough. Any nearer and we risk triggering the protections he’s placed.”
She settled into a cross-legged position, a threadweaving trance stance. “Watch my back. This will take concentration.”
“I’ve got you,” I assured her.
She closed her eyes, her breathing slowing. I couldn’t see the threads she was perceiving, but I could feel the subtle extension of her awareness and tendrils of magical perception that spread outward like an invisible web.
Thilly emerged, hovering near my shoulder. “Thread-lady looking with special eyes. Thilly look different way.”
Before I could respond, she darted forward, staying low and moving in an erratic pattern. Her diminished glow made her almost invisible in the gathering darkness.
Ten minutes passed, then twenty. Faint magical illumination began outlining the seven focal points as night settled. Activity was increasing. Shadows moved between trees and pulses of energy flowed along invisible lines.
My phone vibrated. It was Marcus. Energy fluctuations up 12% in the last hour. Definite acceleration. Any sign of Lang?
I typed back, Nadia mapping security. Should have access points soon. What are you seeing?
His response read, Thermal imaging shows significant activity in central clearing. Something big is happening.
A few minutes later, Thilly returned, zipping through the underbrush. “Cal-friend! Thilly found things! Important things!”
“What did you find?”
“Seven circles at special places! Each circle connected to earth-magic. All sending power to center space. Strange metal things too! Buried in ground at each place. Human-made magic joined with nature magic. Both feeding doorway.”
“Amplifiers,” I realized. “Lang’s supplementing the natural sources with technology. That’s how he’s accelerating and why he doesn’t have to wait for natural power to build. How is he doing that? This was some celestial event that mattered.”
Nadia’s eyes snapped open, her violet irises glowing faintly.
“The security network is sophisticated,” she said, her voice slightly hoarse. “Multiple layers, both magical and technological. But there are three weak points where different systems overlap without perfect integration.”
“Can we exploit them?”
“Yes, but only briefly. The system runs self-diagnostic checks every seventeen minutes. Any disruption would be detected during the next cycle.”
“So we’d have maybe twelve to fifteen minutes through any access point.”
“At most.”
I considered this alongside Thilly’s discovery. “The amplifiers mean our original plan needs adjustment. If the energy flows are different than what Matthew described, our modifications will have to account for that.”
“We need to get this back to Matthew and Marcus,” Nadia agreed. “And contact your friend in the Agency to coordinate response planning.”
We began our retreat, moving even more cautiously now that full darkness had fallen. The forest had grown oppressive, the shadows deeper than they should have been even in the moonless night.
Thilly’s agitation had increased. “Bad feeling growing. Doorway starting to open, just a little. Like eye opening to peek.”
And with that, a surge of dark, demonic energy washed outward.
CHAPTER 26
“A door is only as useful as your ability to close it. Without that control, you haven’t built an entrance—you’ve created a wound.” —Theoretical Applications of Boundary Magic, 3rd edition, Restricted Archives.
There’s a hum that starts in your teeth when magic this big starts to move. Not the usual sizzle of a ward being tripped or the eerie hum of a half-spent glyph. No, this is the kind of sound you don’t hear so much as feel right in your bones. Something old waking up and stretching before it remembers it hates you.
And tonight? Tonight, it was very awake.
My phone buzzed once—a text from my father. Just three words: Trust your training.
I didn't know how he knew. Maybe he'd been monitoring Agency communications, or maybe he'd simply felt the shift in magical pressure that preceded catastrophic events. Either way, he was watching. Ready to help if he could, even from miles away.
I texted back: I will.
Then I silenced the phone and focused on what lay ahead.
We were halfway up the ridge when Nadia suddenly stopped, her breath fogging in the air. The radiating power ahead of us made my morph senses crawl like ants under my skin. Every instinct I had was screaming at me to turn around and run.
I paused beside her, peering through the dark tree line to the clearing ahead. Even from here, I could see the ritual circle blazing with threads of power: fiery arcs of sigil work intersecting like a spiderweb drawn by a pyromaniac. Lang stood at the center, arms raised, three captured boundary walkers around him suspended like marionettes mid-pull.
And me? I was already calculating how badly this was going to hurt me when I tried to do what I knew needed to be done in order to stabilize it—and then stop it.
“Any chance we can sneak in quietly?” I asked.
Nadia didn’t even bother responding. One look at the way the threads bristled, at the dozens of glowing cords that snaked from Lang into the circle, and I knew the answer.
“Nope,” I muttered. “Didn’t think so.”
The boundary walkers hung in midair around Lang. Their forms wavered between human and something else, translucent one moment, too solid the next, as if they couldn’t decide which reality to belong to. Their eyes were vacant. But their mouths were open. Silent screams were frozen on faces that kept flickering between expressions of agony and terrible peace.
“He’s not siphoning their energy,” Nadia murmured, her fingers twitching as if she were plucking unseen strings in the air. “He’s converting them. Bending their essence to tune the dimensional frequency.”
“Which is magic-speak for bad,” I said. “Can we cut the connection?”
“If we’re lucky,” Nadia replied. “If we’re not, they detonate.”
We crept closer. The power in the air wasn’t just rising. It was warping. Colors shifted wrong. The energy that I’d not managed to fully release thrumming like strings on a caffeine binge.
The air felt thick. Viscous. Like breathing through honey. Each step forward required more effort than the last.
“Cal,” Nadia whispered, her hand on my arm. “You’re absorbing too much. Pull back.”
She was right. The raw power pouring off the ritual was trying to flood into me whether I wanted it or not. I forced myself to tighten my defenses. It helped, but not much.
Then I felt it. Him.
Matthew.
He stepped out from behind a twisted pine with his weary elegance, like a man who had walked through too many lifetimes and wasn’t quite sure he liked any of them. His eyes glinted gold for half a heartbeat.
“He’s too far in,” he said, no preamble. “You won’t be able to stop it from the outside.”
Nadia’s hands stilled. “What do you mean, too far in?”
“He made the trade.” Matthew looked at her. His look wasn’t unkind, but had the patience of someone explaining death to a child. “They’re not batteries. They’re currency.”
The temperature dropped. My breath came out in visible puffs.
Nadia’s face went hard. “You mean Elena—”
“I don’t know if she’s part of the payment or the receipt.” He looked at me, something like regret in his ancient eyes. “But your old friend Lang? He believes the trade’s already done.”
“Done how?”
“He doesn’t have to find James. He just has to open the door.”
Lang’s voice drifted across the clearing. Chanting. A language that made my teeth ache and my vision blur at the edges. The boundary walkers began to convulse in unison.
“We need to move,” I said.
“Wait.” Matthew held up a hand. “You know the ritual is not designed to close cleanly. So you have to do what you will do quickly.”
We moved quickly after that, heading down toward the edge of the circle. I could see Lang clearly now; he looked older than I remembered. Greyer at the temples and with dark circles under his eyes that made him look hollowed out.
But there was something else. Something I hadn’t expected.
He was crying.
Tears streamed down his face as he chanted, silver light reflecting off the wet tracks on his cheeks. His hands shook with each gesture. Whatever this ritual was costing him, it wasn’t just magical energy.
I’d expected a monster. What I saw was a father who’d gone too far to stop.
Behind us, I heard the rumble of vehicles approaching. Heavy engines. Multiple units. Agency response teams. Mercer’s voice cut through the night air.
“Containment units, establish perimeter at two hundred meters. No one approaches the active circle without authorization.”
I caught sight of Alison among the responding agents. Her magical signature was already building. But all their preparation meant nothing if Lang completed his ritual.
Lang’s voice carried across the clearing, calm and resigned. “You’re too late.”
I stepped forward into the circle’s edge, feeling the power surge through me like touching a live wire. “Nine years too late, apparently.”
He didn’t look away from the center of the circle, where reality was beginning to warp and fold. “This is the only way.”
The suspended boundary walkers were glowing now, their forms becoming translucent as the energy flowed through them. I watched one of them—a young woman with short, dark hair—turn her head toward me.
Her eyes were completely silver. But for just a moment, I saw recognition. She was still aware. Still conscious. Watching helplessly as her essence was drained.
Her mouth moved. No sound came out. But I could read her lips.
Please.
“You think they’re coming back the same?” I asked, taking another step closer despite every instinct screaming at me to retreat. “Even if this works, James won’t be who you remember.”
Lang finally turned. His eyes were burning silver. Actually glowing, like twin stars in his skull.
“I don’t care.”
Three words. Absolute. Final.
“I held him when he was born,” he said, his voice cracking. “I taught him to ride a bike. To read. To believe in magic.” The chanting continued automatically, the words flowing from him like breath. “I was supposed to protect him. And I failed. For nine years, I’ve lived with that failure. Every morning. Every night. Knowing my son is trapped in Hell because I wasn’t careful enough.”
His eyes burned a brighter silver color.
“You want to know what I’d sacrifice to fix that? Everything. Everyone. Including myself.”
The honesty in his voice was more terrifying than any threat could have been. He meant it. Whatever came back through that gateway—whether it was James or some demonic shadow wearing his face—Lang would accept it.
Looking into those burning silver eyes, I felt something cold stir inside me—not fear, but recognition. I understood that absolute certainty, that willingness to sacrifice everything for someone you loved. I'd felt it when the Courts' energies warred inside me, when the Hunter's power whispered promises of strength I could use to protect the people I cared about. How far was I from becoming exactly what Lang had become? One wrong choice, one person I couldn't save, and would I be standing where he stood, willing to tear reality apart for a chance—just a chance—to undo my failure?
The thought should have horrified me. Instead, it felt like looking into a mirror I'd been avoiding for years.
Nadia moved beside me. “I can sense Elena. But... it’s twisted. Her thread is there, but stretched. As if something else is clinging to it.”
“She’s changed,” I said. “They both are.”
“Turn here,” Matthew directed at an unmarked gravel road. “There’s a service access point about two miles down that provides a view of the main complex without crossing into the security perimeter.”
“You’ve been here before?” Marcus asked.
“Several times. Lang’s security has deliberate blind spots designed to channel unwanted visitors along predictable paths where they can be intercepted.”
“But you know how to avoid them,” Nadia observed.
“I helped design some of them. Before I understood what this property was really being prepared for.”
The road dwindled to a rutted track. Matthew directed us to a clearing concealed by overhanging branches. As we got out, I felt a subtle shift in the magical atmosphere—a heaviness suggesting accumulated energy patterns unlike anything I’d encountered.
“You feel it?” Nadia asked quietly.
I nodded. “Like static electricity, but deeper.”
“Boundary pressure,” Matthew explained.
We divided equipment and set off on foot, following what might have been an animal trail. Thilly occasionally whispered observations. “Many metal-things in trees,” and “Magic-circles under ground,” and most concerning, “Shadows watching but not seeing yet.”
We reached the ridge just as the sun dipped below the horizon. The vantage point was good, high enough to see the entire complex but far enough to stay outside detection range.
Before us, Blackridge Valley stretched open like a vast natural amphitheater. Instead of industrial buildings, the landscape revealed carefully preserved wilderness, forest surrounding a central clearing where natural rock formations jutted from the earth in patterns too regular to be coincidental. Seven distinct features ringed the valley floor in an unmistakable septagram pattern: a towering old-growth oak, a natural spring, an exposed quartz deposit, a lightning-scarred boulder, a sinkhole filled with dark water, a cave entrance, and a natural stone arch.
I joined Nadia at the ridge’s edge, extending my own senses. The various energy signatures emanated from the valley in a discordant symphony that set my teeth on edge.
“The central clearing,” I said, pointing. “That’s where the main circle will be established.”
Matthew nodded. “Those seven features aren’t natural. Lang’s been modifying them for years. Even planted that oak, positioning it precisely.”
“He said it was his backup. The Scar—”
“Might have always been a distraction,” Matthew said.
I could see that. Even when Lang told the truth, some things were still not real. I scanned the valley again. “Seven outer sites, one central point. Each natural feature tapping a different elemental source: earth, water, air, fire, life, death, and transition.”
“The septagram creates a self-reinforcing pattern,” Nadia said grimly. “The longer it exists, the more stable it becomes. And the harder to disrupt.”
Marcus had finished calibrating his scanner. “I’m detecting significant energy fluctuations across the entire valley. According to these measurements, the network is already partially activated.”
“That’s not possible,” Matthew said sharply. “The ritual is designed to activate at the celestial timing.”
“The data doesn’t lie,” Marcus insisted, turning the display so we could see. “Pre-activation sequences are already in progress.”
A cold certainty settled in my stomach. “Lang changed the timetable. He’s accelerating. I suppose the question is how, but considering what he’s done to get to this point, I shouldn’t be surprised that he has come up with some strategy.
“Why rush it now?” Nadia asked. “After nine years?”
“Because he knows we’re coming. My meeting with Mercer, bringing Matthew to the Agency… Lang must have been warned. We need to get closer,” I said, “and see the ritual.”
“Closer means crossing that perimeter,” Marcus pointed out.
“Not if we use the right approach.” I turned to Nadia. “Can your threadweaving identify weak points in the defensive network?”
“Any security system has connection points that can be temporarily disrupted. I’d need to trace the energy patterns more closely, like within a quarter mile of the perimeter.”
“How long?”
“An hour, maybe two.” I weighed our options. “We split up. Nadia can map the security gaps faster if she’s not also monitoring the broader energy patterns; that’s what Marcus’s equipment does. And Matthew, you’re the only one who can interpret changes in the activation sequence in real time. If something shifts, you’ll know what it means before Marcus’s readings can tell us.”
Matthew looked like he wanted to object but saw the logic. “Be careful. Lang’s security is designed specifically to detect—”
“I know. People like me.”
“Not just like you. You.”
“We’ll stay beyond the active perimeter,” I assured him. “Reconnaissance only.”
I turned to Marcus. “If you can’t reach me, call Alison.”
“I will,” he promised.
Thilly emerged from my pocket. “Cal-friend, doorway magic growing stronger. Hungry magic, eating boundaries.”
“I know. That’s why we need to see exactly what’s happening.”
“Thilly come too. Can find small spaces, see things big peoples miss.”
Nadia nodded. “She might notice patterns I would miss.”
We descended toward the valley floor by a different route. As we drew closer, the heaviness in the air intensified, pressing against not just my body but my magical senses. The boundary pressure created subtle distortions that made distances shift unpredictably.
“The temporal anchors,” Nadia whispered as we paused behind a fallen tree. “We should activate them now.”
I pulled the pocket watch device from my jacket and gave it three quick presses of the crown. The mechanism clicked and immediately the world snapped back into focus.
We continued until we reached a small clearing about a quarter mile from the perimeter. Nadia held up a hand.
“This is close enough. Any nearer and we risk triggering the protections he’s placed.”
She settled into a cross-legged position, a threadweaving trance stance. “Watch my back. This will take concentration.”
“I’ve got you,” I assured her.
She closed her eyes, her breathing slowing. I couldn’t see the threads she was perceiving, but I could feel the subtle extension of her awareness and tendrils of magical perception that spread outward like an invisible web.
Thilly emerged, hovering near my shoulder. “Thread-lady looking with special eyes. Thilly look different way.”
Before I could respond, she darted forward, staying low and moving in an erratic pattern. Her diminished glow made her almost invisible in the gathering darkness.
Ten minutes passed, then twenty. Faint magical illumination began outlining the seven focal points as night settled. Activity was increasing. Shadows moved between trees and pulses of energy flowed along invisible lines.
My phone vibrated. It was Marcus. Energy fluctuations up 12% in the last hour. Definite acceleration. Any sign of Lang?
I typed back, Nadia mapping security. Should have access points soon. What are you seeing?
His response read, Thermal imaging shows significant activity in central clearing. Something big is happening.
A few minutes later, Thilly returned, zipping through the underbrush. “Cal-friend! Thilly found things! Important things!”
“What did you find?”
“Seven circles at special places! Each circle connected to earth-magic. All sending power to center space. Strange metal things too! Buried in ground at each place. Human-made magic joined with nature magic. Both feeding doorway.”
“Amplifiers,” I realized. “Lang’s supplementing the natural sources with technology. That’s how he’s accelerating and why he doesn’t have to wait for natural power to build. How is he doing that? This was some celestial event that mattered.”
Nadia’s eyes snapped open, her violet irises glowing faintly.
“The security network is sophisticated,” she said, her voice slightly hoarse. “Multiple layers, both magical and technological. But there are three weak points where different systems overlap without perfect integration.”
“Can we exploit them?”
“Yes, but only briefly. The system runs self-diagnostic checks every seventeen minutes. Any disruption would be detected during the next cycle.”
“So we’d have maybe twelve to fifteen minutes through any access point.”
“At most.”
I considered this alongside Thilly’s discovery. “The amplifiers mean our original plan needs adjustment. If the energy flows are different than what Matthew described, our modifications will have to account for that.”
“We need to get this back to Matthew and Marcus,” Nadia agreed. “And contact your friend in the Agency to coordinate response planning.”
We began our retreat, moving even more cautiously now that full darkness had fallen. The forest had grown oppressive, the shadows deeper than they should have been even in the moonless night.
Thilly’s agitation had increased. “Bad feeling growing. Doorway starting to open, just a little. Like eye opening to peek.”
And with that, a surge of dark, demonic energy washed outward.
CHAPTER 26
“A door is only as useful as your ability to close it. Without that control, you haven’t built an entrance—you’ve created a wound.” —Theoretical Applications of Boundary Magic, 3rd edition, Restricted Archives.
There’s a hum that starts in your teeth when magic this big starts to move. Not the usual sizzle of a ward being tripped or the eerie hum of a half-spent glyph. No, this is the kind of sound you don’t hear so much as feel right in your bones. Something old waking up and stretching before it remembers it hates you.
And tonight? Tonight, it was very awake.
My phone buzzed once—a text from my father. Just three words: Trust your training.
I didn't know how he knew. Maybe he'd been monitoring Agency communications, or maybe he'd simply felt the shift in magical pressure that preceded catastrophic events. Either way, he was watching. Ready to help if he could, even from miles away.
I texted back: I will.
Then I silenced the phone and focused on what lay ahead.
We were halfway up the ridge when Nadia suddenly stopped, her breath fogging in the air. The radiating power ahead of us made my morph senses crawl like ants under my skin. Every instinct I had was screaming at me to turn around and run.
I paused beside her, peering through the dark tree line to the clearing ahead. Even from here, I could see the ritual circle blazing with threads of power: fiery arcs of sigil work intersecting like a spiderweb drawn by a pyromaniac. Lang stood at the center, arms raised, three captured boundary walkers around him suspended like marionettes mid-pull.
And me? I was already calculating how badly this was going to hurt me when I tried to do what I knew needed to be done in order to stabilize it—and then stop it.
“Any chance we can sneak in quietly?” I asked.
Nadia didn’t even bother responding. One look at the way the threads bristled, at the dozens of glowing cords that snaked from Lang into the circle, and I knew the answer.
“Nope,” I muttered. “Didn’t think so.”
The boundary walkers hung in midair around Lang. Their forms wavered between human and something else, translucent one moment, too solid the next, as if they couldn’t decide which reality to belong to. Their eyes were vacant. But their mouths were open. Silent screams were frozen on faces that kept flickering between expressions of agony and terrible peace.
“He’s not siphoning their energy,” Nadia murmured, her fingers twitching as if she were plucking unseen strings in the air. “He’s converting them. Bending their essence to tune the dimensional frequency.”
“Which is magic-speak for bad,” I said. “Can we cut the connection?”
“If we’re lucky,” Nadia replied. “If we’re not, they detonate.”
We crept closer. The power in the air wasn’t just rising. It was warping. Colors shifted wrong. The energy that I’d not managed to fully release thrumming like strings on a caffeine binge.
The air felt thick. Viscous. Like breathing through honey. Each step forward required more effort than the last.
“Cal,” Nadia whispered, her hand on my arm. “You’re absorbing too much. Pull back.”
She was right. The raw power pouring off the ritual was trying to flood into me whether I wanted it or not. I forced myself to tighten my defenses. It helped, but not much.
Then I felt it. Him.
Matthew.
He stepped out from behind a twisted pine with his weary elegance, like a man who had walked through too many lifetimes and wasn’t quite sure he liked any of them. His eyes glinted gold for half a heartbeat.
“He’s too far in,” he said, no preamble. “You won’t be able to stop it from the outside.”
Nadia’s hands stilled. “What do you mean, too far in?”
“He made the trade.” Matthew looked at her. His look wasn’t unkind, but had the patience of someone explaining death to a child. “They’re not batteries. They’re currency.”
The temperature dropped. My breath came out in visible puffs.
Nadia’s face went hard. “You mean Elena—”
“I don’t know if she’s part of the payment or the receipt.” He looked at me, something like regret in his ancient eyes. “But your old friend Lang? He believes the trade’s already done.”
“Done how?”
“He doesn’t have to find James. He just has to open the door.”
Lang’s voice drifted across the clearing. Chanting. A language that made my teeth ache and my vision blur at the edges. The boundary walkers began to convulse in unison.
“We need to move,” I said.
“Wait.” Matthew held up a hand. “You know the ritual is not designed to close cleanly. So you have to do what you will do quickly.”
We moved quickly after that, heading down toward the edge of the circle. I could see Lang clearly now; he looked older than I remembered. Greyer at the temples and with dark circles under his eyes that made him look hollowed out.
But there was something else. Something I hadn’t expected.
He was crying.
Tears streamed down his face as he chanted, silver light reflecting off the wet tracks on his cheeks. His hands shook with each gesture. Whatever this ritual was costing him, it wasn’t just magical energy.
I’d expected a monster. What I saw was a father who’d gone too far to stop.
Behind us, I heard the rumble of vehicles approaching. Heavy engines. Multiple units. Agency response teams. Mercer’s voice cut through the night air.
“Containment units, establish perimeter at two hundred meters. No one approaches the active circle without authorization.”
I caught sight of Alison among the responding agents. Her magical signature was already building. But all their preparation meant nothing if Lang completed his ritual.
Lang’s voice carried across the clearing, calm and resigned. “You’re too late.”
I stepped forward into the circle’s edge, feeling the power surge through me like touching a live wire. “Nine years too late, apparently.”
He didn’t look away from the center of the circle, where reality was beginning to warp and fold. “This is the only way.”
The suspended boundary walkers were glowing now, their forms becoming translucent as the energy flowed through them. I watched one of them—a young woman with short, dark hair—turn her head toward me.
Her eyes were completely silver. But for just a moment, I saw recognition. She was still aware. Still conscious. Watching helplessly as her essence was drained.
Her mouth moved. No sound came out. But I could read her lips.
Please.
“You think they’re coming back the same?” I asked, taking another step closer despite every instinct screaming at me to retreat. “Even if this works, James won’t be who you remember.”
Lang finally turned. His eyes were burning silver. Actually glowing, like twin stars in his skull.
“I don’t care.”
Three words. Absolute. Final.
“I held him when he was born,” he said, his voice cracking. “I taught him to ride a bike. To read. To believe in magic.” The chanting continued automatically, the words flowing from him like breath. “I was supposed to protect him. And I failed. For nine years, I’ve lived with that failure. Every morning. Every night. Knowing my son is trapped in Hell because I wasn’t careful enough.”
His eyes burned a brighter silver color.
“You want to know what I’d sacrifice to fix that? Everything. Everyone. Including myself.”
The honesty in his voice was more terrifying than any threat could have been. He meant it. Whatever came back through that gateway—whether it was James or some demonic shadow wearing his face—Lang would accept it.
Looking into those burning silver eyes, I felt something cold stir inside me—not fear, but recognition. I understood that absolute certainty, that willingness to sacrifice everything for someone you loved. I'd felt it when the Courts' energies warred inside me, when the Hunter's power whispered promises of strength I could use to protect the people I cared about. How far was I from becoming exactly what Lang had become? One wrong choice, one person I couldn't save, and would I be standing where he stood, willing to tear reality apart for a chance—just a chance—to undo my failure?
The thought should have horrified me. Instead, it felt like looking into a mirror I'd been avoiding for years.
Nadia moved beside me. “I can sense Elena. But... it’s twisted. Her thread is there, but stretched. As if something else is clinging to it.”
“She’s changed,” I said. “They both are.”
