“It’s with me,” I reply. “In my prison. In Hell.”
And that’s the only way we’ll be able to retrieve it…
By venturing into the deepest pits of Hell and freeing it from my prison. If we don’t, Hadley will be lost to us forever.
Chapter 36
Auston
The tears won’t stop falling. I’ve never been a man to cry. Even when we lost our dad, I didn’t cry. I held it together for my mom and for my brothers. I’ve always been the unofficial leader of my brothers. I was the one they’d run to if there was a spider in their room, the one they’d come to for advice or encouragement. I was the one who was able to keep his emotions in check and be the rock for everyone else, even if my own world was falling apart.
But right now?
I’m fucking broken.
Pieces of my heart are shattered on the ground, surrounding the haunting image of Hadley’s body. Her skin is pale, black tendrils of deadly magic trailing through her veins. Even her eyes are blank, sightless.
She looks dead, again.
And I saw her die the first time, which was bad enough. I watched over her body as my brother came for her soul, saw her take her last breath, grieved with her friends and family who were so proud of how hard she’d fought.
And now, I have to relive that again.
I look over to Caius and see the anguish in his smoky face. For him, this is also the second time.
But she’s not dead. He said so.
“Hadley!” Braxton’s voice shatters as he collapses next to our girl, his shoulders shaking, clawed breaths and anguished cries escaping him. His wings are covered in blood, and his body is riddled in cuts and gashes.
“We can still save her.” Cauis’s voice reminds me again of where she is.
In Hell.
With him.
“We need to move her. Now. Administer is coming,” Caius warns, glancing towards the professors who have been thwarted by a group of monsters while trying to get to us.
“Fuck,” Brax growls, just as Preston and Karston come jogging over, both covered in sweat, blood, and grime.
“She’s not dead,” I inform them quickly. “But we need to get her out of here. There is so much more at play here than a disgruntled Administer and rogue monsters from Hell.”
“The tunnels,” Karston murmurs. “The secret room we found. No one knows about that except the five of us, Aggie, and Layla.”
“All people we trust,” I agree. “Let’s move her.”
Our girl weighs nothing in our eight strong hands, and usually only one of us would need to carry her, but we’re trying to stabilize her body, not wanting to jostle the dagger. Caius looks down on her longingly, his mist and smoke unable to grasp her unless he uses more of his stored up essences down in Hell. But I’m glad he’s not. Maybe that means she at least has company down there.
“Move! Now!” Caius growls, and we listen. There’s no time for emotion right now, and I sniff back the tears as we rush through the grounds, weaving through the East Woods and into the Academy.
We head up to premonitions and slip through the secret fireplace entrance to the tunnels, sliding the grate aside to get in. I drop down first, then Brax. Karston and Preston lower Hadley’s body through, and we catch her with ease.
Caius is already heading through the archway as if he knows exactly where he’s going. But then the memory of Hadley’s tunnel prison filters through my mind, and his epic battle with Karston when he almost took his life plays over and over. Yes, he’s familiar with tunnels.
“This way.” Karston pushes ahead of us and floats through the labyrinth while Brax and I carry Hadley. Preston just looks down at her with sad eyes and keeps running into walls and other objects.
“Fucking pay attention,” I snap at him. He winces, and I immediately regret my outburst. But we don’t have time for this. Soon, we find the hidden latch and open the secret staircase leading down.
Brax and I take care moving Hadley, not wanting to jostle the dagger still embedded in her chest. The secret room looks the same as it always has—dark green brick walls and a green mist hovering over the endless darkness above. Sconces come to light on the walls as we pass, illuminating the niches they are inside of.
“Watch out!” Karston shouts as the room starts to rumble and shake. Braxton and I place Hadley down on the floor and lean over her body protectively, shielding her from whatever this is.
A crash sounds, and the mosaic depicting Hadley and my quad crumbles to the ground. The shaking grows harder, reminiscent of how my ass vibrated on Earth when I had my subwoofers blasting in my ride.
The shattered pieces of the mural float up from the ground and swirl around as if stuck in a vortex or a tiny tornado. I can see hints of blue that remind me of Hadley’s eyes, the stark white that could be my wing, pale green of Preston’s gaze, the blond hair of my Ghost brother.
The pieces break apart, repositioning themselves over the now empty wall, before setting themselves back inside the mural.
We gasp collectively as a new picture glows bright on the wall. But instead of me and my quad, it displays all six of us. My brothers and I are on one side of Hadley, our bodies depicted in the likeness of our Afterword divisions, and Caius in his human form is on the other.
“What do you think it means?” Preston shouts over the tremors still shaking the room.
Before anyone can give an answer, a grinding noise has us turning our heads. Rising from the ground is a stone statue, reminding me much of the mural. An Angel, Demon, Ghost, and Reaper are surrounding a woman holding a book. Behind them is a regal man, standing proud, his arms stretched wide. None of the six stone people have faces—just blank, uncarved rock.
Lights from above shine down on it, making the white stone sparkle and glisten.
“What the—?” Brax starts, but he’s cut off when a voice resounds in the room.
“The time is now to put your differences aside,” a woman’s voice booms, the sound causing goosebumps to rise on my skin. “This was always your destiny, your fates entwined.”
“Mom?” Preston whispers into the air.
“Your path will not be easy, as nothing worth doing ever is.” This time, it’s our dad. Tears threaten to fall down my cheeks, hearing his voice after he’s been gone for so long.
“You will be tried, tested, brought to the deepest bowls of despair, yet you must fight and claw your way out.” This time Caius gasps, the woman’s voice one he must recognize.
“In her quest for vengeance, Lilith will destroy everything we love. She won’t stop until the world crumbles beneath her fingers.” My breath hitches—it’s Hadley. “The five of you are all the world has left. Find me, and together, we can fight her. Abandon me, and it will lead to your doom.”
The lights dim, and we all stand around dumbstruck for a moment.
“The dagger!” Karston exclaims, and we rush over to Hadley. Karston summons a dagger of his own and slices through the oversized sweatshirt she’d borrowed.
For once I’m not distracted by her perfect breasts, the dagger embedded between them my sole focus.
“Caius! What do we do?”
“You need the power of a Fate to remove that.” His words hang heavy in the air.