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Yeah . . . I wasn’t sure that was the bartender’s number one rule. “Where’s Syros right now?”

Tom reached out and flicked his fingers, but those fingers turned into static streams of sparkly energy and vanished into the screen nearest him. “In the exercise yard, trying to get through the fence.

“We can’t let that happen.” I caught Victor’s stricken gaze. He wanted to come too, wanted to protect us, but he also had several thousand Lost Ones to contain.

“Join us, Vic, when you’re done saving the prison,” Zee said.

“Keep him safe.”

“I will,” both Zee and I said together.

“This romantic moment is nice an’ all, but stop making eyes at each other and go already!”

“Right, yeah, okay . . . uh, bye.” We ducked out the door and raced down the corridor.

We could do this, we had to do this. I had faith.

And the best demon there ever was at my side.

CHAPTER 21

The sirens weren’t as loud in the exercise yard, and the panic happening inside the prison seemed like a whole other world away. The night air was still, stars twinkling beyond the chain-link cage we were all trapped in. Across the dusty yard, Syros tried to pull apart the warded metal links, and was gradually making a hole that would soon be large enough for him to squeeze through.

He couldn’t shift, not yet, but he was strong.

We weren’t the only ones closing in on my brother, though.

Jenny emerged from another side door.

“Oh, hell no,” Zee breathed.

“It's okay, she’s on our side . . . I think.”

“You know, Syros.” Jenny raised her voice, crossing the yard toward my brother, several strides in front of us. “This is literally your villain origin story backfiring.”

Syros turned to see us all bearing down on him. “You guys do know I’m a dragon, right? Anything you do to me, I’ll just heal and hit back harder.”

Zee kept on heading forward too. “Yeah, we know. But it’ll feel good while we beat the crap out of you.”

“I had mad time to think after Adam tried to make me play nice at Whiteacre,” Jenny continued in her confusing Gen Z slang. “Just vibing with my thoughts, wondering if I was being toxic as fuck, and not gonna lie, I was givin’ major red-flag energy. The thing is, you can’t force someone to stan you, can’t make them simp for you, and I learned, it’s not their fault that you’re living in your flop era⁠—”

“I don’t want people to like me,” Syros laughed. “They will worship me.”

Zee rolled his eyes. “Bro, you need a shit-ton of therapy. Do dragons have therapists?” he asked me.

“No, we mostly eat all our problems.”

The three of us stopped a few strides from Syros, and the buckled fence was at his back, close to being mangled enough for him to squeeze through. A few more tugs would probably snap the links. But he continued to glare at us. “There’s only one way this ends, and that’s with all of you dead at my feet.”

Zee snorted a laugh. “Does Mr Grumpy Dragon want belly rubs?”

“You said you’d gift me the hotel if I worked for you,” Jenny said. “But when I was there, as Adam, you missed all his main character energy. The people who work there? They’re all literally ride or dies. They went so hard, planning to bring everyone here who’s also in their squad. They chose to help Adam, and Zee, even the old vampire too—who nobody much likes btw—and I’m so living for that energy. I agreed when you came looking for their enemies, because I was low-key throwing shade at all of them, but the plot twist? Seeing through Adam's point of view, who they actually are? That kind of found family core memory can’t be gatekept, it’s just high-key authentic. And I stopped with the hate vibe, straight up. Syros, bro, you got it all wrong.”

“So you had a learning moment.” Syros sneered. “Do I look as though I care?”

“Hey,” Zee snapped. “This is Gen Z’s redemption arc. Have some respect for her character development.”

“That hotel is special,” Jenny said. “It’s people are low-key special, and I kinda wanna be like them, and not fight against them. Y’know, it’s better with your besties, than without.”