Page 107

“I can't do this. Malachi, I think I’m going to be sick. Like, actually vomit.” My hands are shaking so hard the lanyards rattle against each other in my grip. “I can't see him. I can't look at him.” The panic’s rising, a dark tide closing over my head. “What if he turns nasty on me? What if he doesn’t want an apology? What if⁠—”

Malachi steps in front of me, blocking the view of the corridor. He grips my shoulders, his fingers digging into the muscle, grounding me in the here and now.

“Look at me,” he commands, his eyes burning into mine. “He is dead. He is a soul in processing. He has no power here. You are the mortal Eden fucking Loxley, bound to the demon Malachi Virezeal. You are the one holding the leash.” He leans in, his voice dropping to a lethal whisper. “If he so much as looks at you the wrong way, I will tear his soul apart before he can blink. Do you understand me?”

I stare up at his wild, golden eyes, and I nod jerkily.

“No,” Malachi growls, his grip tightening as he gives me a demanding shake. “Say it. Tell me who you are.”

“I am...” My voice cracks, pathetically, but I try again, drawing strength from the heat of his hands on me. “I am Eden fucking Loxley.”

“Louder.”

“I am Eden fucking Loxley,” I say with a little more vigour.

“And who holds the leash?” he demands, face inches from mine.

“I do,” I breathe.

“Good.”

He laces our hands together and turns to the massive slabs of reinforced iron that look like they belong on a bank vault. He presses his lanyard against the metal, and with a deep groan, the doors slowly swing inward.

An oppressive wall of noise slams into us. It’s a cacophony of pure, distilled anguish. Wails. Screams. The desperate sobbing of thousands of people who have just realized that the stories were real, and they’re on the wrong side of the gate. The space is crammed with bodies. There are no chairs here, no orderly lines. The souls are packed into endless, fenced-in pens that stretch out into the darkness.

And watching them are the guards. These aren't the Wardens—these are impossibly tall, looming at least eight feet in the air. Their skin’s a deep, saturated crimson, the color of fresh arterial blood, and they wear no armor to hide it.

My gut roils, and not even just from the smell of ozone and the unwashed bodies and the fear. It’s him. I swear I can feel him. It’s like walking into a room where someone has left gas running—an invisible, suffocating pressure that warns you to run before you strike a match.

“Check the papers,” Malachi orders. “What row’s he in?”

I look down at the swimming words upon the crumpled parchment in my free hand. “Row... twelve.”

“Deep breath,” Malachi murmurs, pulling me tight against his side as a crimson guard stalks past us, its baton crackling. “Do not pass out on me, Eden. Not here.”

We pass Row eight. Row nine. Every step like wading through wet concrete. I focus on Malachi’s boots hitting the metal grating. I focus on the heat of his hand. I focus on anything but the terrified thought that in thirty seconds, I am going to see the face that has haunted my nightmares for a year.

He stops abruptly, the momentum nearly sending me crashing into a support beam. I stumble, catching myself on the cold railing, and look up.

“Row twelve,” he says, his voice devoid of any emotion. “He's in there.”

From what I can see through the chain-link, it doesn't look like the other pens. It isn't a riot of screaming and wailing. It looks like an airport terminal delayed indefinitely, filled with men in varying states of decay pacing back and forth in tight, anxious circles. But somehow, the sound’s worse.

“You're overreacting,” one man mutters to the floor. “I never said that. You're crazy.”

“She made me do it,” another insists to the corner. “If she hadn't pushed me, I wouldn't have had to hit her.”

A red guard unfolds itself from the shadows near the gate, its head tilting down toward us, and Malachi shoves the crumpled paperwork toward it. The guard scans over everything before stepping aside and tapping the locking mechanism with its baton. A violet spark arcs, and the lock disengages with a clunk.

The cool metal of the iron handle presses into my palm, sending a cruel shudder up my spine. With one deep, heavy breath, and push.

I wipe my palms against the rough fabric of my trousers, but the sweat comes back instantly. It’s cold and clammy, a physical manifestation of the terror clawing at my throat. My boots move silently over the stained concrete as I wade into the sea of pacing, muttering men, with a demon and his hound flanking me like royal guards.

“I can't do this,” I whisper, my voice trembling. “Malachi, I can't⁠—”

“You can,” he answers, his voice a low rumble against my ear, as he steers me forward.

“Eden? Babe?”