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“This,” she groaned, “is like some fucked-up version of attending your own Sailing.”
Everyone was gaping at her. And Hunt—he was real, he was right there, and the shock on his face was so genuine that Bryce just laughed.
The Asteri were gone. And with them, their firstlight, secondlight, their prison of an afterlife, and those she’d loved and lost … they were safe, too.
All of Danika’s work, fulfilled.
Bryce looked from Hunt to Ithan, also hovering over her, and gave the wolf a long, assessing look. “Who died and made you Prime?”
Ithan gaped at her, but Hypaxia—crowned with bones, for fuck’s sake—smirked and said, “Sabine.”
And Bryce laughed again.
“What the fuck, Quinlan?” Hunt muttered, and she looked back at her mate, whose face was so wan, his eyes so full of wonder—
She had the sense of others being there. Of Ruhn and Lidia and Flynn and Dec and Tharion and the Princes of Hel, but they all faded away before Hunt.
Bryce lifted a hand to his cheek, wiping away a tear with her thumb. “Look at my big, tough Alphahole,” she said quietly, but tears thickened her voice, too.
“How can you joke at a time like this?” Hunt said, and Bryce surged forward and kissed him.
It was light and love and life.
She had a dim awareness of a stirring in the air around them and Ruhn saying, “Does someone, uh, want to put Jesiba’s ashes in a … cup or something?”
But Bryce just kissed Hunt, and his arms slid around her, holding her tight to him.
Like he’d never let go.
* * *
Hunt allowed Bryce out of his sight only for a few minutes. So he could do this last, final task.
Wings of every color and the husks of the mech-suits still lay where they’d collapsed hours earlier, instantly crashing to the ground the moment the Fallen souls had vacated them.
He didn’t have any particular suit in mind, but he walked among the field of them—stepping over the bodies of fallen demons and Asterian angels alike, feathers scattered everywhere, and finally halted before a hulking suit, its eyes now darkened.
“Thanks,” he said quietly to the Fallen, even if their souls were now gone. Off to the place Bryce claimed they’d all go, in the end. “For having my back this one last time.”
The battlefield beyond the city walls was eerily silent save for the calls of carrion-feeders, but the city behind him was a symphony of sirens and wails and screams. Of news helicopters circling, trying to find some way to convey what had happened.
Naomi had gone off to meet them, to attempt to establish some semblance of order.
“We did it,” Hunt said, throat thick. “At last, we did it. The hierarchies are still here, I guess, but I promise you …” He swallowed hard, surveying all the cold, empty metal littering the field around him. “It’s going to change from here on out.”
Wings flapped overhead, and then Isaiah was there, wounds already healed beneath the blood crusted on his dark skin. His brow remained wonderfully clear of the halo.
Isaiah surveyed the mech-suits, the empty eyes, and bowed his head in silent thanks.
“Wherever they’ve gone,” Isaiah said after a moment, “I hope it’s the paradise they deserve.”
“It is,” Hunt said, and knew it in his heart to be true. He eyed the angel. “What’s up?”
Isaiah smiled slightly. “I heard you came out here and thought you might want company. You know, someone to brood with.”
Hunt chuckled. “Thanks. I always appreciate a partner-in-brooding.”
Isaiah’s smile broadened. But his eyes gleamed as he said, “So, after all this time, all this suffering … we finally saw the Fallen’s cause fulfilled.”
