“Will you stop it?” I jumped to my feet. “Just stop it. You’re on ash because if you don’t keep taking it in regulated doses, you’ll drop into a coma and die. Just like Amanda and everyone else who survived using the drug in the first place.” I paused, trying to sound calm. “A few of them have formed a support group. Why don’t you go? Talk. There’s a meeting tomorrow. I can take you.” I sat back down on the arm of the loveseat. “Doctor Mott is going to figure out a cure, but letting yourself shrivel away like this”—I slid from the arm into the seat—“it’s not you.”

My head fell back and I shut my eyelids tightly against the rising tears, repeating that last sentence over again in my head.

I hated this.

The frustration made me throw up my hands and give her a defeated look. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry this happened to you. I’m sorry that it was because of me and Emma—”

“Oh my God. Enough with the guilt routine, Charlie. If you say you’re sorry one more time, I might actually vomit.” She got up and walked behind the couch, her hands braced on the back. “I knew the risks. I love Emma. I love you. It was my choice to go to that bath house that night, my choice to fight, and I’d do it all over again. Just … let me deal with this on my own, okay?” Her eyes drifted closed for a moment. Her shoulders lifted and fell tiredly. “I’m tired. Can’t you just come back later or some-thing?”

I stared at the wall for a long second. “Sure.” I shook my head, feeling exhausted myself. “I’ll bring some groceries in the morning. Before I take you to the meeting.”

“Whatever you want.” She shuffled into her dark bedroom and closed the door.

I left Bryn’s apartment, keeping my head down and my gaze averted as I passed the goblin, letting my steps carry me toward the plaza on autopilot, too overwhelmed with worry and frustration to notice much around me, just knowing I had to fix things.

The despondent aura surrounding her was eating away at her light, her spirit, at everything that had made her Bryn. My sister. The earth mage. The independent business owner. The much-loved aunt.

I didn’t go back into the office. Instead, I got my Tahoe from the back lot of the station and drove down I-85 to the outskirts of the city, to the grounds of Mott Tech.

The guards at the gatehouse waved me in now that I had a full-clearance badge.

The complex was Titus Mott’s baby—the underground research facility that allowed him to work on all of his off-world and human inventions. After he and his team had discovered the alternate dimensions of Elysia and Charbydon, he’d acquired the massive funding needed to create his scientific empire. But I didn’t plan on seeing Titus. Not tonight. I’d been coming here on and off since I’d brought darkness to the city, not even sure why I chose this place of all places to come.

The cool night air made me pull my jacket closer around me as I got out of my vehicle and headed across the parking lot, grateful that the inside lining was dry and warm. My footsteps shuffled over the flagstone pathway that led through the manicured grounds to the romantic Victorian-style pavilion perched on the edge of a calm lake.

The breeze was heavy down here, like always. I rounded the grassy edge of the water, coming to the idyllic bridge that spanned the small creek that fed the lake and led to the pavilion. A bench had been placed near the bridge and I sat in my usual spot, on the right side, facing the circular meadow where I’d first called the darkness. Where I’d fed on Mynogan’s blood, the blood of an Abaddon elder, killing him.

The center of it all.

I didn’t know why I kept coming here, envisioning the past, replaying that night over and over in my head, and taking out Grigori Tennin’s card from my inside jacket pocket. I like what you’ve done with the place, it said.

The small card had come with the flowers he’d sent via florist to the hospital just as I was leaving. The flowers were long gone, but the card I’d kept. It was wrinkled and bent now, but it reminded me of my place in this game. Grigori had had a hand in bringing darkness to the city; I just didn’t know the part he played. His card reminded me to be vigilant, to always watch my back because he wasn’t through with me. And I sure as hell wasn’t through with him.

I stared at the meadow, my gaze not really focusing on any one thing as I flipped the card slowly through my fingers, thinking about the victims in the warehouse. All Elysian. There’d be no one who would benefit more from a war than the jinn tribal boss. The entire tribe would be eager to fight and get back to their warlike ways. And while the jinn and other Charbydons would be battling the rest of us, Grigori would, no doubt, benefit from the distraction. Law enforcement would be completely overwhelmed, leaving Grigori to expand his many illegal endeavors.

That was worst case scenario. And Pendaran would play right into Grigori’s hands, starting a battle with the jinn over Daya.

A green flash snaked through the darkness above, lighting the meadow for a moment in a soft green glow.

I tapped the edge of the card against my cheek, opening my mind, letting in all the possibilities, all the paths this case might take, and where they might have originated. My thoughts turned to Llyran, the Adonai serial killer, a Level Ten felon who had escaped Titus Mott’s lab around the time I’d brought darkness to the city. Llyran had disappeared. No word. No sightings. He could be back in Elysia by now or right in my backyard, laying low.

Or—goose bumps sprouted along my arms—he could be killing his own kind. I hugged myself against the sudden chill. An Adonai killing his own kind? His own race? Seemed shocking, but why not? Humans had been killing humans since the dawn of time. The question was: did he have a motive? Or was he simply killing for the love of it, for a reason only understandable to the serial killer mind?

Pendaran’s ultimatum of one week—one week to find Daya’s killer before he confronted the jinn—grated on every last nerve. One week to find a serial killer powerful enough to kill not one, but seven of the most powerful beings in the city.

Hardheaded dragon bastard.

It was either lock the Druid King up and prevent him from waging war—which was guaranteed to cause serious injury to all parties involved—or find the killer. Or, I thought, biting the inside of my cheek, find something or some way to convince Dragon Boy to back off and let us do our job.

I slipped the card into my pocket and slouched further down the bench, bracing my boots in the grass.

A chuckle stuck in my throat as the realization of why I kept coming here, given the circumstances, dawned on me. This was the only place where I could just sit and not be bothered or worry about anyone else. This was the only place where I felt like I belonged, because, really, who else would belong at such a place except me?

This was the site where the warring genes in my body converged, melded, came together in one cohesive, perfect moment. Did I know that for certain? No. But it had felt like it. Thinking back on it, I was pretty certain Mynogan’s ritual was what gave me that sense of oneness. I’d heard the drumbeats in my mind and body. I’d been thrown back to a time so ancient it felt like the beginning of time itself, and in that moment I was whole, not fractured like I’d felt before or after.

So, yeah, I thought, looking up at the darkness moving slowly overhead, this was my place, my … creation.

I was an hour and a half late for dinner, but I came home decompressed and back on track. And after I ate and showered, I planned to log on to the ITF database and pull Llyran’s file. My footsteps echoed on the porch steps of my Candler Park bungalow, my stomach taking note of the warm spices leaking from the open window. The tap, tap, tap of claws on wood sounded beyond the door as I reached for the knob, preparing myself for yet another odd night at the Madigan home.