House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1) by Sarah J. Maas

Ruhn crossed his arms. “She does what she wants. She always has.” There was enough bitterness there to suggest history—bad history.

Hunt drawled, “Just how close are you two?”

“If you’re asking whether I’m fucking her,” Ruhn seethed, “the answer, asshole, is no. She’s family.”

“Distant family,” Hunt pointed out. “I heard the Fae like to keep their bloodline undiluted.”

Ruhn held his stare. And as Hunt smiled again, ether filled the room, the promise of a storm skittering over Isaiah’s skin.

Wondering if he’d be dumb enough to get between them when Ruhn attempted to bash in Hunt’s teeth and Hunt turned the prince into a pile of smoldering bones, Isaiah said quickly, “We’re just trying to do our job, Prince.”

“If you assholes had kept an eye on Briggs like you were supposed to, maybe this wouldn’t have happened at all.”

Hunt’s gray wings flared slightly—a malakh’s usual stance when preparing for a physical fight. And those dark eyes … They were the eyes of the feared warrior, the Fallen angel. The one who had smashed apart the battlefields he’d been ordered to fight on. The one who killed on an Archangel’s whim, and did it so well they called him the Shadow of Death.

“Careful,” Hunt said.

“Stay the fuck away from Bryce,” Ruhn snarled before striding back through the door, presumably after his cousin. At least Bryce would have an escort.

Hunt flipped off the empty doorway. After a moment, he murmured, “The tracking device in the water Quinlan drank when she got here. What’s the time frame on it?”

“Three days,” Isaiah replied.

Hunt studied the knife sheathed at his thigh. “Danika Fendyr was one of the strongest Vanir in the city, even without making the Drop. She begged like a human by the end.”

Sabine would never recover from the shame.

“I don’t know of a demon that kills like that,” Hunt mused. “Or disappears that easily. I couldn’t find a trace. It’s like it vanished back to Hel.”

Isaiah said, “If Briggs is behind it, we’ll learn what the demon is soon enough.”

If Briggs talked at all. He certainly hadn’t when he’d been busted in his bomb lab, despite the best efforts of the 33rd’s interrogators and the Aux.

Isaiah added, “I’ll have every available patrol quietly looking out for other young packs in the Auxiliary. If it winds up not being related to Briggs, then it could be the start of a pattern.”

Hunt asked darkly, “If we find the demon?”

Isaiah shrugged. “Then make sure it’s not a problem anymore, Hunt.”

Hunt’s eyes sharpened into lethal focus. “And Bryce Quinlan—after the three days are up?”

Isaiah frowned at the table, the crumpled chair. “If she’s smart, she’ll lie low and not attract the attention of any other powerful immortals for the rest of her life.”





7

The black steps ringing the foggy shore of the Bone Quarter bit into Bryce’s knees as she knelt before the towering ivory gates.

The Istros spread like a gray mirror behind her, silent in the predawn light.

As quiet and still as she had gone, hollowed out and drifting.

Mist curled around her, veiling all but the obsidian steps she knelt on and the carved bone gates looming overhead. The rotting black boat at her back was her only companion, its moldy, ancient rope draped over the steps in lieu of a mooring. She’d paid the fee—the boat would linger here until she was done. Until she had said what she needed to say.

The living realm remained a world away, the spires and skyscrapers of the city hidden by that swirling mist, its car horns and array of voices rendered mute. She’d left behind any mortal possessions. They would have no value here, among the Reapers and the dead.

She’d been glad to leave them—especially her phone, so full of anger and hatred.

Ithan’s latest audiomail had come only an hour ago, stirring her from the unsleeping stupor in which she’d spent the past six nights, staring at the dark ceiling of the hotel room she was sharing with her mother. Ignoring every call and message.

Ithan’s words had lingered, though, when she’d slipped into the hotel bathroom to listen.

Don’t come to the Sailing tomorrow. You’re not welcome there.

She’d listened to it over and over, the first words to echo in her silent head.

Her mother hadn’t woken from the bed beside hers when Bryce had exited the hotel room on Fae-soft feet, taking the service elevator and leaving through the unwatched alley door. She hadn’t left that room for six days, just sat staring vacantly at the floral hotel wallpaper. And now, with the seventh dawning … Only for this would she leave. Would she remember how to move her body, how to speak.

Danika’s Sailing would commence at dawn, and the Sailings for the rest of the pack would follow. Bryce would not be there to witness them. Even without the wolves banning her from it, she couldn’t have endured it. To see the black boat pushed from the dock, all that was left of Danika with it, her soul to be judged either worthy or unworthy of entering the sacred isle across the river.

There was only silence here. Silence and mist.

Was this death? Silence and fog?

Bryce ran her tongue over her dry, chapped lips. She did not remember the last time she’d drunk anything. Had a meal. Only her mother coaxing her to take a sip of water.