The Stars Never Rise

Grayson laughed. “Finn says you do but it’s cute.”


“It’s not cute.” Devi handed the bags to Maddock, then headed back into the bedroom.

I drained my glass and ran my hands through my morning hair. “Where is Finn?”

“Um…” Grayson’s gaze trailed slowly back and forth across the living room. “He seems to be pacing.” She turned back to me and took my empty glass. “Today he’s more frustrated than usual by his inability to interact with the world. I think he wants to talk to you.”

“Wait, you can hear him? How?” I stared at the empty living room, but I had no idea where I was supposed to be looking.

Grayson shrugged.

“She can hear things the rest of us can’t.” Devi crossed the living room with a stack of clothing. “Like degenerates. And Finn.”

“I hear him like he’s talking from inside my head,” Grayson clarified. “Like I’m hearing his thoughts, but only the ones he wants me to hear. It’s different with the degenerates, though. I can feel them when they get close enough.”

“Weird.”

She stood with my empty glass. “Maddy can hear him too.”

I turned to Maddock, fascinated.

He nodded. “Yeah, but not like Gray does. I actually hear Finn, like I hear you. As if he’s standing right next to me.” He frowned and dropped another can into a new bag. “Or shouting from the other room, as he’s doing right now.”

“Make yourself useful.” Devi emerged from the bathroom and shoved a toiletry bag at me. It was nearly full of half-used tubes of toothpaste, rolls of floss, and sticks of deodorant. “Take everything we could possibly use in the badlands. We can’t risk breaching another town until we’re no longer a national headline.”

I stood, suddenly relieved to realize I’d slept fully clothed. “Wait, you’re leaving? Today?”

“We’re leaving,” Maddock corrected. “You have to come with us, Nina. If you stay here, they’ll find you. They’ve locked down the town and they’re patrolling the wall. Our only chance to get out is during the press conference.”

“Which is where these come in,” Devi added from the bedroom doorway, where she held a white school blouse in one hand and a pair of navy slacks in the other. “The daughter’s closet is full of old school clothes, which should help us blend into the crowd on the way to the south gate.”

“What crowd?” I set the toiletry bag on the bathroom counter and dropped a bottle of acetaminophen into it.

“The press conference is shaping up to be a public spectacle.” Reese set a platter of bacon on the table. “They’re going to reveal the identity of whatever demon they claim to have found hiding among your friends and neighbors. The Church is ramping up the drama with the ‘monsters among you’ angle, and they’ve set the press conference for five o’clock so they’ll catch parents on their way home from work and kids lingering after school for the drama.”

“They’re expecting a turnout of a couple thousand.” Grayson snagged a slice of bacon. “It’s our best chance to blend in. Thus the school clothes.”

“How do you know all that?”

“You slept through the news,” Maddock said around a slice of bacon.

“You snored through the news,” Devi corrected.

“Five o’clock…” My thoughts raced. We had less than an hour. “I’m not going without my sister.” I said it softly, but everyone heard. All sound ceased, except for the sizzle of eggs frying in the kitchen. “How hard could it be for Finn to jump inside some Church official and unlock her cell? We’ll take a set of those for Mellie too”—I pointed at the uniform hanging on the bedroom door—“and we’ll leave as soon as we have her. She’ll fit right into your plan.”

Devi was the first to break the near silence. “I told you she’d be a pain in the ass. I knew the minute I saw her with her mouth all over my boyfriend that she’d be nothing but—”

“Devi, shut up!” Grayson snapped, and we all turned to her in surprise. “That was from Finn,” she clarified. “But I second the motion.”

“Nina.” Maddock set the second full backpack next to the first, practically begging me with his gaze to cooperate. “I’m sorry, but your sister’s beyond our reach. Even if we could get her out of Church custody—and we can’t—the whole world has seen Devi, Reese, Melanie, and you on the news. If any one of you is recognized, we’re screwed.”

Devi squeezed her arms crossed over her chest. “Which is why we’re going to skirt the edge of the crowd on our way out of town, not march through the heart of the assembly and into the courthouse, where we’re most likely to be recognized, then arrested.”

“Then executed,” Reese added.

“So you’re going to run,” I said flatly.