The Stars Never Rise

“No.” Devi spread her arms to take in the entire room and everyone in it. “This is regrouping, so we can come at them again. That’s not the same as running. April ran.”


“April?” And suddenly I understood. “April Walden?” The girl from Solace who’d died in the badlands. “She was an exorcist?”

“She would have been. When the degenerates started flocking north, we followed them, but they weren’t leading us to New Temperance. First they led us to Solace.” Which would have been between them and my hometown, coming from the south. “Finn and Reese found her, and she hadn’t been triggered yet, which should have been good, except that she didn’t know what she was. When they told her, she didn’t believe them. Until the degenerates found her. Finn and Reese tried to get her to fight—she had to kill a demon to trigger the rest of the transition—but she ran.”

“Into the badlands? How is that any better than fighting degenerates? The badlands are crawling with them, right?”

Grayson nodded. “I think she panicked. She was terrified, but she knew a way out of the town. Reese held off the degenerates so Finn could follow her. She made it through the wall before he caught up with her, but when he did, he had no way to talk to her. So he took over her body. He was just going to bring her back to us so we could help her, but…”

“But more degenerates found us before I could get her back inside the town,” Reese said, and I glanced into the kitchen to see him leaning against the counter while the eggs sizzled behind him. Only it wasn’t really Reese. “I fought them, in her body, but there were too many of them, and I’d never been in her before, so…”

“There’s nothing else you could have done,” Grayson said when his voice faded.

“If I had a body…”

Grayson actually rolled her eyes and managed to make the gesture look comforting. “If you had a body of your own, things would have been different from the start, but we work with what we have. That’s the best we can do.”

“Right now the best we can do is get the hell out of dodge and regroup, then come back for your sister when we’ve faded from the headlines,” Devi insisted. “We can’t get to her now.”

I set the case on the bathroom counter, frustration raging deep inside me. “We’re faster and stronger than anyone I’ve ever met. We can get to Melanie. We’re the only ones who can. But if you badass, super-strong demon hunters are too scared of a handful of human jailers to help me, I’ll damn well do it myself.”

For a moment, silence reigned. Even the eggs were quiet, draining on a paper towel–covered plate, where Reese had put them now that he was back in his own body. Then Grayson whispered from the couch, “I love her fight.” When everyone turned to her, she gave us a sheepish shrug. “That was from Finn. Also, he says he’s in. And so am I.”

Maddock shrugged. “If Finn’s in, I’m in.”

“No!” Devi shouted, and I hoped everyone in the apartment next door was still at work. “Your bullshit plan is tantamount to suicide, and that’s one sin I’m not eager to try out.”

Maddock covered his ears with both hands. “I can’t think with you both shouting at once.” Grayson looked uncomfortable too, and I realized that Finn was trying to be heard. “Finn says he’s staying to help Nina, and that if the rest of us leave her, he’ll…never forgive us.”

“Only his version was slightly more profane and much more entertaining,” Grayson added.

“Fine. He’s made his decision. We’re leaving.” Devi reached past me to scoop an armful of pill bottles into the toiletry bag from the open medicine cabinet.

“No.” Maddock scowled at her. “We stick together. All of us. Including Nina. We need her, and she needs us.” Maddock turned to me then. “You know how you get stronger and faster when degenerates are near? We call that ‘proximity strength,’ and it’s amplified in the presence of your fellow exorcists, which means we need every exorcist we can find.”

I stared at him, trying to take it all in. If they’d be gaining speed and strength from the presence of one extra exorcist, I could only imagine how much I’d be gaining from the addition of three. Four, if and when Grayson transitioned.

“If we help you get Melanie, we need to be sure you and your sister aren’t just going to disappear into the badlands,” Maddy continued. “We need to know you’re willing to risk as much for us as we are for you.”

I hadn’t actually thought out my next move, beyond stealing my sister back from the Church, but disappearing into the badlands by ourselves was not on the list of possibilities.

“Yes. We’re with you.” We had no one else in the world, and even with the bickering, they were already more of a family to me than my mother had ever been. “So…now what? I’ve never organized a prison break.”