The hotel room was tiny, split into two spaces by a thin wall, almost like paper.
One side for the girls, the other for us.
At first, everyone stayed on their side. Elias sat on the stiff mattress, his back against the wall like a guard on duty. Dorian collapsed onto his bed, already complaining that he had "never experienced a more hostile mattress." Me, I stayed standing, staring at the window, hypnotized by Arcadia's neon lights blinking like warning signals.
From the other side of the wall, the girls' voices came through.
Lyra whimpered:
— I can't sleep… This place is too… gloomy. And those noises outside… it sounds like a child crying in the street… shouldn't we go check…?
Asha groaned.
— Those aren't children, Lyra. They're bait… but feel free to go check for yourself. Sleep, before your fear feeds something else…
Silence… then a creaking bed… the wall trembled.
Then the door opened, and Asha appeared, a sheet over her shoulders, her hair messy and her eyes flashing.
— Enough… We're sleeping together. If Lyra keeps bothering me while I sleep, it might be her last night on this earth…
Lyra rushed in behind her, embarrassed but relieved.
— I… I didn't insist, it was her…
Elias raised an eyebrow.
— You think we're better equipped to protect you?
Asha slammed the door behind them.
— No… But at least I know one of you will answer the duchess's whining…
A few minutes later, we were all gathered in the same room.
The mattresses pushed together made a crooked line, but it was enough.
We were so different, yet strangely complementary.
Dorian, of course, broke the moment.
His eyes lingered on Asha, in simple clothes, and he gave that stupid smile he always had when he was looking for trouble.
— Well… never thought I'd say this, but even storms have their hidden charms.
Silence for a second. Then Asha raised an eyebrow.
— Say that again, and you'll be sleeping with my halberd shoved up your *** you stick…
Dorian went pale, Elias burst out laughing despite himself, and even Lyra hid a smile behind her hand.
I let out an amused breath.
— You asked for it, Dorian…
Dorian grumbled, but his smile didn't disappear.
The tension eased a little. The walls creaked, voices were still screaming outside, but inside, it was different.
Stories started to come out.
Lyra talked about how, as a child, she healed an injured cat using her Thorne for the first time, convinced it was a miracle from her god.
Elias spoke about his father with deep respect and admiration, even though he forced him to train since he was seven, alone, for entire days, until he threw up his own insides.
Asha admitted, reluctantly, that she lost her first duel… against a boy using nothing but a wooden staff covered in blue flames.
And Dorian, with exaggerated gestures, imitated his teachers repeating etiquette rules all day long, making us laugh quietly.
Even I ended up sharing a memory, the only one that came back clearly.
A man my mother used to bring home had gotten into the habit of beating her.
I was only five, and one day I couldn't stand hearing her suffer anymore, so I stepped in. I didn't need to prove anything. I was just a kid who didn't want to see his mother crying and covered in bruises. I was just a starving child who tried to help her… and still ended up beaten and bloody, while being scolded by the one who gave me life.
Instead of protecting me from that monster, she took his side.
But that day, I understood… blood ties meant nothing…
No one laughed. But no one looked away either.
In the end, we were lying side by side, our breathing calming down, eyes fixed on the cracked ceiling.
A soft silence settled.
Elias whispered, almost to himself:
— So this is what it feels like to sleep like a family…
— Good night guys, tomorrow's going to be a big day.
And for the first time in a long time, I fell into a deep sleep, like even in this hell, nothing could reach us.
⸻
The next morning, the sun hadn't yet pierced through Arcadia's metallic fog when we left the hotel.
The streets were already full: street vendors, kids running between cars, workers in dirty uniforms. But beneath all that noise of life, I felt something else.
A dull feeling.
Like the city itself was holding its breath.
Pedro and Bruno had warned us: here, there was only misery and injustice.
So we stayed calm.
As we moved deeper into the lower districts, the glass towers disappeared, replaced by broken buildings covered in strange symbols. Red crosses, circles drawn in dried blood. I started to feel uneasy. Something was wrong.
Lyra shivered.
— Do you think we're going the right way?
Asha shook her head.
— No doubt. Just look around.
Elias ran his hand over one of the symbols, then pulled back like he got burned.
— It's still pulsing… like it's alive.
We turned into a narrow alley.
The silence hit instantly. No more screams, no more crowd. Just the echo of our steps.
Dorian whispered:
— Too quiet.
I felt it before I saw it. A thick, metallic smell sticking in my throat. The smell of blood.
Then the shadows moved.
They came out from the corners of the alley.
Human shapes… almost human. Their bodies twisted, their veins black, their eyes bloodshot. Some had arms like blades of flesh, others had cracked skin leaking a dark purple liquid.
Lyra covered her mouth.
— My god… they're…
— Aegon's dogs!!! Asha spat.
They moved forward without a word. Their breathing hissed, like every breath tore their throat apart, and their eyes burned with the same madness.
The first one jumped at us.
I raised my wind blade and cut it clean in half, but when it hit the ground, its blood started crawling, trying to grab onto something.
Terror…
Elias raised a wall of stone, pushing back three others.
Asha cut one's throat cleanly, but it kept moving, its arms twitching like whips of flesh.
Dorian shouted, releasing a sound wave that shattered the windows around us. Two creatures collapsed, blood pouring from their ears.
I kept striking, again and again, my blades spinning around me like extensions of my will. Every body that fell seemed to feed the next. Their madness didn't fade, it grew, gathering, like it was being pulled toward something.
Asha shouted:
— We're not alone! Something's pulling them!
And she was right… because behind them, at the end of the alley, I saw a horrible figure.
Tall.
Thin.
A smile too wide on a twisted face.
Veins glowing like volcanic rivers under pale skin. A nightmare… no, it was the Devil himself.
He stepped forward calmly, amused by what he found, his eyes shining with a sick clarity.
And when he spoke, his voice was soft, almost welcoming.
— My children are getting too excited… forgive them… they can't help but bring me high-quality prey… hahaha…
The blood around us flowed under our feet, like a sea of corpses.
And we knew…
Yes… we knew, with cruel certainty, who the man in front of us was…
Aegon Targus.