Chapter 20 · Third Gate

The gate was right there. Ten feet of open air between Kai and a way out that didn't involve getting crushed under three floors of Red Heron's private archive.

The rift hung in the center of the vault like a tear in bad fabric, edges shimmering the same sick silver as the mark under his ribs. Dust poured from the ceiling. Something groaned deep in the walls. The file Vera shoved into his hands was still warm from her palm, and the blood note on the last page was already burning itself into his brain. Don't trust Vera's sister. His dad's handwriting, rust-brown and jagged.

Kai took two steps toward the rift. Then he heard the hounds.

They weren't howling anymore. They were tearing into something. Someone. The sound came from the corridor behind him, past the collapsed shelving and the door Vera had sealed with her own blood sigil before she shoved him through. She'd stayed on the other side. Told him to run. Told him the file was enough.

She was lying. She was always lying. That was the job.

Kai looked at the rift. Looked at the file.