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“That’s not gone anywhere, whatever Malgrave’s doing.” I keep going before the relief on his face turns into a conversation of its own. “Then there’s Malgrave’s Hellwarden signature wrapped around both of those. Careful, controlled, like chains wound tight around something powerful enough to fight back while he hauls it somewhere.”
“And under that?” Scar asks, already knowing the answer, wanting me to say it out loud anyway.
“Under that. Something vast, patient and pulling.”
We all know it’s the Devil, and none of us have slept right since we realized it.
Carnage’s hand flexes against my leg.
Raze sits back, his jaw tight enough to carve stone. “So, we know Malgrave’s extracting the fusion for the Devil. What we don’t know—”
“Why he bound it instead of just taking it,” Scar finishes. “If the fucker wanted it that badly, why the ritual? Why the waiting?”
“Where it’s actually going once it leaves Carnage?” Sentinel adds.
“Why does he need Echo alive?” Raze’s eyes cut to me, and something in them makes my spine straighten. “Why he specifically told Thessaly not to touch your throat?”
The table goes quiet enough that I can hear the old clubhouse pipes groaning somewhere behind the walls.
Scar is the one who says the part everyone’s been circling. “If the Devil only wants what’s inside Carnage, Echo shouldn’t matter at all. She’s not the power source? She’s not the fusion?” His eyes find mine in a way that used to make me nervous before I understood it’s just how he looks at every problem he’s trying to solve. “But he’s willing to bargain with the entire Conclave to get his hands on her. That’s not a man collecting an afterthought.”
Carnage’s whole body goes rigid beside me, hellfire rolling off him in a wave I feel against my skin like standing too close to an open oven.
“We don’t like it either,” Raze says, low. “But we don’t have the why yet. We work with what we’ve got.”
What we’ve got is a plan built on the parts we understand and held together with hope over the parts we don’t.
Everyone in the room nods like it’s enough.
But I watch the way their eyes keep drifting back to me throughout the meeting, like checking a wound to see if it’s stopped bleeding, and I know we all feel the same missing piece.
Me.
***
An hour later, the garage is packed with brothers getting ready to go to war.
Weapons cover every spare surface. Bags are being thrown together, guns checked and rechecked while Wreck drags a whetstone down the edge of a blade with a scrape that sets my teeth on edge. Across from him, Scar slides something silver into a case and snaps the lid shut before Cali tosses him another weapon to add to the collection.
Sentinel keeps himself out of everyone’s way near the back wall, eyes closed while his wings shift beneath his shirt. Gold leaks through the fabric in brief flashes as he rolls his shoulders, testing them before whatever the hell we’re about to walk into.
Everyone’s moving.
Everyone’s armed.
Nobody’s joking anymore.
And somewhere in the middle of all of it, I find Carnage already looking at me. He crosses the garage without taking his eyes off mine, weaving through brothers and weapons until he stops right in front of me.
His hands come up to cup my face.
No warning.
No hesitation.
Just warm palms against my cheeks and those amber eyes holding mine while the garage carries on behind him.
He can’t ask me if I’m sure.
