Caleb burst out of the museum's back service entrance and onto the main road just as a black sedan with tinted windows screeched to a halt across the street. The rear door opened. Julian stepped out, immaculate in his gray suit, the brass device held casually in his hand. He wasn't even breathing hard.
"Mr. Thorne," Julian’s smooth voice carried over the sound of the idling engine. "Always running, always late. We anticipated you might use the museum as a library."
Silas emerged from the driver's seat, looming large and unimpressed by Caleb's evasion tactics.
Caleb didn't respond with words. He sprinted into the nearby cluster of dilapidated warehouses. He heard the sedan's engine rev and the crunch of tires on gravel as they gave chase.
He needed to get back to his own apartment—the one place they already checked. It was a risk, but he needed a moment to breathe and decipher the map. He used the maze of back alleys and abandoned rail lines to make his way across the city, the heavy silence of the night broken only by his footsteps and the distant sound of Julian’s car pursuing him from the main roads.
He made it to his flat, a simple one-room place above a closed bakery, and locked the three deadbolts on the door. He slumped against the door, the adrenaline finally starting to fade into bone-deep exhaustion.
He pulled out the diary and the Stone, laying them out on his scarred wooden table beneath a bare lightbulb. He traced the map. The Nexus Point was beneath the old Oakhaven Clock Tower—the heart of the city. That was where the ritual would take place.
He flipped through the rest of the diary, looking for anything else. He found a final, hidden passage beneath a glued-in photo of Edmund Vance.
Edmund had it wrong. The Stone is not just a key. It is a governor. It keeps the breach closed. Without it, the energy will rip Oakhaven apart on the Solstice.
Caleb read it again, the meaning sinking in. Julian didn't need the stone to open the breach; the breach was already straining to open, held back only by the natural energy balance and perhaps the residual power of the Vances. Julian wanted the Stone to break the final seals and let the Nothing in.
A sharp, violent knock rattled his front door.
"Caleb," Julian's voice, no longer smooth, was cold and sharp. "We know you are in there. We tracked the energy signature of the stone to this location. You have the map. We have the time. Open the door, or we will open it for you, and I assure you, you will not like the way we do business."
Caleb grabbed the Stone and the diary, tucking them safely away. He looked around his tiny apartment. No back exit. No fire escape.
He heard the heavy thud of Silas’s battering ram hitting the door. The wood splintered.
Caleb looked out the window. He only had one option left: fight the mundane way, or embrace the madness. He reached for the consecrated water he'd used at the House of Regrets and unscrewed the cap, preparing for a fight he couldn't win conventionally. The Solstice was hours away, and he was trapped.
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