Syrinx sniffed at a trash can overflowing with food waste from the stands around the square. “You ever touch the disk and make a wish?” Bryce asked.

He shook his head. “I thought it was something only kids and tourists did.”

“It is. But it’s fun.” She tossed her hair over a shoulder, smiling to herself. “I made a wish here when I was thirteen—when I visited the city for the first time. Ruhn took me.”

Hunt lifted a brow. “What’d you wish for?”

“For my boobs to get bigger.”

A laugh burst out of him, chasing away any lingering shadows that talk of Sandriel dragged up. But Hunt avoided looking at Bryce’s chest as he said, “Seems your wish paid off, Quinlan.” Understatement. Big, fucking, lace-covered understatement.

She chuckled. “Crescent City: Where dreams come true.”

Hunt elbowed her ribs, unable to stop himself from making physical contact.

She batted him away. “What would you wish for, if you knew it’d come true?”

For his mother to be alive and safe and happy. For Sandriel and Micah and all the Archangels and Asteri to be dead. For his bargain with Micah to be over and the halo and slave tattoos removed. For the rigid hierarchies of the malakim to come crashing down.

But he couldn’t say any of that. Wasn’t ready to say those things aloud to her.

So Hunt said, “Since I’m perfectly happy with the size of my assets, I’d wish for you to stop being such a pain in my ass.”

“Jerk.” But Bryce grinned, and damn if the morning sun didn’t finally make an appearance at the sight of it.

The library beneath Griffin Antiquities would have made even the Autumn King jealous.

Ruhn Danaan sat at the giant worktable in its heart, still needing a moment to take in the space—and the fire sprite who’d batted her eyelashes and asked if all his piercings had hurt.

Bryce and Athalar sat on the other side of the table, the former typing at a laptop, the latter leafing through a pile of old tomes. Lehabah lay on what seemed to be a doll’s fainting couch, a digital tablet propped up before her, watching one of the more popular Vanir dramas.

“So,” Bryce said without glancing up from the computer, “are you going to look around or sit there and gawk?”

Athalar snickered, but said nothing, his finger tracing over a line of text.

Ruhn glared at him. “What are you doing?”

“Researching the kristallos,” Hunt said, his dark eyes lifting from the book. “I’ve killed about a dozen Type-Six demons over the centuries, and I want to see if there are any similarities.”

“Is the kristallos a Type-Six?” Ruhn asked.