“I’m somewhat of a history buff,” the second doll said. “I’ve been watching TV every night for a month.”

“We’ve heard,” Auntie Bae mumbled.

Upstairs, Eli, Frankie, and Zeran were huddled on the floor in front of a video game. The three of them had teamed up to go on a quest to save a powerful mage kidnapped by an evil overlord bent on world domination. “We don’t have anything like this back home,” Zeran said as his fingers flew across the buttons of the controller.

“You don’t have to be so good at it,” Eli groaned.

“We would’ve been past this level already if you two would’ve used the indestructible suits I made,” Frankie said, pausing the game. “There was a sixty-one percent chance that they wouldn’t have melted our bones.”

“And a thirty-nine percent chance they would have,” Eli shot back. “I don’t know about you, but I like my bones un-melted. Thank you very much.”

“It is time already?” Zeran asked, blinking up at me. He looked nervous.

I wanted to reassure him, but I had no clue how the celestials would rule. They were so strict about everything—and they thought they always knew what was best. “Whatever happens, the five of us have to make a pact right here.” I looked at each of them, taking in their faces. “We’ll always be there for each other, no matter what. Deal?”

“Deal,” everyone said as we executed a five-way fist bump.

Frankie thrust her phone into my hand, and I read the headline from the Azurian Times-Journal: NOTORIOUS EX-PEACEKEEPER “BUTCHER” CONTINUES TO EVADE AUTHORITIES. “She’s still out there,” Frankie said.

I cracked my knuckles. “We’ll find her. She can’t hide forever.”

“My ghosts are on the lookout too,” Eli added. “They have a whisper network across the universe. It’s only a matter of time before one of them spots her.”

Frankie adjusted her glasses and wiped her eyes. “Let’s hope so.”

“The council meeting should be starting any moment now,” Eleni said, opening a gateway.

As we stepped through Eleni’s gateway, which looked like a spring day in a magical forest, I couldn’t get over how this was my life now. I had a sister—A SISTER—and she was pretty awesome. Mama and Papa were okay. My friends were okay. We’d defeated the Lord of Shadows and his cronies.

The hallway outside of the gods’ realm was crowded with people. The cranky Johnston twins were directing traffic. We rubbed shoulders with elokos, aziza, darkbringers, adze, werehyenas, the Bigfoot clan, and many more magical creatures. Our human families had come too.

“This is going to be interesting,” Eli said as a werewolf growled at a werehyena.

“Very,” Frankie mused, watching a group of adze in firefly form swarm by us.