Chapter 5

On Friday, Alex attends classes with Mercy, joins Mercy and Lauren for a party, and maintains a sober facade while microdosing basso belladonna. The next morning, restless and hungry, she resolves to proceed with the plan to reach Darlington despite nerves and lingering campus normalcy.

Alex meets Dawes and pressures Scroll and Key’s president, Robbie Kendall, into granting access under the pretense of a Lethe inspection. Inside the star-shaped sanctum, Alex and Dawes acknowledge the unstable nexus but choose to proceed rather than wait for better means or more allies.

They construct layered protections: a Solomon’s Knot of salt with silver chains and gemstones, additional salt lines down the corridor, and a final blood-mixed barrier. Lacking Aurelian’s bells, Dawes uses a toy trumpet as the ritual’s “instrument,” while Alex contributes a note addressed to a prior Virgil and an unopened bottle of rare Armagnac as lure.

Dawes anoints the table and chants in Arabic, opening a star-filled abyss where the table stood. Alex burns the note, casts iron filings, and pours the Armagnac into the void. The trumpet’s call resounds, and approaching movement answers—first like paws, then a rumble from below with the stench of sulfur and glints of red eyes.

A stampede of coal-black, red-eyed hellhorses erupts from the portal, shattering inner wards and igniting the floor with each hoof strike. The herd only breaks at the blood-salt line, then surges back toward the sanctum. Dawes commands them with amplified horn calls and Arabic, finally hurling the trumpet into the abyss; the horses leap after it and dissolve into darkness.

As Dawes closes the portal, a familiar voice—Darlington—echoes “Wait,” confirming his presence beyond. Before they can respond, the portal slams shut with a concussive boom that throws Alex off her feet, leaving the attempt both catastrophic and revealing.