The cold air that had seized Mr. Finch and Clara instantly dissipated, replaced by the suffocating summer heat and the terrified scent of dust and sweat. Clara scrambled up, her face pale as bone china. "Ezra! Ezra, where is she? Papa, where did that... that he take her?"
Mr. Finch slowly pushed himself off the ground, his clothes torn and smeared with earth. He stared at the empty space where his eldest daughter had stood.
"Veridia," he rasped, his voice raw. "He took her to Veridia. To his stronghold."
His entire life had been a series of careful maneuvers to protect his daughters' forbidden, mixed Fae/Vampire lineage. He had chosen the Duke as a shield, but Val, the Prime Nexus, had shattered that shield in an hour.
Clara clutched her father's arm. "We must go to the King, Papa! You said the Crown would protect us from the Nexus!"
Mr. Finch looked not toward Atheria, but back in the direction of Rosewood Lane. He knew every citizen of their world, mortal and otherwise, understood the hierarchy of power; the King was political, but the Prime Nexus was absolute. Fleeing to the King's guard would only lead Valerian's pursuit into the city, endangering Clara and exposing their secret.
"No," Mr. Finch said, his voice hard with renewed resolve. "We will not flee. We will return home."
Clara stared at him, bewildered. "Return to the house? But the Nexus—"
"He took Ezra," Mr. Finch stated, his gaze fixed on the distance. "He took her because he believes the prophecy requires her. If we run, he will have every incentive to hunt us down to sever any distractions. But if we remain..."
He knew Ezra. His daughter, the proud and stubborn Fae-Lesser Vampire, would not stop until she found her family. Her loyalty was her greatest strength, and her most exploitable weakness.
"He wants the Creatrix Regium bound to his destiny," Mr. Finch continued, seizing Clara's arm and moving them quickly back toward the main road. "He will take her to Veridia, prepare his claim, but he will not harm her until the ritual is complete. And when she escapes—because she will escape—she will return to the only safe harbour she has ever known."
His decision was final. He would use the sanctuary of their abandoned, respectable home to wait out the inevitable return. The Prime Nexus had demonstrated his contempt for mortals by leaving them alive. Mr. Finch would prove that a father's devotion was a strategic force even the Abomination had failed to calculate.
He pulled Clara toward the damaged Brougham. "We retrieve the strongbox, we find the fastest Hackney Cab back to Rosewood Lane, and we seal every door and window. We will wait for your sister to come home."
He scanned the woods, the memory of Val's cold power freezing his resolve. He knew one thing with absolute certainty: Val had the power to kill them both instantly, but he hadn't. He had left them alive to spread the message.
"He wants the King to know what he has done," Mr. Finch realized. "He wants the challenge to be public. He intends to use Ezra to demonstrate his own power over the King's jurisdiction."
He grabbed Clara's arm. "We are going home.
As they fled the silent clearing, Mr. Finch reached into the pocket of his coat for the gold coins he needed to buy passage. Instead of coin, his fingers brushed against a piece of thin, polished obsidian—a small, dark triangle he knew was not his. He pulled it out; it was warm to the touch and emanated a faint, chilling scent of Elemental Earth. It was a single scale, a Demon's calling card, pressed into his pocket during Valerian's final contact, and beneath it was a single word etched into the leather lining of his coat, a secret command written in a language that predated even the Fae: "Wait."