The post-show lounge at Blackthorne Hall had been hastily converted into a “meet and greet” space—if you could call a room with crumbling tapestries, cobwebs, and a candelabra chandelier “greetable.” The band had barely cooled down. Most still smelled like fog fluid and adrenaline.

A velvet rope had been put up in front of the stone dais where the band sat with water bottles, sharpies, and a thousand-yard stare of post-gig exhaustion.

At first, it was just the usual:

  • Swooning goths telling Cassie she was their patron saint of eyeliner
  • A man in chainmail asking Jonah to sign a loaf of sourdough
  • A woman dressed as a mourning Victorian widow sobbing to Maya about the raw emotional symbolism of “Funeral Bloom”

And then… things got weird-er.

Emily was standing near the entrance, clipboard in hand, keeping the flow of fans moving.

That’s when she walked in.

A woman dressed in head-to-toe crushed velvet with a taxidermy crow strapped to her shoulder and a leatherbound book clasped to her chest like a holy relic. Her mask was bone-white and shaped like a skull, but the real weird was in her eyes. Unblinking. Fixated.

She didn’t go for Gabriel. Didn’t even flinch at Thane.

She zeroed in on Rico.

“Your chords… they ripple across the soulstream,” she intoned, stepping closer, voice like someone had taught an audiobook AI how to do necromancy. “I saw you in my dreams… before I was born.”

Rico blinked. “Uh… cool?”

She opened the leather book. Inside were hand-drawn sketches — hundreds of them — of Rico. Playing, sitting, eating a burrito, one with him in a spacesuit on Mars. Some of them… looked traced. Others didn’t.

Rico’s eyes went wide. “…Okay that’s a lot of me.”

Emily stepped in quickly, voice calm. “Hey there! Let’s keep moving — let’s not crowd the band —”

The fan tilted her head in a perfectly synchronized crow-like twitch. “You don’t understand. He’s my chord twin.”

Emily looked like she was starting to lose her cool, and Rico was definitely on the verge of bolting.

That’s when Thane stepped in.

No warning. No sound.

Just the solid, unmistakable thud of clawed feet on stone and his looming presence right behind her.

She turned slowly.

And froze.

His eyes — icy and sharp — locked with hers. One brow lifted. He didn’t growl. Didn’t say a word.

But the message was crystal clear.

Back. Off. Now.

The crow-lady looked at him, then back at Rico, then silently turned… and vanished into the crowd like smoke.

Emily let out a breath she’d been holding like it was her last.

Rico leaned forward, wide-eyed. “Bro… that was terrifying. But like… thank you.”

Emily turned to Thane. Her voice quiet, careful.

“I… I’m sorry,” she said. “Again. That could’ve gone sideways, and I shouldn’t have waited that long to ask for help.”

Thane stared at her.

Long.

Measured.

And then — just as her shoulders tensed — he gave a single, small nod. The kind that carried all the weight of a second chance.

Message received.
Forgiven.
Just don’t ever cross that line again.

Emily exhaled again, visibly relieved, and drifted off to wrangle the rest of the crowd before anything else could go full crow-mystic.

Rico still looked stunned. “Dude. I think she had my soul in that book.”

Gabriel passed by and clapped him on the shoulder. “Welcome to the wolfpack, man.”