Prologue

Luca

I stood there for five minutes pretending to choose between two brands I couldn’t afford. They were both cardboard and regret in a box, but one was cheaper by twenty-nine cents, and that twenty-nine cents meant I could get two eggs instead of one.

My left boot had a rip along the side. I’d stepped in a puddle an hour ago, and now my sock squelched with every motion. I didn’t want to move too fast. It made the wet slap louder.

I had five dollars and sixteen cents. A loaf of bread. One onion. Three packs of ramen because they were ten for a dollar, and I told myself it was “stocking up,” like some kind of prepper. Like I wasn’t just broke and starving and trying to make it look like a choice.

When I reached the front counter, the clerk didn’t even look up. Just scanned the barcode off the limp bread like he’d seen a hundred other losers walk through that door tonight. Which, to be fair, he probably had.

The air outside smelled like rot and damp pavement. I held the little brown bag close to my chest like it was something precious. Something I could protect.

That’s when my phone buzzed.

Not the kind of buzz you ignore, either. Not a stupid notification or a spam email pretending to be from a prince. No. The kind that starts in your bones before you even check the screen.

I stopped walking. Right in front of a busted streetlamp. Wind gnawed at the hem of my hoodie.

The screen lit up with a single text.

You want your brother back? Erebus. 11PM. Ask for the Devil’s Show.

My fingers went numb first. Then my throat closed up. The bag of groceries slipped from my hand, like my body didn’t know how to hold anything anymore. The bread hit the ground with a sad little puff, the onion rolled into the gutter like it was trying to escape the moment, and the eggs—well, those bastards cracked on impact. Of course they did.

I stood there and watched the yolk leak out like something dying.

My brother.

Jesse.

God.

We hadn’t spoken in over two years. Not properly. Not since that night. Not since blood hit the kitchen tile and never got cleaned up right. Not since I told him to run before the cops came.

The air tightened around me, and suddenly I was back there—inside that goddamn house. That twisted cathedral of guilt and bile and crosses on every wall. Our parents didn’t love us. They didn’t even pretend. They loved rules. They loved shame. They loved God the way a man loves fire—close enough to feel holy, far enough not to burn.

But Jesse… Jesse always stood in front of the fire.

He took the beatings like it meant something. Like if he stood between me and their madness long enough, I’d grow up to be whole. He was older, stronger, louder—he could lie better. Charm better. And he used every bit of that to draw their hate away from me.

Because I was the freak. The cursed one. I couldn’t speak without stuttering. Couldn’t look strangers in the eye. I laughed at the wrong times and never knew how to talk like the other kids did. I saw patterns in clouds and shapes in numbers. I screamed in my sleep. I didn’t even know what “normal” was supposed to look like.

I had been diagnosed as neurodivergent and a stutterer.

My mother told me I was touched by the devil. Said her sister—the “witch” aunt who gave me books and taught me how to breathe—had cursed me with a tongue that couldn’t obey. My father agreed, of course. Said discipline would carve the devil out of me.

It didn’t.

It carved something else.

Jesse always tried to stitch the pieces back together. He’d sneak me candy when I bled. Whisper dumb jokes until I could smile again. He’d hold my hand under the covers even when we were too old for it. He called me “Luc” like it was short for light.

I think I might’ve loved him more than anything.

So when he started unraveling, I saw it first.

The cracks. The twitch. The coldness in his eyes that didn’t match his smile. The way he stopped flinching when they hit him. The way he started looking at our father with something dangerous in his face.

And then one day, something snapped.

It was just another Tuesday. Our father called me down to the basement. Said I needed to pray harder. Said I needed to confess. I didn’t even cry anymore when he dragged me by the wrist.

Jesse stopped him.

Or tried to.

There was a knife. A yell. Blood. Too much blood.

And just like that—Jesse was gone.

He disappeared before I could follow. Ran before I could say thank you. Left behind a storm and a lie and a ghost that never stopped whispering.

The cops called it a break-in. Self-defense. They questioned me, but I stuttered too badly to give real answers, and nobody wanted to dig too deep.

But I knew the truth.

And I’ve been choking on it ever since.

So now, two years later, I’m standing in an alley, with broken eggs at my feet and the past clawing its way out of my chest, staring at a message that doesn’t make sense—but somehow makes perfect sense.

You want your brother back? Erebus. 11PM. Ask for the Devil’s Show.

I don’t know what Erebus is. I don’t know who sent the message. And I definitely don’t know what the Devil’s Show is supposed to mean.

But I’m going.

Because Jesse once stood in front of the fire for me.

And if he’s still alive… then I owe him the same.

Even if it burns me to ash.

My thumb hovered over her name like I was summoning a demon.

Josie.

The last time I called her, I was crying too hard to get a full sentence out. That was six months ago. Right after I found out the temp job that paid rent was a scam. Right after I pawned my coat for heat. Right after I screamed into my pillow that maybe if I disappeared, no one would notice.

She stayed on the phone for three hours that night. Didn’t ask me to explain. Just talked about her cat and her coworker’s shitty tattoos and that guy who tried to hit on her using a Shakespeare quote. We didn’t even talk about us. That was the thing about Josie—she knew when to pull and when to leave me the hell alone.

I tapped the call icon before I could chicken out.

It rang twice before she picked up.

“Luca?” Her voice was soft. Familiar. Then sharper. “What’s wrong?”

I swallowed. My tongue felt thick. My stutter used to be bad when I was a kid, but it crept back like a ghost when I got scared. I cleared my throat.

“N-n-need your h-help,” I said, hating how small I sounded. “You… y-you still know the clubs, right?”

Josie went silent.

Then: “Jesus. Is this a booty call? ‘Cause wow, Luca, the ghosting and the flaccid dick weren’t enough?”

I flinched, then laughed, because—God. Of course. Josie didn’t do pain unless it was barbed in humor.

“No. Not… n-not like that. I n-need directions. To a p-place called—” I looked at the message again. “Erebus.”

Pause.

“What the fuck do you want with Erebus?”

I didn’t answer.

“Luca,” she said, her voice tightening, “that place isn’t for you. It’s not a bar. It’s not even a club. It’s… underground. Like, deep underground. Think latex and leashes and enough leather to make PETA cry.”

“I d-don’t care,” I said. “J-just tell me.”

She sighed. I heard music in the background. Josie was always near a speaker.

“It’s in SoHo. Behind that shut-down theater near Broome. Looks condemned, but knock twice on the back door, tell the guy you’re there for the Devil’s Show. If he likes your face, you’re in.”

I opened my mouth to thank her.

“Luca—wait, are you—?”

I hung up before she could finish.

It wasn’t cruelty. I just didn’t want to lie to her again.

I booked a cab with the last card that wasn’t maxed out. I didn’t check the balance. Didn’t wanna know. My hands were shaking. Not from fear. Or not just from fear. It felt like the air had teeth now. Like the city was watching.

The cabbie didn’t say a word. Just side-eyed me through the mirror like he could smell something wrong.

By the time we reached SoHo, my stomach was a knot made of wire. Everything around us was too quiet. No music. No voices. Just the resounding of my heartbeat as I stepped out onto the street.

The theater was a husk. Rusted scaffolding, blacked-out windows, a torn movie poster still clinging to the wall like it hadn’t gotten the memo. I circled around the back and found the door.

Knocked twice.

A panel slid open. Eyes—gray and dead as ash—blinked once.

“I-I’m h-here for the d-devil’s show,” I muttered.

The slot closed. Then the door creaked open.

The bouncer didn’t ask for ID. Didn’t even speak. Just gestured for me to go inside.

I stepped in.

The first thing I felt was heat. The second was sound. Not music—throbbing. Like the walls were breathing, like something alive and starving pressed against every corner of the club.

There was red everywhere. Red light. Red ropes. Red bodies painted like marble, bound and writhing and moaning as shadows watched.

I had never seen so much skin in one place.

Leather. Chains. Straps and spreaders and masks. Someone screamed in pleasure from the corner. I smelled sweat, perfume, rubber, and something bitter and sharp underneath it all.

A haze floated in the air. Thick, sweet smoke curling around every lightbulb like it had a mind of its own. People passed a long pipe between them—clear, with black veins twisting through it like ivy. I didn’t ask what was inside. Didn’t want to know. But the smoke clung to my throat like syrup. My head buzzed.

Too much. Too much. The lights were blinking too fast.

I stumbled against the wall, breathing too shallow. Behind my eyes—images.

A belt. A candle.

My father’s voice: Confess, boy. Confess what you are. My mother gripping my hand tighter, pressing it toward the flame: The devil must feel pain before he leaves you.

I saw blood. My blood.

I saw Jesse, standing at the edge of my bed, face swollen, whispering, Don’t cry. I took it. You’re okay.

But I wasn’t okay. I had never been okay.

I blinked. The haze got thicker. Smoke curling in patterns I couldn’t recognize. Faces shifting. Time stuttering. Someone laughed in my ear, but when I turned, there was no one there.

My knees buckled.

The world tilted sideways.

And then—black.