Demise

The Brethren demands absolute loyalty—a desire to protect its heritage, a thirst for vengeance against any threat.

The Brethren demands absolute loyalty—a desire to protect its heritage, a thirst for vengeance against any threat. Becoming an Elder requires an induction designed to test devotion beyond reason, different for every initiate. Brothers must keep their eyes wide open, for evil lurks at every corner. The witches of past, present, and future stand as the eternal enemy. Faithlessness earns their wrath unleashed. The only choices: join or perish. One chance is all you get.

Professor Corwin kidnaps Skyla to a warehouse dressed as home

Skyla regains consciousness in a moving car, bound and groggy. Her captor is Professor Corwin—the stalker who has terrorized her for months. He calls her Giselle, her dead mother's name, and drives them to a warehouse in Vermont he spent a quarter million dollars converting into a furnished home. Corwin drugged the apple cider packets he knew she loved, then carried her unconscious from her balcony while Wesley, her newest protector, worked downstairs hearing nothing. Inside the warehouse, Corwin oscillates between tender delusion and volcanic rage, bathing Skyla while narrating his decades-long obsession with her mother. When Skyla resists his advances, he kicks her repeatedly, cracking her ribs. He pins her naked beneath him as she lies there planning escape, unable to budge his weight.

Vincent arrives moments before Corwin destroys what can't be undone

Back in Salem, Wesley discovers the security feed was looped to disguise the abduction. Vincent, Skyla's most obsessive protector, identifies Corwin through street cameras and races to Vermont on his motorcycle, hours ahead of the others. He bursts into the warehouse bedroom to find Corwin naked and positioned behind Skyla, seconds from raping her. Vincent tackles him and unleashes a savage beating. Ronan, Wesley, Asher, and Liam arrive close behind. It is Liam—sweet, gentle Liam with his broken leg still booted—who delivers the killing blow, smashing a lamp into Corwin's skull with enough force to end him instantly. Vincent douses the warehouse in gasoline and strikes a match. They load Skyla into the car with cracked ribs and bruises covering her face as the building erupts behind them.

Skyla welcomes Wesley, and her aunt reopens old wounds A doctor confirms Skyla's ribs are cracked but not broken, and no rape kit is needed—a relief that loosens every jaw in the room. The guys blame Wesley for failing to guard her, and Asher slams the door in his face. But Skyla insists on speaking with him alone. Wesley confesses he was so elated she had given him a chance that his guard dropped entirely. She tells him he fits—like a puzzle piece she didn't…