Page 6 of Forging Darkness

Chuckling under his breath, Greyson snags the other desk chair in the room. “All right, we need a game plan.” He props his elbows on his knees and glances at each of us. “Now that we know Steel’s found Silver, what are we going to do about it?”

I don’t dare turn my face to see Nova’s reaction. I already don’t like discussing Steel, but talking about him with her is downright awkward. Maybe it’s my imagination, but I feel her regard like a heater against my skin whenever his name is brought up.

“I think—” Ash only gets two words out before Tinkle drops from the air, landing on Sterling’s bed with a soft thud.

“Sweet nectar,” he mumbles before falling asleep.

Ash clears her throat, garnering our attention once again. “As I was saying, I think Steel is going to need help. It’s dangerous to be out there on his own, hunting Forsaken. We need to decide if we’re going to be the ones to help him, or if we’re going to petition someone else to do it. Either way, we obviously have to do something.”

Greyson’s head bobs as Ash speaks. “I agree. It was foolish of him to go off alone. He needs help. I can understand why he did it—Silver is . . . was my sister as well, but Steel can’t take on the world alone, even though he thinks that’s written into his job description.”

“Are we sure the Nephilim will do anything if we give them the information?” I ask. “Will they even use the resources to track him down? They haven’t yet, so why start now?” My questions are met with silence and lowered brows as the group considers. The Nephilim have known about Silver since the battle all those weeks ago. They refused to send anyone after her when Steel asked, and then when he left, they made no move to retrieve him. Why would now be any different?

“If Sable knew he’d found Silver, she’d have to send help,” Ash says. Around me, no one looks certain of that—not even Ash.

“First things first. We need to find Steel,” Nova says. “Until then, this conversation is premature.”

Greyson exchanges a look with his twin. An unspoken conversation passes between them. With a whoop, Sterling spins in his chair and starts typing away on one of the keyboards. The screens in front of him come to life. Random characters, letters, and numbers fill most of the monitors. Maybe code or computer language? Is that the same thing? I have no idea.

Did Sterling just enter the Matrix?

“What’s he doing?” I ask Greyson.

“He’s going to look for Steel by back-tracking your calls.”

“Just like that?” I snap my fingers. “This isn’t a movie.”

“That’s right. The movies make it look way harder than it actually is,” Sterling says. “As long as you’re not opposed to breaking a few laws, which of course I’m not, it’s actually quite easy. I just need to figure out which cell towers he’s using when he calls you, and then we’ll know approximately where he is.” Glancing over his shoulder, Sterling’s gaze lands on his brother. “He’s probably using an analog phone and blocking his number, thinking that’s going to protect him.”

“That would be my guess. As if having his number displayed as ‘unknown’ is going to shield him.”

“He was never the brightest one in the family, was he?”

Greyson smirks. “It depends on who you ask.”

“Pfft.” Sterling scoffs. “As if anyone believes Steel is more intelligent than me.”

The four of us exchange looks. Noticing our silence, Sterling tips back in his seat and shoots us an upside-down glare. It would pack more of a punch if a strand of red licorice wasn’t hanging out the side of his mouth.

Righting himself, Sterling interlocks his fingers, cracks his knuckles, and renews pounding on the keys. “Oh ye of little faith. Just you wait. Before the end of this adventure you’ll all be singing ballads about my giant—”

“Sterling!” Nova launches a pillow at his head, which bounces harmlessly to the floor.

“Brain,” he finishes with a chuckle.

“We should check the network, too. You know he wasn’t able to track Silver down on his own. It’s not like we’re blood hounds.”

“Already on it.”

Greyson shoves off the bed to stand beside his twin. His gaze slides over the gibberish on the screen like he actually knows what’s going on. Maybe he does. Catching sight of my quizzical look, he starts to explain. “The Keepers are a team of people devoted to monitoring the human world. They collect whatever data they feel might be of use to us and store it in a super-protected cloud network. It’s like the Neph version of The Dark Web, and a lot of angel-born don’t even believe it exists. Sterling thinks it’s a game to try to hack into their system without getting detected.”

“Sable mentioned a group of investigators that had been monitoring me while I was in foster care.”

“That would be the Keepers. They horde information and are extremely savvy at tracking down people and Forsaken—a group of true tech geniuses who know how to slip in and out of all sorts of interesting digital places. There’s a good chance Steel’s been relying on a Keeper friend for help if he’s been able to successfully track Silver.”

“Gotta be Jem,” Sterling pipes up.

“Or Vivian,” Greyson offers.

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