Aria's POV
I wake up gasping, water pouring from my lungs.
I'm on the riverbank, coughing up what feels like half the ocean. My whole body shakes. I'm alive. Somehow, impossibly, I'm alive.
But everything feels wrong.
My skin tingles like electricity runs under it. My vision is too sharp—I can see individual raindrops falling, can count the bricks in a building fifty feet away. Sounds assault me from every direction—cars on distant streets, rats in the sewers, my own heartbeat thundering like drums.
"What did you do to me?" I gasp, looking around for the creature with golden eyes.
He's gone. Or maybe he was never there. Maybe I imagined him while drowning. Maybe—
No. I know what I saw. What I felt. What I agreed to.
Half your life for all the power you need.
I stand up on shaking legs. My clothes are soaked, my body is freezing, but I'm not dead. The killers Veronica sent are gone—probably think I drowned. Good. Let them report back that I'm dead.
I need to disappear. Need to figure out what just happened to me. Need to—
A scream cuts through the night.
High-pitched. Terrified. Coming from an alley two blocks away.
My body moves before my brain catches up. I'm running toward the sound, faster than I've ever run before. My legs feel powerful, tireless. The world blurs past me.
I shouldn't go toward danger. I should hide. Survive. But something pulls me forward like an invisible string.
The alley is dark and narrow, filled with overflowing dumpsters and broken bottles. And three men surrounding a teenage boy.
The kid is maybe fifteen, skinny, with blood already running down his face. He's curled on the ground trying to protect his head while the men kick him.
"Where's the money?" the biggest man shouts. He's wearing a red bandana—gang colors. "Your mom owes us five grand! We told her what happens when people don't pay!"
"We don't have it!" the boy sobs. "My mom lost her job! Please, just give us more time!"
"Time's up." The man pulls out a knife. "Maybe if we cut you up a bit, she'll find the money faster."
Something inside me snaps.
"Leave him alone!" My voice comes out stronger than it should, echoing off the alley walls.
All three men turn to look at me. I must look insane—soaking wet, hair plastered to my face, clothes torn from jumping into the river. But I don't care.
"Walk away, lady," the leader says. "This ain't your business."
"You're beating a child." I step closer. My hands are shaking, but not from fear. From rage. "That makes it everyone's business."
The second man laughs. "You got a death wish or something? There's three of us."
"I don't care if there's three hundred of you." The words pour out of me like poison. "I'm so tired of bad people hurting innocent ones. I'm tired of bullies winning. I'm tired of this whole rotten world."
"Then let us help you out of it." The leader moves toward me, knife raised. "Nobody's gonna miss one more dead homeless girl."
He lunges.
And something incredible happens.
My body moves on its own. I sidestep his knife like I've trained for years. My hand shoots out and grabs his wrist. I twist—feeling his bones shift under my grip—and the knife clatters to the ground.
"What the—" He doesn't finish.
I punch him in the throat. Not hard enough to kill, but hard enough to drop him gasping.
The other two men stare at me, shocked. I'm shocked too. I've never thrown a punch in my life. But somehow I knew exactly where to hit, exactly how much force to use.
All the power you need, the devil's voice echoes in my memory.
"Run," I tell them. My voice sounds different. Colder. "Or find out what else I can do."
They grab their choking friend and scramble out of the alley.
I stand there breathing hard, staring at my hands. What am I? What have I become?
"Thank you." The boy's weak voice reminds me why I'm here. He's trying to sit up, blood pouring from a cut above his eye. "You saved my life."
I kneel beside him, my hands hovering uselessly. "You need a hospital."
"Can't afford it." He coughs, and I see blood on his lips. Internal injuries. Bad ones. "Just... help me get home. My mom will..."
He doesn't finish. His eyes roll back and he collapses.
"No!" I catch him before his head hits the concrete. His pulse is weak. Breathing shallow. He's dying.
Panic floods through me. I just saved him from those men, and now he's dying anyway? That's not fair. That's not—
Knowledge slams into my brain.
Medical knowledge. Anatomy. Emergency procedures. I suddenly understand exactly what's wrong with him—punctured lung, internal bleeding, going into shock. I know how to fix it. I know where to press to slow the bleeding. I know how to position him so he can breathe.
My hands move with impossible confidence, applying pressure to the right spots, tilting his head back, monitoring his pulse. This is insane. I failed biology in high school. But now I'm performing emergency medicine in a dirty alley like I've done it a thousand times.
"Stay with me," I tell the boy. "You're not dying tonight. I won't let you."
His eyes flutter open. "How... how are you doing that?"
"I don't know." It's the truth. "But I'm not letting you die. What's your name?"
"Danny." His voice is barely a whisper.
"I'm Aria. And I promise, Danny, you're going to be okay."
I pull out my dead phone, silently cursing. No way to call 911. But I can't leave him here to die while I run for help.
"Hey!" A woman's voice. "What's going on?"
A figure appears at the alley entrance—a woman in scrubs, carrying a coffee cup, probably just getting off a hospital shift. She sees Danny bleeding, sees me covered in river water and blood, and I watch her face cycle through shock, fear, and determination.
"I'm a doctor," she says, rushing over. "What happened?"
"Gang members beat him. Internal injuries. Collapsed lung." The medical terms flow from my mouth naturally. "I've been applying pressure but he needs surgery."
The doctor—her name tag says Dr. Chen—stares at me. "How do you know about the collapsed lung?"
"I just... know." I can't explain this. "Please, help him."
She makes a quick call on her phone, then kneels beside me. Together we stabilize Danny until an ambulance arrives five minutes later. The paramedics load him onto a stretcher.
"You saved his life," Dr. Chen says, studying me with sharp eyes. "That pressure you applied? Textbook perfect. Are you a medical student?"
"No." I stand up, suddenly aware of how I must look. "I'm nobody."
"You're somebody who knows emergency medicine and just happened to be in the right place at the right time." She hands me a business card. "I'm Sarah Chen. I run the emergency department at St. Mary's. If you ever need anything—a meal, a shower, a job—call me. Anyone who saves lives in alleys is someone I want to know."
The ambulance pulls away with Danny inside. Dr. Chen follows it, leaving me alone with her card and more questions than answers.
I look at my hands again. They're steady now. Confident.
The devil gave me power. Not just strength or speed—knowledge. Skills. Everything I need to be excellent at anything.
Including fighting.
Including medicine.
Including... revenge.
A cold feeling settles in my chest. Not fear. Not anger. Something else. Something that scares me because it feels like nothing at all.
I think about Veronica. About Marcus. About Lily. About all the people who hurt me, who killed my father, who destroy innocent lives.
And for the first time since this nightmare began, I smile.
"Half my life?" I whisper to the empty alley. "Worth it."
My reflection catches in a broken mirror leaning against a dumpster. My eyes flash red for just a second.
I don't look away.
I look like something dangerous.
Good.
The world needs something dangerous.
A phone rings—not mine, but a phone. I look down and see one of the gang members dropped it during the fight. The screen lights up with a text message:
"Job done? The Chen girl dead? Boss wants confirmation."
My blood runs cold. These weren't random thugs beating Danny. They were here waiting. For me.
Another text comes through: "If she's alive, find her. Veronica Chen is paying triple. Dead or alive. Preferably dead."
Veronica knew I'd survive the river. She's got people all over the city hunting me.
And she just made her biggest mistake.
Because now I have power. Now I have knowledge. Now I have nothing left to lose.
I type back using the gang member's phone: "She's dead. Body in the river."
The response is instant: "Good. Payment delivered. Next job tomorrow night."
I pocket the phone and walk out of the alley.
Tomorrow night, they have another job.
Which means I have until tomorrow night to learn exactly what I can do with these new gifts.
And then?
Then Lady Justice will pay Veronica's people a visit.
My eyes flash red again in the darkness.
I don't look away from my reflection this time.
I look straight into those crimson eyes and make a promise:
"Every single person who hurts the innocent. Every corrupt criminal who thinks they're untouchable. Every monster wearing a human face."
The rain starts falling again.
"I'm coming for all of you."