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Half City Chapters 45–50 Summary
This Kate Golden Half City chapter summary contains full spoilers.
Half City Chapter 45
Viv and Reid reconcile and become intimate in the museum. Midway through, Reid’s demon horns emerge involuntarily, and when Viv reacts with curiosity rather than fear, he admits that he lied when she previously asked whether he wanted her soul. He does want it, and resisting that urge costs him. Viv trusts Reid anyway, and they continue. She falls asleep in his arms, her last thought lingering on the idea that under different circumstances, happiness might actually be possible for her.
Half City Chapter 46
Viv wakes from a nightmare reliving the night her father died, when she watched Brood demons drive him to the edge of the docks until he threw himself into the water rather than be taken. Reid recognizes the story and realizes that he once heard the Brood boast about killing Viv’s father, which shakes him. Then they get dressed to leave, and Viv decides to name her daggers Angel and Hellion.
Before heading to the gateway, Viv drops off some damaged artifacts in Fiona’s office. Fiona explains that the Elders made concealing Fiona’s double life a condition of her role at the Windsor and asks Viv and Reid to keep this information to themselves.
Almost as an aside, Fiona mentions something from her research into Viv’s father’s death. Viv’s father’s autopsy report showed that he had carved the number twenty-six into his own hand.
The detail stops Viv cold. She doesn’t explain what the number means, but she tears out of the office in a panic. She grabs Reid from the lobby, and together they leap through the gateway.
Half City Chapter 47
Viv sprints to the Old Campus courtyard and finds a lacrosse photo of her father. The plaque identifies Edgar Driscoll as the player who wore jersey number twenty-six. Everything clicks. Edgar Driscoll has been working for the High Thane the whole time. He was the man Viv’s father recognized at the docks, the one with access to the armory and the hidden garden, and the one who likely faked the emails about Kitty and steered Viv toward the White Stag. A scar where Edgar Driscoll’s Brood brand should sit suggests he removed it to hide what he had become.
Reid wants Viv to go to her apartment and stay clear while he takes the evidence to the Citadel. Viv refuses. They agree to meet at the campus gates in five minutes.
Back at Elkfore, Viv decides against waking Peter or Sophia. Telling them about the dean would put them in danger and risk tipping off others in the dean’s network. She changes into all-black clothes and heads for the door. Sophia stirs and asks where Viv is going. Viv says she’s meeting Reid, which is close enough. Sophia says she’s glad Viv and Reid sorted things out and that Penny and Sophia’s mother will come around. Viv tells Sophia she loves her and leaves.
Half City Chapter 48
Viv and Reid are on their way to the Citadel when Viv suddenly hears Penny in distress through a mental link tied to a lure Viv had given her earlier. She tells Reid that Penny has been taken to the docks and insists on going straight there rather than stop for backup.
At the docks, Reid kisses Viv goodbye and rushes the Brood demon guards to draw their attention while Viv slips around to find Penny. Viv locates Penny inside a shipping container, tied up and hooded but physically unharmed. Once Penny is free, Viv takes Penny’s place, has Penny loosely bind her and pull the hood back on, and tells Penny to stay hidden or run if she gets the chance.
The demons take the bait and haul Viv into a warehouse where Dean Driscoll is waiting. Driscoll identifies Viv as the aeon his group has been hunting, the daughter of his former friend David Cadell. Driscoll explains that he handed David over to the Brood out of resentment and a hunger for belonging. He also confirms that the Brood killed Kitty and Lyra because the group mistakenly believed the two women were the aeon they’d been searching for, when in fact, it was Viv all along.
The High Thane shows up briefly with his son, instructs the men to confirm that Viv can be used for the spell, and leaves. The High Thane’s son steps forward to confront Viv directly.
Half City Chapter 49
Viv breaks free of her restraints but is dragged back down before she can act. Driscoll produces a small glass vial containing the completed syrabraxa. As he prepares to use it, Viv realizes something she’d missed all semester. Aeon’s blood was never a literal ingredient. An aeon is the vessel. The spell has to be fused to Viv’s soul so that whoever kills her receives its power.
Finn fills in the rest. The High Thane intends to use that power to tear open the Chasm and unleash deviants on the mortal world. The censer stolen from the Windsor will shield the High Thane from the madness that follows. Kitty and Lyra were failed attempts to find a host who could survive the binding.
Driscoll begins chanting in a language older than anything Viv recognizes and pours the spell into her back. Pain splits through every bone and vein in Viv’s body. Viv screams until she has nothing left, then stops fighting and waits for the pain to end. It does. Driscoll steps back and confirms what has happened. The spell has taken hold, and whoever kills Viv will become the most dangerous being alive.
Half City Chapter 50
Reid crashes into the warehouse and cuts through the Brood demons surrounding Viv. He tells her to run. Viv does, though not before watching Reid hold off Finn and the remaining demons alone.
Back at the shipping container, Viv finds Driscoll advancing on Penny with a knife. She drives a dagger into his back. Pinned beneath Viv, Driscoll tells her she needs him alive, since only the witch who cast the syrabraxa can remove it. Viv kills him anyway, choosing to stay a hunter rather than buy her freedom at that price. With his last breath, Driscoll tries to tell Viv something about Reid before dying mid-sentence.
Viv sends Penny to the police with a cover story and texts Fiona that Driscoll is dead and Reid is in Brood hands. She runs through the city with demons on her trail, knowing she can’t return to Harker, her family, or her friends without drawing danger to them.
Out of options, Viv goes to Fever Dream and asks for Deacon. Deacon finds her outside, reminds her he promised to kill her if she came back, and grabs her by the hair. She twists in Deacon’s grip and shows him the syrabraxa wound on her back. Deacon lets go, and she drops to the ground. Barely conscious in the snow, Viv tells him it concerns his brother. Deacon hauls her inside, and the doors slam shut.
Disclaimer: This is a Half City summary. The original work is the property of Kate Golden and Ace.
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