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snuffing out most of the light. Several jars of fruits and vegetables that lined wooden shelves in the shallow, cement-lined pit had fallen and splattered on the floor. The ground appeared to rumble less down here, but the creaking wood above us seemed to disagree.
    “We should get to the workshop’s bunker.” Nate looked at the corner of the cellar where a barrel concealed a narrow, fifty-foot tunnel that led to a steel-plated bunker capable of withstanding a category five hurricane. No true survivalist built a house without a secret hideout, and Grandpa was no exception.
    Grandpa shook his head. “The Passover protection is stronger.”
    I looked down at his hand and immediately understood the reference—the Israelites put blood over their doorways for the angel of death to pass over them and only attack the Egyptians.
    I swallowed hard and grabbed Ria’s hand. Those stories couldn’t be real. It was just another myth, a—
    She squeezed my hand back as a stray beam of light from the floorboards above lit her terrified face.
    Nate’s hand strained on the leather strap of the panel above our heads, waiting for something, the impact, the army to come crashing down on the house and claw through the door.
    We didn’t have to wait long.
    Like a forest of trees all snapping in half at once, the house collapsed above us. Metal pipes and wood and tile and dishes splintered and rained down on the floor above with a crashing wave of dust.
    I held my breath and closed my eyes, confusion and disbelief snapping through my bones with every sound.
    Grandpa grunted and pulled me forward. I pulled Ria, and we crawled through the tunnel toward the workshop as fast as we could. Nate, the last person through the tunnel, slammed the metal panel shut in the slightly larger hiding spot. The emergency generator had already kicked on to bathe us in florescent light.
    Grandpa slumped beside Ria in the corner as tears fell down her cheeks, the straps of the go-bags clutched in her hand. He patted her head as she cried into his shoulder. His eyes drooped, and his mouth hung open—more defeated than I’d ever seen him.
    I knelt down and took his hand, drawing strength from his weakness. “Tell me what to do.”
    He looked up like I’d woken him from a dream, his eyes whirling around until they grabbed on to my necklace like a life preserver. “I got that for her, you know—when it was whole.”
    I caressed the single-wing pendant and the cracked blue stone that would have connected it to the other half. It had been my mom’s before she died.
    “I tried to protect her, but he took her from me. He killed her, and I couldn’t stop him.” He squeezed my hand and kept his gaze on the pendant, tears threatening to flood past his eyelids.
    Devout and religious as he was, I’d always known there was a part of him that blamed God for killing my mom when I was born. He’d never gotten over it—how could he? When I looked at her pictures, it was like looking in a mirror. He’d had to keep seeing her every day through me—a constant reminder of the daughter he’d lost.
    “Tell me what to do,” I repeated, steadying my voice against the deep rumbles and vibrations rattling the bunker. We were five feet below the surface, and I could still hear the storm raging outside. Part of me still wanted to believe that was all it was.
    Nate’s voice mumbled from the other corner next to the CB radio, his hand cupping the microphone to his mouth.
    Grandpa shook his head. “I should have known the moment it happened today. The Babylonians are always watching for my sign.”
    I took a deep breath of patience. “Grandpa, what’re you talking about? The moment what happened?”
    He looked up at me for the first time, his blue eyes locking on to mine. “When you lost control. You’ve always had so much power, Evey.” He exhaled a sympathetic smile. “Your essence flared when you lost control—it was like a beacon—and they saw it.”
    My gut