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“Has there been an entire day since you entered the Nine Realms, where everyone isn’t trying to kill you?” Killian asked, which caused a smirk to twitch over my lips.

“With Knox, yes,” I responded sadly. He was my protector, even when he thought of me as his enemy. Sure, I’d had to worry about his moods, but they’d been triggered by the chest, mostly.

“Trust me, he was killing something,” Killian scoffed before releasing a soft chuckle.

Chewing my lip, I considered the backup plan, which wasn’t ideal. “If shit goes wrong, I’ll run. He’ll follow me. That’s where you ladies come into play. You ladies will open a portal, then you’ll open another far enough away so that you can easily escape, but be sure to maintain sight of the first one. Once you’re through, you will do the same thing again. If Knox cannot be contained or freed, we’ll continually move until the men and Esmeralda can create another salt barrier. Soraya, you’ll open the first. Siobhan, the second. If Knox gives chase, I’ll use the first as you two enter the second, immediately setting the next one. There will be seconds between jumps. I cannot stress this enough, but you cannot stop for anything.”

“What if they don’t get there before Knox catches you?” Esme asked thickly. “Aria?”

“Then I do whatever it takes to keep us both alive until someone reaches us,” I whispered, though the heat scorching my eyes and behind my nose.

“That’s the worst fucking idea I’ve ever heard,” she acknowledged, with tears rolling free. “I won’t let him kill you.”

“You won’t interfere, Esmeralda. That’s not happening.” My voice shook with my fear and worry of her intervening. “I cannot afford to have my attention divided. Knox will fight. He has to. If not, she’ll make him kill me. It will make it less troublesome for her to fracture his mind and then finally destroy his soul.”

“I can’t sit there and watch you die. Knox is faster, stronger, and he’s being driven by a murderous bitch who seriously wants you dead.” The tears in her throat were so thick that they almost choked me instead of her.

“You won’t have to,” Killian assured. “We take him down. Then she removes the darkness from Knox. If we have to go with Plan B, I’ll ensure he doesn’t harm Aria, Esme. I’ll do what he ordered me to do in order to save her and our people.” At Killian’s reassurance, Esme’s eyes drifted to him, which caused Basilius to rattle with possessiveness.

“I think thefucknot,” I snapped sharply, as a rattle tried to claw its way up my throat. “Killian, I am saving Knox. You need to at least allow me to try to save him. He’d come for me, just as he’d come for anyone else here if they were in trouble.”.

“Knox wouldn’t want that for you. He’d want you to live, even if it meant letting him go, Aria. If he killed you and somehow survived? How do you see that playing out?” Killian countered with a plea burning in his eyes.

“No. No, Knox has to live. He has to because I can’t breathe without him.” The words trickled from my lips, as gasps of shuddered breaths forced their way through the pain gripping my throat. “He’s going to be a father. Hecate doesn’t get to win. Do you fucking hear me?” My voice trembled with agony and paralyzing fear. “Hecate doesn’t get to win this time. She’s taken everything from Knox. I’ll be damned if she takes his life away from him, too. Stick to the fucking plan. I give you my word that if shit goes sideways, I’ll get everyone out. We’ll regroup and figure out a different way to get him back.”

“You’re pregnant?” Killian asked through narrowed eyes. “Aria?”

“Ember told me right before the girls began hitting Acheron. It changesnothing.”

“It fucking changeseverything. Women don’t go into battle pregnant!”

“Yes, they fucking do. A woman’s life is a never-ending war, Killian. Women fight from the moment they take their first breath until they breathe their last. They’ve gone to war plenty of times before, and I will be no different from the women who came before me. I can fight her pregnant. I have to do this. I took precautions to ensure that what happened last time doesn’t happen again.” Shaking my head, I straightened my spine and looked around at the faces before me.

“I shouldn’t have placed you in a box with the women I know, Aria. You’re truly nothing like them, but Knox wouldn’t come back from harming you. Hewouldn’tcome back from it if you’re harmed, or worse, you died.”

“I am no damsel, Killian. I’m going to go save my fucking dragon. With or without you. That’s your choice to make. I’ve made mine.”

“You’ve come a long way since the naïve, soft girl we met not long ago.” Killian smiled, his eyes sparkling with mirth.

“Plan B is I run, he chases and I don’t stop running. Ember can escape him. She’s aware of the problem at hand. In the abandoned village three miles south of here, there’s a well. It’s spelled already, and it’s deep. If I can get him in it, we can use it. Plan C will be nuclear. Do you all understand the plan?” When they nodded, I felt a prickle of fear at the idea of running from Knox. He was a better hunter, better runner, better fucking everything than I was.

“What aren’t you saying?” Esme asked, her perceptive stare festering with worry.

“It’s not just me who needs him back,” I admitted. “Knox has had access to the Library of Knowledge, which contains a detailed history of everything that’s occurred, every creature’s creation, their weaknesses. By taking him, she’s taken the library, as well. Since he was a child, that has been his favorite place. He’s an archive in which she can continually pull information from, against all of us. It holds both the phoenix and dragon histories, but also what can wipe the races out? If she maintains control? We’re not fucked. We’ll all go extinct. So, no. She can’t keep the repository of knowledge he holds within his mind. Even if his soul dies, the knowledge and shit that aren’t a part of his soul, like memories, remain.”

“That’s why Julia never remembered me,” Soraya uttered.

“Exactly why she didn’t. Julia’s soul left long before Hecate killed her body.” Smiling sadly at her, I felt Ember adding warmth to tell me she was there. “We tie emotions to faces instead of souls. But we are merely souls in outer shells, which often leave when they become too much to carry around. You said you sister was gentle, so she didn’t stick around long enough to feel the pain Hecate would’ve forced her to feel.”

“You’re lying, but I’ll take it,” she said tightly. “Lies are what we feed on nowadays. While we pray for better ones to find us.”

“Lies, or days?” Esme asked with her eyebrows shoved together.

“I’m not as good as Aria with the whole ‘speech’ shit,” she scoffed with a soft shrug. “I was giving it a whirl.”

“Do me a solid, Soraya, leave the speeches for the queen?” Esme snorted, even as she put on a brave face, smiling. Soraya bumped Esme’s shoulder, which sent Esme into Siobhan, who leaned her head against her.

“You bitches know we’re all going to die. If we don’t, Aria is going to go back to demanding I help her hide a body.” Soraya and Siobhan’s stares slid to me at Esme’s statement.