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CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

Ellery

“You can let me go,” I told him.

“Can you stand without me?”

“Yes.”

He reluctantly released me, and while my entire being screamed at me to sink to the floor, I locked my legs and remained standing. I wouldn’t go down.

I fisted my hands to firm my resolve; when I did, agony lanced through my arm. I lifted it to inspect the gash that had torn through skin and sinew.

The bleeding had eased, and the wound was healing, but I’d forgotten about the sword that sliced through me, probably because the pain was nothing compared to the loss of my mother.

“Are you okay?” Callan asked.

“Yeah.”

He gripped the ruined pieces of my sleeve and tore it away. With deft fingers, he bandaged as much of the injury as he could before tying a knot.

“We have to keep moving,” Callan said.

“I have to go back.”

“What? No.”

“There’s someone I can’t leave behind.”

Callan’s eyes narrowed on me. “My sister is up there, Ellery… maybe. I have no idea where Luna is anymore. I haven’t seen her in a while. I’m hoping she got away. That’s what we agreed to when this started; we had a place to meet in case things went wrong, and hopefully, I’ll find her later, but you’re not going to find anyone back there.”

His words reminded me of Ryker’s before we separated earlier. “You have to leave, Ellery. As soon as you get the chance, go. I need to know you’ll escape as soon as you can.”

I’d told him I would, but I couldn’t lose him too. I had to know he was safe, and what if he was in trouble and I could help him?

What if going back gets him killed?

I was torn between my heart and brain as I stood uncertainly in the tunnel.

“We have to go,” Callan said. “They haven’t had time to do so yet, but the guards know about these tunnels, and they will come down here.”

I bit my bottom lip as I looked between Callan and the shadowed tunnel leading back the way we’d come. I’d promised Ryker I’d leave, and after everything that had happened between us, it was a promise I couldn’t break… even if leaving him behind tore me apart.

“If the servants see us together, I’ll be labeled a traitor,” I whispered.

“You don’t have to worry about that.”

I frowned as I focused my full attention on him. I’d resolved to leave, and I wouldn’t look back again. “Why not?”

“Who do you think organized the rebellion?”

“ All of them?”

“The few who weren’t trusted enough to be in on it were killed before the rebellion started.”

My eyebrows shot up at this admission and the ruthlessness behind it. “And how did you get involved?”