Page 61

Alexiares

C utting the bullshit, the night didn’t sit right.

The nightly briefing broke and I couldn’t shake that aggressive feeling of being watched. Our scouts had little information. They’d gotten as close as they could risk in order to ensure their ability to make it back to relay the message. All it was were murmurs of Covert troop movements in our general area—but I’d lived the kind of life that never allowed me to mistake whispers for ‘nothing.’

Amaia was the first to sense it. Her posture shifted the moment we stepped into the open air. She didn’t say a thing. Doe brown eyes scanned the camp, her fingers brushing the hilt of her blade. Her breathing hitched just slightly—something I found myself overly sensitive to. I breathed when she did. My breath hitched when hers caught.

Even if she had shown no signs of awareness, I felt it in my bones.

Something was wrong. Off. She glanced back at me as if reassuring herself I was still there.

“You good, Princess?” I said, trying to sound casual though I was on high alert, same as her.

She shook her head and turned back toward camp. “Yeah. Just … stay close tonight.”

A plea wrapped in steel.

“Don’t have to tell me twice,” I teased, reaching for her instinctively, then remembering where we were.

It was no secret we were together. It had been a rumor throughout territories for months and confirmed at the first meeting. Where she went, I went. And if I wasn’t with her, then I was somewhere carrying out her orders—but out here, she was their general, not the woman who owned my heart.

That earned me a short, uneasy laugh. “Eyes forward, soldier.” Her eyes didn’t match her smile.

I followed her without another word. There was this crushing certainty that she wouldn’t survive this war. It went beyond my chest tightening and my stomach dropping. Every organ in my upper body was under the foot of an elephant while someone kicked at the sides.

The first explosion came as we reached the camp’s edge for our night shift check in.

A concussive wave knocked the air out of my lungs, the blast disorienting. I wheezed, searching for Amaia, hands flailing, but I couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t hear. My senses were knocked from me, then returned with a slamming force. The second explosion followed in quick succession and the wards around the camp flickered. Then died.

Magic suppression.

Fog rolled in, creeping through our camp in serpentine fashion. It hissed as it ate away at tents and equipment. The first screams pierced the air as it found flesh. Soldiers scrambled. Their orders were forgotten from shock and fear.

“Remember your training! Hold the line!” Amaia’s voice cut through and relief flowed through me, unfreezing me and pushing me into action. “Fall back to the inner perimeter!”

The panic in the camp was a living thing, surging and pulling soldiers apart, swallowing Amaia in the fray. I pushed through it, my focus narrowing to one goal—reaching her. My boots slid in the mud as the fog thickened around me. Choked sobs filled the air, and guttural cries of pain came from every direction.

The wall was there—my power was out of reach. I didn’t waste effort calling on it. I knew better. Only time could bring it back.

“Cover your mouths, you fucking idiots .”

I recognized the grating voice despite the chorus of wails and gags. Finley.

Her stark blonde hair was a blur in the fog, but her blade flashed as she cut down a Covert soldier, fully masked. She moved with trained grace, carving through him as though the man had never been a threat at all.

Another soldier broke from the fog, charging her blindly, and I was already moving. My blade caught him mid-lunge, slicing through his ribcage and silencing him before his weapon could swing.

Finley didn’t flinch. “I had him,” she said, her tone flat.

“I don’t care.”

My focus shifted back to the surrounding chaos. The fog was closing in, eating at the camp, and I could hear more soldiers dying—ours and theirs.

“Where’s Amaia?” I demanded.

Finley’s gaze darted to me, keen and assessing. “Holding the line, obviously. Probably better than you are.”

I turned away from her, having no interest in dying by her side if this was the night I was going to have a final dance with death.

“This, unfortunately, is one of mine,” she called out, stopping me in my tracks and gesturing to the fog with her blade. “Cover your mouth, Hound . You’re not vaccinated against this one.”

“What the hell did you do?” I demanded.

She shot me an impatient stare that said I was wasting her time. “What I felt like doing, obviously. Developed it after you left. Suppose I should have mentioned this was one of those pesky design documents he stole.”

Her attention shifted back to the soldiers pressing through the fog—blade moving fast, precise, mowing them down before they could regroup.

She was good, I’d give her that. But I wasn’t relying on her to keep me alive.

A soldier charged from my left, and I spun, driving my dagger through his throat and kicking him to the ground. I kept my movements efficient. Without magic, there was no energy to waste.

I saw Finley glance at me from the corner of my eye, her lips twitching in what could have been amusement. “I missed this, you and me,” she said, skewing another attacker and driving her blade into his gut.

“Do you ever shut the fuck up and just focus on surviving?” I said, twisting my blade free from the neck of a meaty motherfucker.

“Nope.” She wiped blood from her face with the back of her hand, her expression shifting to something of a menace. “But you better hope Amaia is.”

I paid her no mind. Of course, Amaia was focused on surviving—she hadn’t made it to Ronan yet. She’d keep fighting until he was dead.

Finley froze. As much as I hated to admit it, the years spent fighting at her side made me … familiar with her style. She never froze, never hesitated. Finley Thomas was all impulse.

I pulled my pistol, dropping the two soldiers closest to us. In the brief pause of the fight, I caught it—that flicker in her eyes. Fear. Something I’d long thought she was incapable of.

“Oh, shit ,” she whispered, grabbing onto my wrist.

I snatched myself away and turned to follow her line of sight. It was hard to see through the swirling fog—but there was a rhythm underfoot … one that didn’t belong in battle. The ground shifted.

“What the fuck?”

She dragged me back by the arm, fingers digging into my skin. “Someone should really talk to her about tightening her leash. Did you get hit in the head? Stop standing out in the open.”

“The ground?—”

“Yeah, I have all five senses too,” she snapped, interrupting me, her pupils dilated even in the late night. “Geokinetic trackers.”

As if answering the call of their name, the ground where I’d been standing fractured. A narrow fissure opened, and gradually, it gave way to a pit. Soldiers fell, screaming—from both sides.

The healers’ tent erupted in flames. I could see the faint outlines of figures trapped inside, shadows scrambling against the firelight. There was nothing to put it out.

Fuck that . I backed away, Finley having the same idea. We moved fast, cutting through the mayhem as the fog thickened. We fell into a routine—old habits took over. Duck. Jump. Left. Right. It was muscle memory, a rhythm beaten into us by too many battles fought side by side. I hated it. But I wasn’t stupid enough to fight it. Not if it doubled my chances of making it to Amaia.

“You’re going the wrong way,” I snapped, shoving a Covert soldier aside with brutal force.

The ground opened with fascinating speed where he dropped. Fissures were sprouting everywhere, jagged wounds tearing through the battlefield. Step wrong, and it was game over.

“I know where I’m going,” Finley shot back, her voice sharp. “And if you don’t want to end up in a fucking pit of Pansies, you’ll follow me.”

“Amaia—”

“Won’t see you again if you don’t shut up and come on.”

Pansies . But of course. How original, Ronan.

The massacre thickened around us—healers cut down mid-motion, their bodies crumpling into heaps. This wasn’t chaos. It was a purge. We burst through the fog into a clearing near the edges of camp, the ground ahead now sloped downward into a pit crawling with them. A trap.

I yanked Finley back as she stepped near the edge, her foot pushing crumbling dirt into the open earth.

“Relax sweetheart. I’ve got it.” She winked as she pulled a small device from her belt, a sphere that spun every which way, a million cylindrical pieces forming it.

“ Finley —”

“Oh my God, stop flapping your damn mouth,” she interrupted, bringing a finger to her lips. “Trust me, will ya?”

The device hummed in her hand. A pulse shivered through the air, tickling the edges of my brain. It went deep into my chest, rattling against my ribcage. The Pansies froze in place, their jerking limbs now still—stuck in invisible flames.

Finley glanced at me, that cocky smirk tugging at the corner of her mouth as she watched the monsters below, perfectly still now, their guttural growls gone. “You think this is impressive? Stick around and wait to see what happens when it wears off.”

I gritted my teeth. “How long have you been able to do this?”

She winked, smirk growing wider. “Not long.”

I shot her a cold stare that made her pause for a second. Her expression tempered, but she didn’t flinch. “Can we do this later, babe? We’re in the middle of a beautiful escape plan, and I’ve never tested the thing. Don’t know how much time we’ve got.”

“Fine.” I made my choice before she could say another word. I grabbed her arm, yanking her toward the edge.

“Move slow. It’s still a prototype—can’t handle too much jostling,” she said, taking even, steady steps. One foot in front of the other.

I didn’t answer. Didn’t trust myself to speak without telling her exactly what I thought—about this plan, about her , about the years she’d spent tearing me down every time I attempted to build myself up after Tiago’s death. My focus stayed on the ground in front of us, avoiding the twitching Pansies mere inches away. Looking at her would only make me volatile.

“So,” Finley murmured, like this was small talk over coffee instead of us surrounded by Pansies. “How’s life in Monterey?”

I kept my head forward. “I’m not doing this with you.”

Her chuckle was odd—soft. Full of amused curiosity. “Really, I always wondered how you and Little Miss Perfect live.”

Jealousy was one of her stronger traits. She could do as she pleased. At least that’s how she’d always seen things. But me? Never. Another woman even looking my way ended up in punishment for us both. My punishments, however, lasted longer than whatever strike Finley offered them. I lived with her. There was no limit to where the cruelty born from jealousy could touch.

I tightened my grip on my weapon. Every word she said pulled memories to the surface, ones I’d spent years trying to bury. The disorder she reveled in, the pain she’d left behind, the way she’d torn me down simply to see if she could.

“That place would eat you alive,” I said, and it was true. Monterey wasn’t built for people like Finley. It wasn’t about being ruthless; it was about knowing when to change, when to bend.

Finley didn’t bend—she broke things. It was why she thrived in war and why she’d never survive peace.

“Oh, come on,” she pressed, her tone mocking. “Let me guess. Marriage? House? Kid on the way?”

My jaw tightened. She wasn’t far off, and she knew it. If I gave her anything, she’d twist it, use it. That was her nature.

“You know what I miss about you the most?” I asked, enthralled by the way she perked up—still expecting the lost dog to come home.

She spared a glance at me, a small glimpse of faint hope as we weaved between the entranced reeking dead. “Let me guess—fucking?”

“Nope.” I didn’t spare her a second thought as I answered, nostrils flaring in disgust. Letting the suspense build, I paused, waiting until the other side of the pit was in clear view. “I miss the look on your face when you realized I was leaving and had no plans to come back.”

The silence that followed was louder than the animalistic groans of the Pansies around us. I’d wounded her. This was her routine. She expected me to care, to apologize, but I refused. I wasn’t here to indulge her. Whether she helped us in this war or not, the day she died would be a day that couldn’t come soon enough.

We were so close to freedom, the end within reach, when the world erupted behind us. The frantic pounding of boots on the ground, the sharp, ragged breaths of men running for their lives. They barreled into the clearing, their shouts dissolving into a pandemonium of panic. By the time they realized the trap, it was too late. Bodies hit the earth with a sickening thud as they fell into the pit below.

The impact caused the earth to slide, the pit resettling to adjust to the disturbance. It knocked Finley off-kilter, the device falling from her hand. She retrieved it before it could roll away, but the sound warped, flickered, and then died entirely. The pulse in my head had stopped, and the air was still.

“Fix it!” I snapped.

Finley held up the device, shaking it as though it might somehow wake up. “It’s missing a piece. I can’t.”

“Then run.”

The pit’s edge loomed a few feet ahead—close enough to see, yet impossibly far. Pansies stirred behind us, the sound a sickening symphony of grinding bone and wet, rasping growls. It would be a fight to get out, not to mention the nearly twelve feet we’d have to climb to pull ourselves free. With the way the earth had given out on the other side, climbing wasn’t the most stable choice.

“You need the running start,” Finley said, halting abruptly. Her voice was tight, trembling beneath the forced calm. “Pull me up.”

I stopped, my chest heaving. My eyes darted ahead, the jagged drop, and then to the mass of death clawing closer behind us. Every instinct screamed the same thing: Leave her.

But then she turned, and for the briefest, most torturous second, I saw her. Not the schemer, not the liar, not the cheater —the manipulator. Not the person who had burned bridges just to see the ashes. I saw Finley—the girl I thought I had once loved so fiercely it left scars.

Scars that had been healed by a woman who would never leave another soldier behind.

“Don’t make me regret this,” I growled, racing to the top.

I made it out and stumbled onto solid ground, only to be met with two originals at the top. They were easy to tear through. It took no extra thought. Likely had come from all the noise in the area. I turned as Finley reached up, her fingers catching the edge. She’d taken her own running leap toward freedom—unsure if I would come back for her. I grabbed her wrist, my other hand gripping her belt to pull her up. The weight of her was in my hands, pulling me down.

No . That didn’t make sense. I fought against it.

I thought we’d make it.

Her scream ripped through me. She kicked hard, but it didn’t matter. Finley’s thigh was within the clamped jaws of what appeared to be a Supra mutated into a Pansie—its jaws buried so deep I could see bone glinting through the torn flesh. A second one latched onto her other leg. Blood poured from the wounds, her body jerking violently as they tore into her. The mess of her attack pulled in a third. I tugged harder. This wouldn’t be how she died. Her crimes were great, but with her death, more people would suffer.

“I’m sorry,” she choked, blood pooling in her mouth. Her eyes locked on mine, wide and desperate. “For everything.”

Claws sliced through her torso easier than paper. I pulled harder, my grip slipping against the slickness of her blood. My muscles burned. I refused to let go. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Not now. Not to her—not like this. Memories of my mother’s face surfaced unbidden, her hand torn from mine in a moment of sheer helplessness. I hadn’t been strong enough then.

A sharp, brutal crack rang out as her leg wrenched from its socket. The pressure shifted, and then they were on her—ripping her apart in front of me. I heard the tearing of flesh, the crack of bones.

Her upper body slipped from my grasp, falling into the pit as the Pansies tore into what was left. The scream that tore from her mouth was cut short. I stumbled back, dazed, numb. The noise around me faded, drowned out by the image seared into my mind.

Finley was gone—torn apart. Piece by piece. And I couldn’t move. Couldn’t speak. Couldn’t stop the blood from dripping from my hands.

All I could do was let her go.

“Finley?” The voice was a hollow, confused whisper. “No. Finley?”

It was mine. The Pansies overwhelmed her, their bodies piling on top of hers. Something already broken inside me splintered.

Their snarls shifted, their dead eyes swiveling toward me. I braced myself, my muscles tensing for the inevitable, when Finley’s device let out one last, desperate pulse. A deep, resonant hum shook the air, freezing the Pansies mid-motion. Their heads twitched unnaturally, their limbs spasming as if caught in a glitch.

She’d fixed it. In her last moments, she’d found the piece.

I ran. Away from the horror, away from her . The woods swallowed me whole, branches clawing at my arms, roots threatening to trip me. My lungs burned, my thoughts a storm of panic, guilt, and something I didn’t dare name. All I could think of was finding Amaia. Getting to her before she met a similar fate.

Branches lashed at my face, the taste of bile still sharp on my tongue. Finley’s scream echoed in my skull. Trembles coursed through me, my body exhausted.

Pain hit me with the brutality of a tidal wave. I hit the ground hard.

Instinct took over, and I lashed out, shoving the weight off me. My knife was in my hand before I even registered who or what it was.

“Stand down!” a sharp voice barked.

I froze. I knew that voice.

Amaia.

But the haze of panic and lust for blood wouldn’t let me trust it. My grip on the blade tightened as I lunged, slamming her back against a tree.

“Alexiares, stop! It’s me!” She gasped, her hands coming up in surrender. “Baby, it’s me.”

“You’re lying,” I hissed, my voice trembling. My mind raced, twisting her face into an enemy’s mask.

She didn’t flinch, didn’t fight back. “It’s me . Amaia. Here.” She grabbed my hand, guiding it to her face, though I could see but a shadow of it in the moonlight.

For a moment, I couldn’t breathe. My heart thundered in my ears as her words sank in. My grip loosened, and the knife slipped from my hand.

“Amaia?” I whispered. Honestly, I wasn’t sure if I was begging for confirmation or forgiveness.

She exhaled. “I’m here. Shit, you’re okay. Are you hurt?”

“Are you okay?” I asked, my voice cracking with a laugh.

She nodded quickly. Her hands gripped my arms. “I thought—I thought you were dead.” For a split second, the same fear existed in her that had been suffocating me.

“Finley,” My stomach twisted. Her name was poison in my throat.

Amaia’s weight shifted, snapping sticks beneath her boots. “She’s gone?”

I tried to hold myself together. Didn’t want to appear weak or as if I gave a shit. My legs betrayed me—they buckled. The ground came up too fast, and I hit it hard, the nausea rising before the rest of me could catch up. The bile burned in my throat, but I couldn’t swallow it down.

Amaia kneeled beside me. “Breathe.” Her hand circled the center of my back and I rested my head against her shoulder.

The contorted memories of a life with Finley sliced through me, jagged and unrelenting. Then, the image of her death. Finley’s blood, her screams, the snap of her body as the Pansies tore her apart—it was all still there, imprinted behind my eyes.

Amaia cleared her throat. “We can celebrate later, if that’s what you want to do. Or we can grieve. Together. Feel what you need to feel. I love you, I’m with you, but right now, we need to get back to the troops. We’ve regrouped two miles south. They’re clearing out anyone and anything left at camp right now and gathering the supplies that survived. A lot of people were bit … we don’t know who will make it through the night.”

I didn’t answer. I pushed myself up and started walking. Her words didn’t make sense yet. Finley’s face was still too vivid. Because in her final moments, she’d shown me something I hadn’t thought possible.

She’d chosen to save me.

I pulled myself together, shaking the worst of it off. Not enough to be fine, but enough to function.

I surveyed the camp, taking in the wreckage, the bodies. One hundred soldiers had been bit and half had already turned. It wasn’t looking great for the others. But it wasn’t the loss that hit hardest. It was her. Amaia stood at the edge of the clearing, bloodied but still standing tall. Unbroken. She met my gaze long enough for something in her eyes to soften, then turned back to the soldiers.

This—this was a loss, but not like Ronan’s. Not by a long shot.

The light from the early morning revealed the damage she’d caused. Every single Covert soldier who’d breached our perimeter was dead. Every last one. And that wasn’t all. She’d had a cavalry unit track down healers—Covert healers who’d traveled with the attacking force—and drag them back here, right into the mess they’d made.

Then she did what she did best. She gathered them, every one except the last, into the pit in the center of camp. Let her soldiers have their way with them when their magic returned. Watched. Made the last healer watch, too. Then sent them off with a message:

You play dirty, I’ll play in the mud.