Page 64 of His Claim

My chest clenched. My wolf thrilled at his command, at the brutal assurance in his tone, but my human heart rebelled. I couldn’t stand the thought of him getting hurt in the tunnels while I fled into the daylight.

I grabbed his arm, fingers digging into the muscle there. “You’ll die.”

“Maybe,” he admitted. “But if one of us is getting out, it’s going to be you. I’ve shown you the way. Get to the Resistance. Tell them what they need to know.”

I shook my head so hard my vision blurred. “No. That’s not good enough. I don’t want to survive without you.”

I hadn’t wanted to admit it—not after everything, not after the bite, not after the chaos of my first shift, but it was there all the same. The thought of losing him carved a hollow ache in my chest.

“I can’t,” I whispered. “I can’t just run.”

The sound came again, loud, a roar that made the walls shudder all around us. The air pressed hot and heavy suddenly, choking. A shadow in the dark beyond that bend we’d come through shifted. I felt its presence before I saw it, immense and wrong, like a shadow with teeth.

Varek gripped my chin, forcing my gaze to his. His hand was rough, his eyes blazing silver fire. “Mariah. Look at me.”

“I am,” I said, my voice cracking.

“You’re going to make it out of here.” His thumb brushed against my jaw, gentler than the words. “You’re going to live. You’re going to laugh with your friends again. And you’re going to remember me, whether I’m behind you or not.”

Tears blurred my vision. “Don’t say it like you’ve already decided?—”

He kissed me.

It wasn’t slow or sweet. It was violent, desperate, a claim and a promise all at once. My fingers curled into his shirt, my whole body screaming to stay right here, pressed into him, safe in the circle of his arms.

Then he tore away, breathing hard. “Go.”

I shook my head, sobs pushing out of me. “Varek, please?—”

The roar thundered again, closer, so close the dust rained in a steady stream from the ceiling. A shadow rippled against the tunnel wall, vast and writhing, too big, too wrong.

“Here!” he said, ripping a map out of his pocket and shoving it into my hands. My fingers closed around it, gripping tight as though it was a lifeline.

“Now! Go! I’ll catch up. I promise!”

His command cracked like a whip through the tunnel, reverberating down my spine. My wolf whined, my body obeying my alpha before my mind could catch up. I stumbled toward the rock fall, choking on tears and fear.

The gap loomed above me, small, jagged. My hands scraped raw against stone as I climbed, squeezing my shoulders through the narrow wedge. I could barely fit, rocks pressing into my ribs, tearing at my clothes.

The roar came again, deafening now, and the ground shook like the mountain itself wanted to split open.

I forced myself through the gap, stone cutting into my arms, my breath ragged. I twisted, my cheek scraping stone as I looked back.

The lantern light flickered behind me, casting Varek’s shadow huge against the wall.

He stood in the tunnel, knife in one hand, his eyes locked on the bend where the roar had come from. The firelight painted him like a warrior carved into legend.

Scarred, bloodied, unyielding.

My heart cracked.

The tunnel ahead of me narrowed, and for a terrifying moment I thought I’d be trapped, that I’d die here between rock and shadow, but then I burst through into open air, collapsing on my hands and knees in the daylight.

I pressed my hands to the earth, my chest heaving, tears burning my eyes.

The first breath of open air hit my lungs like fire. It should have felt like freedom—the clean bite of pine, the faint chill of morning wind cutting through the damp coal dust on my skin—but instead it only burned with agony.

Because he wasn’t with me.