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Chapter twenty-one

Astria Zielle

I numbly lead the last of Dirus’s team through the ruins of my home village. My boots squished with blood under them with every step. Some people were marred beyond recognition. My father was sure to be in some panic room hiding from the ramification of his actions. No doubt he had his hand in this.

But at the end of the day, this was all my fault. This was a ploy to get rid of me because I wouldn’t comply or die.

My people were gone. All the women who’d gotten me through everything were nothing more than empty meat sacks now. At least their husbands and fathers couldn’t hurt them any more.

As my heart twisted in pain, the dead bodies turned into stars and flew to me as I passed them. I collected all the stars in the pouch Lucero gave me as we passed. I wasn’t sure why that was happening, but if I was given a choice, I wouldn’t let them be buried here.

“Mommy!” a familiar voice screamed. “Wake up.”

Elizabeth laid with lifeless eyes on the ground with her throat ripped out. Everlynn kneeled beside her dead body, covered in some kind of dust. Knowing Elizabeth, it was defense warding.

The costs kept piling up on my shoulders.

Everlynn tried to shake Elizabeth awake. “Mommy!”

I walked over to them and kneeled beside Everlynn. My best friend. My comrade.

I stared into her blue dead eyes. You always protected mine. I’ll look out for yours.

“Everlynn,” I said. Everlynn’s eyes were so much like her mother’s, it made me sick to my stomach. “We need to leave. Something is going to finish off the survivors. If you stay, you won’t make it.”

“Mommy!” Her sob was another crack at my already fragile state of mind.

If I left Everlynn behind, Elizabeth would never forgive me. And I owed her too fucking much to let that happen.

With a steadying breath, I grabbed the child and picked her up.

“No! Mommy! Mommy!” she shrieked while I carried her as she tried to flail out of my hold.

“It’s going to be okay.” I was such a liar. Even I didn’t believe me. How could I ever expect her to?

I rubbed her back in a way that soothed Kylie, but it had no impact on her. She fought and screamed just as hard, if not harder. She was so much larger than Kylie. I struggled to handle her thrashing weight.

I wasn’t her mother. She wasn’t my daughter. When I held Kylie, it was as natural as breathing. But we weren’t bonded to each other like that, not that I would let that stop me.

“Do you want me to carry her?” Dirus asked me after about a mile of her fighting me.

He reached out as if to take her, and her screaming turned into a shriek of terror. Now she clung to me, eyeing Dirus like one would a wild animal. I waved him off, and she finally settled into me without fighting.

Regressing to her training, don’t get the men’s attention.

We went into a clearing where my husband’s plane was. “Nikolai uses it for supply runs to the mainland.”

“She looks like a damn dream.” Pierce threw his fist up. I guess it was a small victory if you hadn’t lost everything.

They opened up the door, and we boarded. I sat Everlynn on the bench, ready to do what I needed to help get the plane moving.

“It’s got just enough gas to hit Central America to one of our drop spots. Perfect,” Dirus gave commands to Pierce. They hit some buttons, and the plane whirred to life. I’d never actually been on this thing before.

Kadeem groaned as he sat at the second set of controls. He growled in pain, but rattled off things that didn’t make sense to me. I didn’t think I could help there, but Lucero laid on the sitting bench across from me, watching me with sad eyes. There were more bullets in his body than should have been possible.

“He needs tending to,” I told Everlynn. She blinked as if she was taking in her surroundings for the first time. She gasped at Lucero’s condition and hopped up to grab the first aid kit mounted on the wall.

“Forceps?” she asked. I handed them to her, and she pulled out bullets with an efficiency that I would never be able to do.

“Her mother was the village healer. She’s young, but she’ll get the job done,” I told him. Hell, Elizabeth would have died weeks ago if it wasn’t for Everlynn.

“Don’t worry about stitches.” He winced. “If the bullets are out, I’ll heal.”

“You can’t lose any more blood,” Everlynn disagreed quietly. I threaded the stitch needle like Elizabeth taught me. She was dead, but she was still saving people’s asses. Wasn’t that just like her?

That thought halted me in my tracks. Pain wracked through me at the very thought.

“Alcohol?” Everlynn’s voice broke me out of my train of thought and got me moving again.

Everlynn moved like a pro. Ten bullets were removed and sutured before we were fully in the sky. A giant explosion shook the plane. I stood to find the island collapsing on itself in a giant blaze.

It was incredible that such a big place was so suffocating. It was more amazing to watch it leaving existence as if it never destroyed countless lives. I noticed a cloud behaving strangely. Like it was imploding, too. “Dirus, do you see the clouds?”

“They destroyed the pocket. Hang on to something. It’s going to get rough,” Dirus answered.

The plane took a harsh turn and tossed me on top of Lucero. He grabbed the seat with one arm and wrapped the other around me when we took a nosedive.

I barely got my fingers on the back of Everlynn’s shirt, keeping her from flying across the plane.

“We’ve gotta even out,” Dirus growled.

“The air pressure changed,” Kadeem answered with a groan of pain.

The growling crescendoed. “Still have to even out, dumbass.”

“Pull up, genius.”

“Fuck you.”

Both men suddenly laughed, and for whatever reason, that calmed my racing heartbeat.

“Don’t mind them ladies, they are always like that.” Pierce smiled from where he was strapped in to the bench across the way. “They should have gotten married years ago.”

My grip on Everlynn was slipping. “Grab me.”

The plane jerked and shivered. The metal groaned. Maybe a plane wasn’t a great idea. It wasn’t the last time.

Everlynn grabbed my arm with both hands and screamed when we bounced. The horror in her eyes made me steel my nerves. “Don’t let me go, Astria.”

“I’ve got you. Always.” I had no business making that promise, but it was too late to take it back.

Just when I was sure we’d crash into oblivion, we ripped through something in the sky. It reminded me of a film over pond water when you toss a rock through it. A red cover of magic keeping things in. Once the body of the plane was clear, it evened out.

“Free and clear. For now,” Dirus yelled.

“I’m sorry.” I climbed off of Lucero. Everlynn went right back to what she was doing.

“The man that’s burned needs to be scrubbed,” Everlynn told me. “I assume he heals fast, but we don’t need bacteria making a home in the open wounds.”

I went to the front where the men were. Kadeem stared ahead and didn’t turn to look at me. “Everlynn says she needs to scrub you down to avoid infection.”

“I’m fine,” he grunted.

“There’s debris in your wounds.” I pulled a twig out of his shoulder to make my point.

“Let the kid do her work,” Dirus told him.

“Fine.” He scoffed. “The kid can come here then. I’ve got to co-pilot this plane.”

Dirus cut Kadeem a glare, but Kadeem ignored that too.

First, get the guys fixed up.

Second, take care of Everlynn.

Keep going, stupid bitch. You made this mess, now clean it up.

This wasn’t the happily ever after I fought for.