Page 110 of The Monster You Made

My chest caves. My breath won’t come. The rebels watch in silence, horror plain on their faces. Vera steps closer, her hand brushing mine, grounding me. But the screen burns the image into me: Cassian, remade via plastic surgery and experimentation to become Declan,now their weapon.

The video ends. Silence crashes down.

Elira spits on the floor. “They’ve finished him. He’s gone.”

“No,” I snarl. My voice shakes, but the fire in me blazes higher. “He’s not gone. He’s there. And I will bring him back, or end Cadmus with him.”

***

Later, alone in the hall, I let the fury bleed out. My hands shake, fists bruised from striking the stone wall. The loop plays again, each frame carving deeper. Vera finds me there, blood on my knuckles, sweat freezing in my hair.

“They want you broken,” she whispers. “Don’t give it to them.”

I press my forehead against hers, breath ragged. “Then stay with me. Keep me whole.”

Her arms wrap around me, strong and steady. For a moment, I believe I can.

***

The safehouse feels smaller after the video. Every shadow stretches too long, every silence presses too heavy. Rebels move in hushed tones, their eyes flicking to me when they think I won’t notice. They don’t need to say it; they all saw. They all know. My brother is their enemy now.

I pace the hall, the video looping in my head. His jaw, scarred and rebuilt. His eyes, flat as glass. His voice, trained into steel.Brother. Traitor.The words sting worse than any blade.

Vera finds me there. She doesn’t ask if I’m all right. She knows the answer. Instead, she holds out Marta’s journal, opened to a page I’ve read a hundred times.Chains can bind the flesh, but not the soul.

I take it, fingers tracing the words. But I can’t believe them tonight.

***

We plan. We plan because planning is all that keeps us from unraveling. Elira slams her breaching axe into the map, marking the patrol routes. “We can bleed them for weeks, but it won’t matter. Cadmus waits. He waits. You think he doesn’t know you’re coming, Lucian? He’s waiting to cut you down.”

I meet her stare, steady. “Then let him wait. Every day we steal, every soldier we break, every convoy we burn, that’s a chain snapped. That’s a message sent.”

Rourke drinks, but his flask shakes. “You’re driving us into the pit. You think you’re leading us out, but all I see is the edge.”

Vera’s voice cuts through the tension. “Then we hold the line until the edge becomes a door. We’re not walking into their trap blind. We’re building our own path.”

Her steadiness steadies me. I nod once. “We bleed them until they bleed no more.”

***

The days that follow are a blur of strikes. Ambushes in forests, fires on supply lines, shadows moving in the night. Each time, the rebels grow sharper, harder. Each time, the Crown pulls tighter, angrier. And each time, I search for him among their ranks.

Once, I almost believe I see him, a silhouette on a ridge, tall, broad-shouldered, standing too still. My heart lurches. I sprint toward it. The snow swallows my boots, the wind slashes my face. But when I reach the ridge, it is empty. Only silence, only snow. And in the silence, the loop plays again.Brother. Traitor.

***

One night, we take a patrol alive. Young, terrified, bleeding from a wound Elira gave him. I drag him into the snow, slam him against a tree. “Cadmus,” I snarl. “Where?”

He shakes his head, teeth chattering. “I…I don’t know. They don’t tell us. Only officers.”

“Then tell me what you do know.”

His eyes widen. He spits blood. “That he isn’t yours anymore.”

I strike him before I can stop myself, fist splitting his lip. He crumples, sobbing. Vera pulls me back, her hand iron on my arm. “Enough,” she says. Her eyes burn, not with anger, but with sorrow. I realize then what I looked like: not a leader, not a brother. A man unraveling.

The soldier dies in the snow. His words remain.