Phoenix’s Fire (The Ruins Of Men #2)

Chapter 84

Eighty-Four

Zasen

I left Ayla with the Mole men. She had that under control, and with her dog beside her, I wasn't worried. In truth, I felt better knowing she wouldn't be in this mess, because Ayla had run the moment everything had started exploding. That meant she hadn't seen what the Moles were doing to us.

At first, I'd thought she'd been afraid, but when I'd gone to catch her, I saw Tobias - and another man trying to slip around them. Well, they hadn't seen me. I'd gotten there just in time to get a very nice view of how capable my little Phoenix had become.

But while she was talking to them, sorting out everything underground, I made my way back towards the explosions. Grenades! I'd heard about them, but only in history books. The fact that the Moles had such things chilled me more than I wanted to admit. Weapons of war! Most of them had been banned long before technology was lost. To know they'd survived down there in the compound?

As I retraced my steps, I found carnage. Over there was an arm in black cloth. Mole, I hoped. Up ahead, a tree had fallen. There were holes in the ground from the explosions, but the battle had moved on, so I hurried to catch up. Nocking an arrow to my compound bow, I kept my ears open and listened for anything that could cause me a problem.

A pop came from my right. My eyes jumped to the sound and my bow followed. I was behind the Moles. A pair of men were using a downed log as cover, so I quickly put a blue-fletched arrow in each one, hopefully hitting those fuckers in the heart. I was moving before they were completely dead.

Over logs, under branches, and around trees, I moved as fast as I could. Soon enough, I found the battle. It seemed Drozel and Kanik had shifted everything to the west and south, dragging them away from where Ayla would be meeting her infiltrator and in the opposite direction of Lorsa. If we were lucky, they'd get lost out here and be eaten by the predators.

Then I saw the first Dragon. He'd ducked behind a tree, clearly tense. That was enough to make me stop behind a tree of my own. A second later, a Mole moved forward with his gun at the ready. The Dragon and I jumped out at the same time, both of us hitting him with arrows.

"Move!" I was told. "There's more coming!"

Together, we ran - but I heard it when it hit. Behind me, there was a soft thud that somehow carried through the chaos of combat. It was hard, maybe metallic, and I wasn't foolish enough to turn back to check. Pushing as hard as I could, I raced away from it - just as the thing exploded.

The rush of air knocked me from my feet. The guy in front of me fell too, but that was all. We'd been far enough away, but how many of those things did they have? I scrambled to my feet just as the other Dragon did the same, letting me see it was Omden. Clearly we'd pushed further west than I'd expected.

"How bad?" I demanded.

"Where's Ayla?" he shot back.

"Busy," I said. "Safe."

He nodded once, but pulled me away, making it clear we should keep moving. "Zasen, they have explosions."

"Grenades," I said, showing I knew that.

"About half of them work. Some lay there for a while before blowing - but at least they've taken out a few of their own."

"Fuck," I breathed. "But they could be out here, waiting to explode?"

He nodded. "Watch your fucking feet. Kill them before they throw. When they pull the thing out of it, that means it's deadly - or could be."

"Pull the thing ?" I asked.

So he demonstrated. "They yank something out and then throw them. They're wearing them, Zasen! That means they have to arm it somehow, and the pulling seems to be how."

"Fuck!" I groaned. "So let's find the rest and push them back to their damned compound if we have to!"

"This way," Omden said, taking off.

He was quick. In the mess of green around us, his verdant skin blended well, but I chased after his tail, running back towards the mass of fighting. We passed bodies and more gore. Destruction was everywhere, but soon enough the pair of us saw them. Without slowing, I pulled an arrow and loosed. Beside me, Omden did the same a second later.

Dragons were rushing in, then pulling back. Moles were taking stings, arrows, and cuts from our weapons. They weren't nearly as fast as us, and now I knew it was from the way they lived. Then I was on them. Rushing into a group, I dropped my bow across my chest and switched to my krael.

Slicing, stabbing, and stinging, I did my best to keep these men from getting their hands on those dark orbs they were carrying. I also didn't have time to look at what they were. I just had to do enough damage to make them retreat. There were too few of us, much less than what we'd started with. I didn't know if we'd been spread apart or cut down, and I couldn't think about it now.

So I killed, thrusting my stinger into a man's leg. Spinning around yanked the barb out and allowed me to cut another across the chest. I whipped my tail at him next and heaved my blades upwards into the man who was now before me. Three down, and I couldn't slow.

I rushed the next group, but they were ready. Someone fired. The moment I saw him lifting the gun, I dropped, turned, and clawed my way off in the other direction. Around me, the shots hit the ground so close that I could feel the impacts through my feet - and then they just stopped.

"Idiot!" Jeera screamed, drawing my eyes to her as she nocked arrow after arrow, loosing them so fast I couldn't keep up.

I ducked behind a massive tree and switched weapons again. Sadly, my quiver wasn't as full as I liked. Pulling two arrows, I nocked one and held the other. Waiting just long enough to slow my breathing, I listened, placing the enemy by sound, and then leaned around the tree to let both arrows fly, one after the other.

"Focus fire!" I roared. "Push them back and don't let them get close!"

"Push them!" someone down the line yelled, then I heard it further on.

Our bird calls wouldn't be audible in this mess, but that was. So I knelt, shifting my quiver around for easy access, and started shooting anything in black I could see. My arrows weren't the only ones hitting.

Heart, lungs, liver, spleen. I named the targets in my mind as my fingers let go of the string. Fatal. I wanted each shot to kill the enemy, making sure they wouldn't be able to hurt another woman, take another body, or torment anyone else.

This was my version of an extermination.

I hated Moles. I always had, and we finally had the upper hand. Through the trees, I saw Xav's dog slam into a Mole, heave him around, and then lunge for the man's throat. That was what we needed: dogs. They worked better than guns out here, because unlike bullets, a dog could go around trees.

But then I got to see what Omden had been talking about. A Mole stood, revealing himself. I lined up my shot as he pulled something from one of those orbs. My fingers released. The arrow flew, slamming into the man's neck, killing him before his body hit the ground, but the grenade slipped from his fingers, rolling onto the leaves beside him.

"Jeera, back!" I yelled, lunging across the distance to grab my little sister and pull her behind a tree.

Nothing.

"What the fuck?" she demanded.

"I saw a grenade," I said.

She slapped at my arms. "They don't all explode! Let go of me and kill those fuckers!"

That was what we were all doing. The whistle of so many arrows flying was like a storm blowing in. Men screamed in pain. Others gurgled as they died, but it seemed we were still winning. My only problem was the sound of booming that refused to stop.

Then, "Retreat! Fall back to a defensive position." It was in English.

"South of base!"

"Fall back, fall back!"

And beside me, a hawk screamed. I whipped my head around to see Drozel with his hand to his mouth, amplifying the call to watch but hold. Across from us, the Moles were running. Above us, the sky was lit in reds and pinks, meaning night was coming too soon, but it was over. We'd won again.

"Let 'em go!" Drozel yelled. "Pull back to that pond we passed. Let's get medical attention. Check for wounded!"

Beside me, Jeera turned, dropping onto her rump so she could lean against the tree. "More arrows next time."

"Yeah," I agreed, checking my own quiver to see only two arrows left. Then I stood and offered her a hand. "And they're going to need you."

"Yep," she agreed, letting me pull her up. "It's this way."

"I'm going that way," I said, jerking my thumb over my shoulder.

Her eyes narrowed suspiciously.

"Ayla," I clarified. "I left her alone with her dog and some Moles."

"Fucking idiot!" Jeera hissed, smacking me with her palm.

I looked over to make sure the Moles were truly gone, then stepped back in the direction I was headed. "She's fine, Jeer. She's fucking amazing, and I don't think she needs to be babysat anymore."

"And they have grenades!" she snapped, flailing her arms to make the point. "Zasen, pull your head out of your ass. We lost more than four this time!"

"What?" I gasped.

"They fucking blew us up, okay? We can't keep doing this! We're dying, and you just left her out there, alone? I get it, you like independent women, but have you thought that Rymar might not handle it so well if she doesn't come home? Or Kanik!"

"How bad?" I asked.

She shook her head. "I don't know. We weren't ready for grenades, Zasen, and if they have those, then what comes next? They're adapting, just like we are, and that means this isn't going to get easier!"

"Fuck," I breathed. "I need to get Ayla!"

"Go!"

So I did, spinning and running back to where I'd left her. Sadly, I'd passed a lot of ground. Now, even more bodies littered the space. When I saw one man in black trying to roll himself over and crawl away, I paused to sting him.

"Die," I growled before hurrying to the next.

Guns were everywhere. Ayla wanted to keep collecting those, but would she still feel the same now? They had grenades. For all I knew, they'd won, but had they taken our dead this time, or just killed us? And if they were no longer hunting us for food, then what ?

Something had to change. We couldn't keep repeating the same tactics over and over, thinking we'd stop them. All these fights were doing was destroying our friends, families, and homes. The Moles had to be worried about food, but we were worried about surviving.

But a glimpse of gold up ahead banished my worries from my mind. Ayla had a few guns slung over her shoulder and was crouching to pick up another. Beside her, Holly's brindle color was almost invisible against the trees and leaves around us, but both of them were fine. Healthy.

Safe.

"Ayla," I breathed, smothering her in a hug as soon as I reached her. "Is everything okay?"

She nodded. "Yes. They were able to tell me a lot."

"And?" I pressed.

"They don't have the code," she admitted. "It's four numbers, but neither is high enough to be trusted with it. I do have a letter from Callah, but Tobias said she's staying."

"What?" I gasped, pulling back to make sure she wasn't trying to tell some kind of joke.

"Zasen!" Ayla hissed. "We grew up the same way, seeing the same things, and complaining about the same problems. Women aren't inferior. We're the ones who keep the men alive. I've said it, but so has Callah, and now she's doing something. She wants to help, and she's in a position to destroy them."

"How?" I asked, trying to wrap my mind around what she was saying.

Those perfectly blue eyes of hers locked with mine. "Rebellion. If women work together, the entire system down there stops, and Callah says she's the one person who can do it. She has me out here, Tobias to go between us, the girls know her, and she's about to be one of the wives." But Ayla's lower lip trembled slightly. "They lowered the marriage age to eighteen."

"Is she safe?" I asked.

Ayla jiggled her head in a nod, but it didn't look like she completely believed it. "Tobias will be her husband. As a friend, he said - but what if he's lying?"

"Then I will show you how to cut off his balls, and I'll hold him for you."

She nodded once. "Okay. But we need to get the guns and leave, because they said the Moles will come back to get their things from camp. They have to, because they'll burn without the shelters."

"Let's go," I said, wrapping my arm around her shoulders and moving her to my side. "Holly, guard Ayla."

Which made Ayla flash me a smile of appreciation, but I'd also put myself between her and the direction the Moles had gone. I wasn't much of a shield, but she wasn't a large woman. Combined, I hoped it would be enough to get us far enough away before they came back.

But the groaning of a man made both of us pause. "There," Ayla said, pointing.

A Mole. I'd hoped for a Dragon, but of course it was one of them. Sighing as if annoyed, Ayla pulled an arrow from her nearly full quiver, then marched over to him. Completely ignoring her bow, she looked down at the man and smiled.

"You are not Righteous, and I hope this hurts," she said before stabbing the arrow into his leg. The poisoned arrow.

Then she turned and continued on the way we'd been going without remorse. Even I felt more guilt than that, but I hadn't survived twenty years of hell with these people.

Sadly, not everybody we found was one of theirs. We came across a blue man with yellow stripes, but he was gone. Ayla helped me drag his body into the bushes and cover it. Hopefully we'd be able to come back for him, but simply keeping the Moles from getting him would have to be enough.

We were just finishing up when something rustled. Immediately, we both froze, but Holly began to growl. Ayla followed her dog's eyes - then tensed. I leaned to see what she was looking at, and saw a black-clad leg.

"Mole," I said, pushing to my feet to finish off what must be a wounded man.

Slowly, Ayla stood. The man thrust his arm forward, but then he saw her. "Ayla, help?" he begged.

"She's not here to help you," I said, giving my tail a flick to extend my stinger fully. "You want him, Ayla?"

I made it two more steps without her answering. This man had clearly dragged himself an impressive distance. Too bad for him, he'd gone the wrong way. But something about her silence made me pause to look back.

She was simply staring.

"Ayla?" I asked.

"That's my brother," she breathed.

I looked between them, trying to find the resemblance. They were both blonde. Both had that golden hair and perfectly blue eyes, but that was it. This man looked as similar to her as Tobias did.

"Are you sure?" I asked.

"His name is Elijah," she said. "His mother was Tiesha. He is my older brother." Then she shook her head. "Can you do it for me?"

I'd never seen that look on her face before. It was the one I'd expected so many times, but she'd never shown it. This was disgust, fear, and horror all rolled up together. This was the reality she didn't want to face, mixed with knowing what was coming wouldn't stop it.

But something had to change.

"Ayla," I said, making my decision, "take Holly and go back to the pond to the northwest. I'll deal with him."

"So I don't have to see?" she asked, her eyes still locked on Elijah's.

"Please?" Elijah begged, making me aware we were talking in Vestrian.

So I crouched down beside him and switched to English. "You are the Phoenix's brother, hm? Well, it seems today is your lucky day. I've just decided to be a diplomat, and yes, I do speak your words. I'm not a beast. I'm a person." Then I smiled. "And this is going to hurt. "

Then I grabbed him and threw him over my shoulder. He screamed, but was too weak to thrash. Still, the man struggled - feebly - making me bounce him once to make sure he was secure. The whole time Ayla said nothing.

"Go, Ayla," I ordered. "I'll catch up with you in half an hour."

"What are you doing?" she demanded.

"I'm proving I'm not the Devil." Then I turned my feet back to the Mole campsite. Tobias said they'd come back, so that was where I needed to be.