Chapter 9 #3
"The Rogues are in there?" Auren stepped beside her, holding his scythe out. His gaze constantly roved over the dark, empty streets. This area of the Financial District was smaller, with fewer buildings.
An empty coffee cart rested, boarded up, next to a dim lamppost. The light flickered just once. It cast shadows on the ground, and she held her breath.
"Yes. Director Ilsa told me they had a call to the Hunter’s Hotline hours before my assignment posted. Rogues were spotted in the area. My scores place me with lower skills than those needed to take down a midlevel. Sabine and Talor know I’m back," she said pointedly.
"You believe they set up this assignment to eliminate you?"
Rin unhooked her sword from her back, feeling the weight in her palm. She stared at the dark building. "I’m sure of it."
No building could truly be locked to a Hunter.
But with a Soul Searcher at her side, Rin was nearly unstoppable in terms of where she could go.
Auren swiped his scythe at his back, closing the portal.
The grand lobby was dark. Past the receptionist’s desk, there was a security check-in. Beyond that, wide steps led up to each level of the building. The way they curved hindered their vantage. If they took those stairs, they’d be in the dark. Easy prey.
Rin felt her training and years of studying kick in. It was almost too easy as she began to search for a maintenance stairwell they could take. Anything that wasn’t out in the open.
When she found it, tucked in a back office hidden behind the receptionist’s desk, she and Auren silently walked up the narrow stairwell.
The steps were molded to the walls, a thin viewpoint right in the middle.
The landings had doors, and as they passed by the first, Auren shouldered in front of her, scythe at the ready.
"Please, let me go first. I cannot bear the thought of losing you again. "
Rin kept staring over the metal railing, craning her head both up and down, ears straining for noises, all while keeping a close eye on her watch. They were getting closer.
Another landing, another door, and Auren met her eyes, a silent question within them.
She shook her head. "Not here. We need to go further up."
Auren hissed out a breath. "Each floor we surpass puts us at a greater risk. How did the Rogues get so high?"
She stayed on her toes to quiet her steps. "What if they were planted here? What if the call to the Hunter’s Hotline wasn’t the only setup?"
"We can find another way to play their game and make it so there are no questions of appearances, Hunter. I do not like putting you in danger like this."
A metallic banging sound echoed down the stairwell. Rin stalled, one foot poised in the air, as it happened again.
Her watch beeped chaotically.
And again, the banging echoed, sounding just like footsteps thundering down the stairs.
A roar. Then another.
Rin’s entire body tensed. She waited for the Nova to claim her, for her heart to go haywire. But it didn’t.
The steps on the floor above them were shaking. Auren grabbed her arm and hauled her up the last few steps onto the landing. She spied the hint of the Rogue’s rock-like form, just as Auren threw open the door and pulled her in, slamming his body against it to keep it barricaded.
Atlas kept her safe. The Celestial always would, through whatever means necessary.
He touched her with his shadowed form, imbuing her with strength. He felt her give a ghost of a shiver. Did she feel him? The thought was pleasing to him. He wanted to be felt by her.
Rin braced herself, calling for Auren, "Get away from the door!"
Auren swept back gracefully, shielding her as two lowlevel Rogues crashed through the door. Rin’s back brushed the side of a cubicle desk.
Rin’s heart tripped. The dim lighting on the low ceilings flickered. She winced as the beats of her heart steadied.
"What do you wish to do, Hunter?"
She took a small step forward, to Auren’s side, ignoring his huff of indignation. A low power thrummed in her veins, scorching her blood.
The Rogues snarled, pawing at the carpet.
"I’ll take the one on the left. You get the one on the right.
" Without further preamble, Rin surged forward, body twisting in a perfectly choreographed dance. She swept down, knee hitting the carpet, as her sword arced out, the blade finding its home at the delicate joint at the monster’s front leg.
It roared, and she surged to her feet, lithely jumping back to miss as it swiped at her.
But why wasn’t it coming any closer? It seemed afraid of her.
Rin didn’t have time to question it further. She heard the other Rogue screech as Auren slashed at it with his scythe. The lights on the ceiling flickered, darkening the shadows. Rin spun out, jumping as she did so, then angled her Echosword down, plunging the blade right into the Rogue’s mouth.
Hot blood sprayed at her. She turned her head away with a grimace.
She wobbled slightly as she pulled the Echosword away, and the Rogue collapsed.
Exhilaration filled her. "That’s two down," she panted, turning to find Auren staring at her with an overt expression of awe.
"You enjoy this," he observed.
"It reminds me of what I’m fighting for." Rin realized now she had much more to fight for than avenging her parents. Five Soulbonds.
She was so out of breath, she leaned forward and braced her hands on her knees. Auren’s blue eyes were filled with worry as he stared at her.
"I’m okay—" she started, but her gaze locked on a larger figure further in the shadows. The midlevel. Her watch hadn’t beeped.
Her pulse surged, but this time, from fear.
Auren held up a hand to keep her back, but she didn’t obey, trailing after him as he stalked toward the shadowed form of the Rogue. It lay crumpled in a heap. No blood. No wounds.
"It is dead," Auren said quietly, eyes scanning the shadows.
"Just like in Lunar City. Does that mean—whatever it was that ended this Rogue followed us here?"
Atlas watched as Vesperin and the Soul Searcher left the building.
She stumbled and coughed faintly, sweat on her temples.
Her body was growing weaker; there was only so much she could endure with his Nova coursing within her.
Only when she was safely back inside her cramped apartment did the Celestial let himself dissolve into nothingness, taking form somewhere else entirely—on another planet.
The air in Polis rippled with stillness. Soon, it would be filled with the sound of her laughter. Soon was subjective, but to a timeless Celestial, the moment of their reunion drew closer than it ever had before.
For Rin and the others, time passed just like that.
Rin was never left alone. Ever.
They were with her always. When she got up, when she went to bed, and every moment in between.
She wasn’t used to being so… coddled, but she couldn’t say she hated it. It was suffocating at times, and the tension often got the best of them all, forcing them to lash out, cutting through the fear of their circumstances.
The gala. They just had to make it to the gala.
But what would come after?
The mere idea sent Rin into a spiral. She took her anger and worry out in her training—not on the mat, sparring with the others on Alpha Team, but in the large indoor pool.
In the goddamned penthouse right outside the Academy gates that Rhyden Valkar somehow owned.
That was the thing he’d had to take care of when they’d arrived back in Solar City.
How the vampire owned such prime real estate, Rin would never know.
When she asked him about it, he merely smirked and reached for a strand of her hair, wrapping it around his finger as he tugged harshly.
Nothing was off the table for the leader of Noctis. Maybe even herself. No, dammit. She couldn’t think that way. She was strong, and he hated her. Rin would never give in. But she wasn’t sure what had changed between them. He no longer seemed hungry for revenge—but starving for her.
They took turns every night staying at her dorm. Auren would portal the others in, and every evening, with her door locked—and her dresser shoved beneath the handle because she wasn’t taking any chances of being discovered with Xara here—she’d await which it would be.
Lucien rarely stayed the night with her with his shifts at the hospital, but when he did, she soaked up every moment, not wanting to fall asleep as she lay tucked against his chest. He’d stroke his firm hands over the back of her hair and press kisses to her brow, her cheeks, and finally her lips, not to build her up, but to relax her, soothe her into sleep.
They were always both too tired to do anything else, and a part of her still felt vulnerable and almost shy after what he’d done to her—been forced to do to save her.
Rin would never hold it against him, but she was undeniably changed.
She felt like her heart would always beat to the tune of his.
Some nights, Rin would awake in his arms, crying, feeling water in her lungs, blurry faces staring down at her as she thrashed. Lucien would cry, too, wiping her tears away as he rocked her in his arms. Her death was her most vivid memory of her life on Tarz.
On the nights Cyrus came to stay with her, they both didn’t get much sleep at all.
Staying up late talking, watching movies, eating salty snacks that Lucien would be sure to get on her about…
And when the sun truly set, and they heard the halls go quiet as Xara—and sometimes Keir when he stayed over—went to bed, Cyrus would roll on top of her and kiss her all over.
Her body grew comfortable with him, from the many times he’d had her now in this life, and from her faint, shimmering memories of the past. She knew she’d been with him—in many different ways—on Sibeth.