Chapter 8 Aurora
Souleaters.
My stomach dropped. I clutched the blanket tighter around my body, as if the rough wool could shield me from whatever horror Radu would unleash.
Again.
He reached the door and shot over his shoulder, “Be in the war room in ten minutes. I’m going to gather the others.” His tone went flat and distant. Nothing good ever came from his mouth when he shut down like that.
“Okay,” I mumbled, catching his stare before he vanished into the hallway.
My skin prickled. Dawn approached. I could feel it in my bones, that internal warning every pureblood carried.
Did Harbinger sense it too? Another question on my never-ending list.
A yawn caught me as I dragged my exhausted body back to my bedroom. Ten minutes later, dressed in black leather pants and a white tank top, I headed for the war room. My mind wasn’t ready for this conversation. I hadn’t even dealt with tonight’s events yet.
Their voices hit me before I reached the stairs. Sharp, impatient, everyone talking over each other. The bitter tang of kafea saturated the air. Gale had been busy pumping everyone full of that swill they called a beverage.
At the doorway, I took in the scene. The Black Guild plus Selena had gathered around the battered oak table. Maps and weapons lay pushed aside for a cluttered array of chipped mugs and Terraknight’s homemade bread. Chunks were already missing.
Selena’s piercing gaze zeroed in on me the instant I stepped inside. The boulder on my back rolled away at the sight of her unharmed. She lounged in her chair with deceptive casualness, but the set of her jaw and white-knuckled grip on the armrest told a different story.
She shot from her chair and crossed the room in a blur, crushing me against her. “You absolute idiot,” she hissed into my shoulder, but her arms wrapped around me tight enough to crack ribs.
I slouched and returned her embrace. We’d figured out the height difference long ago.
When she pulled back, her onyx eyes glistened with unshed tears despite her scowl. “If you ever disappear on me like that again, I swear to Dracula I’ll put a leash on you.”
“I’m so sorry, Sel,” I croaked, my posture collapsing inwardly. “On a scale of one to ten, how furious are you right now?”
She raised her head to look me in the eyes. “A, do you honestly believe I’m angry with you?”
I blinked, thrown off balance. “Well… yes? I broke every promise I made to you. Did everything I swore I wouldn’t.”
“I would’ve been livid if you hadn’t made it back. But you fought through the bloodlust and saved our asses instead.” She gave a sharp, humorless laugh. “I’ve always known how stubborn you are, your remarkable talent for finding trouble, but you’re still you. Still my best friend.”
Her face transformed into a map of worry lines as she continued, “I’m not mad about the Nexus or even the bloodlust. I’m terrified because you think you’re invincible when you’re not.
” Her lips flattened into a white line. “I can’t—no, I won’t—lose you, A.
So, I’ll do my damned best to watch your back whenever that hero complex of yours rears its suicidal head. ”
The naked emotion in her voice caught me off guard.
A lump formed in my throat, inconvenient given the discussion awaiting us, but I needed to tell her how I felt.
Before it was too late. Before Radu shared another world-shattering revelation and proved we were no more immortal than the people living beyond the Gloom.
“I love you, Sel,” I murmured. “I wouldn’t have made it this far without you. I can’t promise something like this won’t happen again, but knowing you have my back makes facing whatever comes next possible.”
She tightened her hold until my lungs protested, said, “I love you, too,” then returned to her seat.
I felt the weight lift from my chest. I couldn’t bear another cold war like the one after Sighisoara.
Terraknight’s rumbling baritone pulled my attention to him. “Good to have you back, Projector.”
The vice-captain stood behind Selena, his thumbs working small circles into her back muscles.
The leather cuirass he still wore from Brasov gleamed with Stalk—Souleater blood, the stench of rot scrunching up my nose.
Standing well over six feet, he looked like a bear ready to crush your skull with a single blow.
Dark circles shadowed his hazel eyes, but his lips quirked in a half-smile when our gazes met.
Shame clawed at me as I remembered how I’d nearly broken his arm when he tried to stop me from tearing out Hummingbird’s throat. I stepped toward him, my throat suddenly dry.
“Sabin,” I said, using his real name, “I’m so sorry for what happened. I wasn’t myself, but that’s no excuse—”
“Don’t,” he cut me off with a gentle shake of his head. “You were fighting it. I could see you struggling against the hunger. Besides,” a wry grin carved lines around his mouth, “I’ve taken worse hits sparring with Cap.”
Hummingbird peeked around Terraknight’s broad back, his dusty-white wings pulled tight against his body. A vivid purple bruise bloomed across his throat where my magic had choked him earlier. My stomach twisted itself into a knot at the sight.
“Tudor, I—” my voice splintered, “I’m sorry.”
“Save the waterworks, Projector,” he interrupted, though his tone lacked any real bite.
“That was some crazy shit you pulled on those bastards. Never seen anything like it.” He rubbed the back of his head, a nervous gesture I came to recognize.
“Worth a little choking to see you tear through them like that.”
I frowned. Apologizing wouldn’t change the fact that I had hurt him.
“If you need to hear it,” he added, as if catching my thoughts, “here it is. You’re forgiven. Stop beating yourself up over it. I’m fine.” He extended his wings with a dramatic flourish, flashing a smile bright enough to rival the moon. “See?”
I returned his smile with a weak one and surveyed the room, checking on everyone else.
They were all here, all accounted for.
“I’m glad you’re all safe,” I said and sighed as the weight on my chest lifted.
“You handled yourself well.” Ember’s exotic lilt drifted from the other end of the table. “For a pureblood.”
Coming from her, that was practically a declaration of undying friendship.
She sat ramrod straight, staring into the cup of kafea cradled between her fingers. Her golden hair was pulled back in a tight, practical braid. When she glanced up, her vivid green eyes caught me off guard. They held a hint of respect that hadn’t been there before.
Across from her, Quakelord sprawled in his seat, one leg propped up on the table. He raised his mug in mock salute as I moved further into the room. “Your Bloody Highness, nice of you to join the party.”
“Don’t start,” Pearl warned, elbowing him in the ribs and making him slosh kafea all over himself.
“What?” he protested, lowering his leg. “She decapitated half of Brasov’s Stalker legion without pulling a muscle and made the rest implode. Even Cap was impressed. And he’s never impressed.”
A flush of pride warmed my cheeks. Now I just needed to figure out how I’d done it so I could repeat the performance again.
Gale perched on the windowsill, copper wings draped loosely around her. They looked like a metallic cloak, each feather gleaming red-gold in the candlelight. Her dark eyes tracked me as I pulled out the only empty chair besides the one at the head of the table.
“Harbinger’s getting more kafea. We’re going to need it,” she said, then jumped from her perch to open the patio doors.
The man in question stepped inside, carrying a steaming pot as mugs hung from his fingers. Through the narrow crack between the closing doors, I glimpsed the faded gray of pre-dawn, and another yawn escaped my lips.
Harbinger’s eyes fastened onto me and held until he reached the table. Hard and apologetic at the same time.
“You ready?” he asked, and I knew he wasn’t talking about being late. He meant if I was ready to find out the truth.
Nothing ominous about that at all.
He propped a hip against the table, mere inches away from me, and folded his bulging arms over his chest. The worn fabric of his shirt bunched between his pectorals, and I had a first row view of his nipple.
Warmth spread low in my belly from all the inappropriate thoughts bombarding my mind.
“Ready for what?” Selena demanded, bringing me back to reality with an ice-cold fist. Her tone had a steel edge that helped her maintain the high-ranking position in a profession overrun with testosterone. “Are you finally going to explain why my best friend bled out screaming her lungs out?”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. “Lieutenant, I promised Aurora answers, and that’s exactly what I’m about to deliver. You both deserve the truth.”
“The truth?” Selena pressed, a mean scowl pulling at her eyebrows.
Unease skittered down my spine, light and cold as mice feet. I swallowed past the barbed wire in my throat and forced myself to speak.
“Tell us about the Souleaters.” The new name tasted strange on my tongue.
Selena’s head snapped toward me so fast I was surprised I didn’t hear her neck crack. Her lips parted, froze, then pressed into a bloodless line as her gaze darted between Radu and me.
Radu gave a curt nod and braced his palms against the table. “I told you earlier, Projector, but for your friend’s sake, I’ll say it again,” he started. “The Stalkers have a different name. Russkaya calls them Souleaters, because that’s what they are. Stolen and trapped souls.”
My heart punched against my ribs. I’d already pieced together my own theory from the Voices in Brasov and what he’d told me in his room, but hearing him say it aloud again hit me smack-dab in the face.
How had Russkaya even managed such a thing?
Nothing in our intelligence suggested they possessed that kind of magic. Then again, we hadn’t known about Radu’s Chronoportal ability either.
I filed that question away and forced myself to speak. “So, the Voices I heard in Brasov… They were the souls they’ve taken?” I couldn’t keep my voice steady as I asked, “They have Phoenix trapped inside one of those… things?”
“What the actual fuck are you two talking about?” Selena snapped. When no one immediately answered, she shot me a wide, terrified look. “Tell me this is some sick joke.”
I could only shake my head. None of the words would come out. Nothing made sense anymore. Had the Republic been this blind all along? Or did the Council know and choose to ignore it?
Radu’s voice sliced through my spiral of questions. “You’ve got it right, Projector. And you heard them because of me. Because I’m connected to them.”
The sting of betrayal reared its ugly head again, sinking its fangs into my heart. “How?” I demanded. “How is that even possible?”
This was the one piece that didn’t fit. Through our Blood Pact, I’d sensed, as clearly as I sensed my own intentions, that he wasn’t a traitor.
The resentment he harbored against the Republic stemmed entirely from what happened to his family, but I hadn’t tasted the foul poison of vengeance in him.
He wasn’t working against us, so how could he possibly be connected to our enemy?
His teeth ground together as he took a long, deliberate breath. “I’ll get to that.”
“Is this the reason you can always tell when the Stalkers are coming?” Selena asked, frost coating every word.
Harbinger laid golden eyes on her. “Yeah. I can sense them. Always can. Even when I sleep.”
“Wait,” I cried out, my voice rising to a pitch that made everyone freeze in place.
He made it sound trivial, but there was no way it was that simple. My mind worked better when every piece of new information was dissected and laid bare, so I decided to dig deeper.
It was either that, or throw a fit.
Radu could detect Souleaters long before my Blood Manipulation could sense them.
I already knew this. Sibiu and Sighisoara both fell within a hundred-mile radius from here, but Brasov stretched much further, and he still heard them coming.
Not even the Republic’s most advanced scanners could catch them from three hundred miles away.
A terrible chill settled in the pit of my stomach, and my foot began tapping against the floor.
The voices of the ghosts—that terrifying sound I’d heard when I harmonized with him…
The Nexus had been set to a low sync ratio when the Voices started screaming and moaning in my head, loud enough to paralyze my body with pain.
If I could hear them so clearly through a mere fraction of our connection… what did they sound like to him?
“What can you hear right now?” I asked, unable to contain my concern. “How far can you sense them, and what does it sound like?”
“Don’t know the exact distance,” he answered with a half-shrug. “I hear every Souleater in the Gloom and the Outer Wards. But when they’re far or moving together, they blend. Can’t tell one from another.”
My eyes met Selena’s, and what I read in them matched the turmoil in my chest. Every single inch of my body turned stiff as rock, my breathing catching on a silent gasp.
Because what he implied defied all logic, reason, and common sense.
He hadn’t told me what the Voices sounded like to him, but even if they came across as mere whispers, it was every single Souleater living in and outside their territory.
That was like saying he could hear the thoughts of every outlier on every front.
Twice as many, since our specialists had forecasted a slight decline in their numbers, indicating that there were now at least two monsters for every mixed-breed in service.
And he felt it. Every single moment of every day. Even when he slept.
“Isn’t it… difficult?” I asked, my fingers tightening around the edge of the table. “Living with that constantly?”
His eyes remained fixed on me as he shrugged again. “I’m used to it by now. It’s been a long time.”
“How long?” I pressed.
“Since Conin died.” His voice dropped, gravel over glass. “I’ve always had a connection with him. Like a mental bond.” He sighed as if this discussion bored him, as if the burden meant nothing. “I told you I was looking for him.”
I nodded, recalling our conversation from my bedroom.
“He’s one of them now,” Harbinger said, and the words fell like stones. “That’s why I hear them.”