Imara
SIX
The alarm bells haven’t stopped screaming.
I press myself against the corridor wall as Attendants rush past, their dark robes billowing. The chaos is useful—no one notices a harvester standing frozen outside her quarters, no one questions why my hair is tangled or my hands are shaking.
No one saw him corner me in that alcove. No one heard what I offered.
Escape attempt in the Breeding Pens.
The Matron’s amplified voice still echoes in my skull. Escape attempt. Three stock running for freedom they’ll never reach. Running through a weak point in the wards that I created six months ago, a subtle flaw I’d been saving for the right moment.
This wasn’t the right moment.
I didn’t plan for today. Didn’t know anyone would try today.
The weakness was supposed to be a backup option, an emergency exit for when my network finally made its move.
Someone must have discovered it independently—tested the wards, found the gap, and made a desperate choice without any idea what they were running into.
Without any idea who would be sent to hunt them.
I push off the wall. Start walking. My feet carry me toward the upper levels, toward the Red Fields where containment protocols always end. The Matron likes her recaptures public. Likes the message they send.
He’s out there. Hunting them right now.
Kharvek. The weapon I just offered to help aim. The monster who cornered me in the darkness and demanded to know why I’d lied for him, whose hand on my arm burned hotter than any blood-ward.
I need to see what he does. Need to know if the alliance I’m gambling my life on is worth the risk.
The Red Fields await.
Attendants rush past without acknowledging me—too focused on the crisis to notice a single harvester moving against the flow. I keep my head down, my pace measured, my expression blank.
My mind won’t stop replaying the confrontation in the alcove. His hand on my arm, burning hot. His breath on my face, close enough to taste. The way he listened when I offered to help him destroy everything we’ve both been enslaved by.
Focus. Three people are running for their lives right now. You can think about the monster later.
The grass crunches beneath my boots—brittle, rust-colored, nourished by centuries of spilled blood.
The Red Fields surround the Sanctum in every direction, open ritual grounds dotted with stone altars and bone pits.
Crows watch from the scattered bone pillars, their black eyes tracking movement with patient interest.
They know what’s coming. They always know.
A crowd has gathered near the eastern edge—Attendants, ritualists, a handful of harvesters who aren’t on rotation. They cluster at a safe distance, faces illuminated by the blood-wards’ crimson glow. No one speaks above a whisper.
I find a position at the crowd’s edge. Keep my expression neutral, my posture appropriately subdued. Just another servant come to witness the Matron’s justice.
The hunt isn’t over yet. I can tell from the tension in the gathered bodies, the way heads turn toward every sound. Two of the escapees have already been dealt with—I heard the reports as I climbed. One drained in the lower corridors. One torn apart near the surface tunnels.
One still running.
The third escapee bursts from a service entrance fifty yards away. A woman—young, dark-haired, legs pumping with desperate speed. She’s bleeding from a gash on her temple, her thin shift torn and filthy, but she’s still moving. Still fighting.
Run. Please, just run faster.
She won’t. I know she won’t. But some part of me—the part that hasn’t been completely crushed by ten years of compliance—still hopes.
Kharvek emerges behind her.
He doesn’t run. Doesn’t need to. His stride is long and measured, predatory patience in every step. The scars along his arms glow faintly red—power already flowing, ready to be unleashed. His face shows nothing. No anger, no satisfaction, no hesitation. Just focus.
The woman sees the crowd. Changes direction. Tries to angle toward a gap in the watchers, some desperate hope that witnesses might offer protection.
They won’t. We’re all complicit here. We all know better than to interfere.
The night air carries the smell of old death and fresh fear.
Torches flicker at the field’s edges, casting dancing shadows across the assembled crowd.
Above us, the sky is the color of a healing bruise—purples and blacks bleeding into each other, the stars hidden behind a perpetual haze that never quite clears over the Vale.
Kharvek closes the distance in a burst of speed that shouldn’t be possible for a creature his size. One moment he’s twenty feet behind her. The next, his hand is around her throat, lifting her off the rust-colored grass with casual ease.
The crowd murmurs. Shifts. Someone near me lets out a soft sound of fear.
But Kharvek doesn’t kill her.
He holds her there—suspended, choking, feet kicking uselessly—and turns to face the assembled servants. His gaze sweeps the crowd with deliberate slowness.
When those mismatched eyes find mine, they pause.
Just for a heartbeat. Just long enough for me to know he’s seen me.
Then he turns and carries his captive toward the Sanctum’s entrance, leaving the crowd to remember what happens to those who run.