23. Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Three
Charon
At first, every prisoner remains frozen in fear.
I get it. Freedom doesn’t come easy in a place built to break you, and I know what it’s like to sit so long in the dark that you forget the shape of the sun.
“Good to go,” Nyx croaks, flapping her wings as she launches into the air.
Someone screams in the pit, followed by the sound of soldiers laughing. A woman steps up to the railing, bony fingers curling around the rusted metal as she gazes down at the scene below. A single tear tracks down her cheek.
“You're free,” I whisper, though I’m sure she can’t hear.
But she seems to understand all the same. Her gaze cuts to mine in gratitude before she steps onto the stairs, and someone follows. Then another, and another.
A ripple of motion rolls down the walkway as everyone moves, stretching and breathing like they haven’t in years. The forgotten, the discarded, the ones left here to rot. Just like Hector and me.
Not anymore.
Rage that has festered beneath my skin for ten long years finally roars to the surface as I follow them down. Prisoners pour from their cells, half-starved but thirsty, eager for blood.
They called us monsters, treated us like beasts. Now they’ll see what monsters really look like.
The guards barely have time to raise their weapons before we storm the pit. One of them swings a bat in my direction, but I catch it mid-air, twisting his wrist until it snaps before shoving him hard into the crowd. They take him apart piece by piece, bludgeoning him with his own weapon.
“Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!” Rita tries to rally her men on one of the upper levels, aiming her baton toward the mass of bodies rushing forward. “I said hold your fucking fire, we’ve got a gas leak!”
A boulder of a man barrels into her from the side, driving her body over the edge, and her scream cuts off in a sickening crunch.
A killing calm takes over my senses. Leaping over the railing, my feet hit the ground in the pit with a crack , knees absorbing the shock as more prisoners follow. Blood splatters my face when I rip a blade from a guard's belt before driving it into his stomach, intestines splashing to the floor .
Cheers ring out from the cells above. Soldiers rush through the open doors, but there are more of us than there are of them, and they can’t get control without their guns.
Just as I drive my fist into someone’s face, a thunderous BOOM shakes the ground beneath my boots. Shockwaves ripple through the compound when a fireball bursts skyward from the western wing, sending stone and dust raining down. Terrified screams follow the blast.
I stagger back, nearly losing my balance as I whip toward the noise, heart thundering wildly. The power flickers, lights sputtering before dimming to a red glow as sirens begin to sound above the chaos. Emergency mode.
“Fucking die!” A guard lunges at me from behind, but one of the prisoners tackles him to the ground, sinking his teeth into the man's throat.
Snarling barks reach my ears as a body falls from the upper level, but not even their dogs are enough to hold us back.
The pit has become a battlefield. Smoke chokes the air as sweat, metal, and burning flesh coat my tongue.
A woman runs past, wielding a leg like a weapon, laughing maniacally when she slams it into someone’s head.
Searing pain runs down my shoulder from a stray blade, but I don’t fall, diving low to sweep a guard’s legs from beneath him before pounding my fists into his face again and again until he stops twitching.
“In we go!” Nyx shrieks above the bloodbath, her swooping shadow pulling me out of my haze. She lands on my shoulder, cawing once before launching back into the ashes toward the western wing. Toward Lena, and the place where she took everything from me .
I take off after her, each step sending fire through my legs, but I don’t slow down.
The hallway is a blur of carnage—bodies litter the floor, guards and prisoners both, the dead indistinguishable from the dying.
Someone grabs for me, but I shake them off, barely noticing the way their blood smears my arm.
Nyx dips down again at the corridor split, screaming over her shoulder before vanishing.
My boots skid through ash and soot as I follow, chest burning from the smoke, fury tangled in my lungs.
I skid to a stop when I spot the doors blown wide open, one hanging crooked on its hinges, the other scorched black.
A pipe hisses steam into the hall as someone screams, making me jolt, because it sounds like Hector .
Has the bloodlust driven me mad already?
Pain explodes in my ribs when a guard slams into my back, tackling me into the wall.
The impact knocks the breath out of me. My shoulders spasm in pain, but I snarl through it, grabbing his wrist as he raises a blade.
The knife slices along my arm, burning hot, but it’s not deep enough to stop me as my elbow connects with his jaw.
He stumbles, blood spraying from his mouth. I shove him down and grab the knife, jamming it into his neck over and over and over until it completely severs the bone.
Once the body stills beneath me, I sag over it, blinking blood from my lashes. Adrenaline surges through my veins, the rhythm of my heart painfully tight. I can hardly breathe.
Nyx screeches again, drawing my attention. When I look ahead to find her, all of my strength leaves my limbs, because I see him .
Not clearly—not yet—but the unmistakable figure stepping from the mouth of the corridor could be no one else.
Smoke curls around him, clothes torn and dirty, but his face…
His face is everything.
It takes me a several seconds to believe this is real, that I haven’t broken so completely that my mind is crafting phantoms just to keep me moving. But then his wide emerald eyes find mine, and my blood roars to life inside my veins.
I rise to my feet, barely noticing the gore dripping from my arms or the taste of copper on my tongue. There is nothing in this moment except him .
Hector. Beautiful, frightened, covered in soot, but alive.
And I'll never let anyone take him from me again.