Chapter 33 #2
“Find the best vantage point. If any of them move toward the alarm, you kill. Do not deviate.”
“Yes, sir.” She hid her smile poorly.
“Vass and Hamish take the northern point. Run in hot and heavy. Intent to kill. Renn, hold back until we’re in position. Come in from the east. Think stealth with the intent to subdue. Preferably we leave five breathing, but our priority is that we all return alive. Understood?”
“Understood, sir!”
“Good. I’ll feel your energy signatures even from here. Once everyone is in position, Short and I will make our entrance. Do not compromise your positions. Wait for chaos, then take advantage of it.”
“Yes, sir.”
“As soon as we secure the area, I enter the building alone and retrieve our charge,” Rain reminded them.
“And we secure the remaining guards and hold the perimeter until you return,” Short added.
“Perfect. Let’s do this.”
Rain clapped Renn on the back, giving him a quick, meaningful look as the Sergeant peeled away from the group and vanished into the trees.
The squad dispersed like a ripple of wind; quiet, controlled, rustling through the foliage with the subtlety of seasoned predators.
Rain and Short remained crouched in the shadows, waiting.
Listening. Rain tracked each of their energy signatures, monitoring their progress as they slipped into position.
His awareness stretched thin across the clearing, a web of sensation woven through every heartbeat, every flicker of intuition.
If anyone so much as felt something was wrong, Rain would know before they did.
Renn finally settled into place; focused, steady, waiting for his cue.
Rain rose abruptly, brushing dirt from his pants and adjusted the straps of his pack.
“Are you ready, Captain?”
“I couldn’t be more ready, Your Highness.”
She stood tall, chin lifted, every inch the soldier she had trained her entire life to be.
Rain dipped his head in acknowledgement and strode into the clearing.
His posture was relaxed, hands loose at his sides, boots crunching over dry mud. The air was thick with heat and dust. The rust-red towers loomed ahead like ancient sentinels.
They made it halfway across the field before a guardian finally noticed them.
The man blinked, squinted, shook his head, as if trying to convince himself he wasn’t hallucinating. Then panic erupted in his aura, sharp and frantic. He stumbled backward, shouting for the others.
Two guardians sprinted toward the alarm posts.
Two bodies dropped instantly beside columns two and three. Pain free, quick deaths.
But Rain felt each life extinguish; a cold punch to the chest that stole his breath for a heartbeat. He kept moving, jaw tight, senses scanning for intent.
Two guards from the first hut fired at them.
Rain flicked his hand, deflecting the bullets skyward in a glittering arc.
Short shifted behind him, suddenly aware of how exposed they were.
She had been ordered not to kill; her job was to guard Rain’s back and ensure the squad’s positions remained uncompromised.
Hamish rounded the central structure, grabbing a lone guardian from behind and slicing her throat in one swift motion. Rain felt the life leave her body; another cold shock channelling through him but he forced himself onward.
He needed their attention on him.
He lifted his hand dramatically, though he didn’t need to. His mind did the work. The nearest guardian rose off the ground, limbs flailing as Rain suspended him mid-air. The display was deliberate; a reminder of who the Aetherial was here.
The dreaded Blue Prince.
Deep in Red territory.
Undetected until now.
More gunfire. Rain deflected the bullets again, then snapped both shooters’ necks with a twist of his power. Their bodies dropped like discarded dolls.
He shuddered.
Six deaths felt.
Two by his hand.
It always hit differently.
Another guardian fell; Glass’s shot clean and precise.
Rain hurled the airborne soldier into the tower wall, knocking him unconscious. Several guardians fled into the huts. Rain gestured sharply to Vass, who circled around the back while Rain entered through the front.
A woman screamed and bolted out the rear door; straight into Vass’s arms. He jerked, ready to kill, then hesitated.
“She’s too hot to kill,” he muttered, knocking her out instead and slinging her over his shoulder.
Rain grit his teeth but kept moving. He dragged another guardian from hiding and felt a sudden shift at his spine.
Someone was watching him. The prisoner of tower one. Her energy was sharp, furious, begging for the death of the man Rain held.
Rain felt and understood her reasoning and gladly obliged.
He felt no remorse killing a predator.
He killed the remaining two guardians of tower one as well; their energies tainted with the same rot. He suspected they all knew exactly what happened inside that tower and it fuelled a fire of vengeance within him.
“Damn it; overkill!” Short shouted, counting bodies.
“Intentional,” Rain said, voice like steel. “Those fuckers deserved it.”
“I trust they did.”
Short exhaled slowly, adrenaline still pumping through her veins.
“Three alive,” she added.
Rain nodded and left them to secure the survivors.
He strode toward the metal door of the central tower. With a flick of power, he ripped it from its hinges. The metal shrieked, warped, then flew aside, rattling as it rolled across the ground.
A narrow stone stairwell spiralled upward, the walls stained with soot and iron. The air smelled of old smoke, sweat, and something metallic; something wrong.
Rain ascended quickly, boots crunching over dust and debris. At the top stood a heavy iron door, secured only by a slide bolt on the outside. No lock. No chains. No reinforcement.
Whoever she was, they hadn’t expected anyone to come for her.
He hesitated, stretching out his senses.
She was calm and contained; oblivious to the world beyond her cage.
She had been trapped here for a long time.
The bolt screeched as he slid it free. The door swung open.
The captive startled, twisting toward the intrusion.
Deep auburn hair clung to her ebony skin in loose, tangled tendrils. Her eyes glowed like embers buried in ash. Heat shimmered around her, distorting the air, radiating from her body in restless waves.
Rain barely had time to register the surge of emotion emanating from her— panic, desperation, terror—before she called out.
“No! Stay back!”
Her voice cracked, raw and pleading.
Then—
A detonation of fire erupted from her chest.
A violent corona of heat exploded outward, white-hot and blinding. The entire chamber ignited in an instant. Personal belongings disintegrated into ash. Stone blackened. Air screamed.
Rain flinched, too slow to raise a shield.
The fire swallowed him whole.