Chapter 15
Ahrick
The prize room was dark—just the faint glow from the window casting long, skeletal shadows across the.
I crossed to the bed and pulled the blanket back, arranging the pillows beneath it in a shape that might pass for a sleeping body if no one looked too closely.
I adjusted the positioning, angling one pillow to suggest a head, another to mimic the curve of shoulders and hips.
It wouldn't fool anyone for long. Any guard who actually stepped into the room and looked would see through the deception immediately. But it didn't need to withstand close scrutiny.
It just needed to buy myself enough time to get it done.
I stood there for a moment, looking down at the makeshift form, and something twisted in my chest—sharp and painful, like a blade sliding between my ribs.
The absence of her was physical. Wrong. Like a limb had been severed and my body hadn't caught up to the reality yet, still sending signals to something that was no longer there.
My mate was out there in the wasteland, hiding in a shack miles from the city, alone and vulnerable, waiting for me to come for her. Trusting me to keep my promise.
And I was about to do something that might get me killed.
Three days, I'd told her. Three days to finish this and come for her. Three days to end Hewes and make Fange City safe enough that we could disappear without looking over our shoulders for the rest of our lives.
I just had to survive that long.
I pulled the blanket up over the pillows, smoothing it down with my hands, making it look as natural as possible. Then I crossed to the door, my footsteps silent on the metal floor, and pressed my ear against the cold surface.
Silence.
The guards had moved on, their heavy footsteps fading down the corridor minutes ago. Probably assumed I was doing exactly what Persico expected me to do with my prize.
The thought made my stomach turn.
I opened the door slowly, checking the corridor through the narrow gap. Empty. Nothing but flickering emergency lights and shadows.
Good.
I moved through the city with the practiced silence of a hunter, my body remembering skills I'd honed over years of survival.
Years as an assassin had taught me how to read spaces, how to move through them without drawing attention.
Where the guards would be stationed. Where the blind spots existed—the gaps in surveillance that could be exploited by someone who knew what to look for.
Fange City was a maze of corridors and chambers carved from derelict ships and scavenged station parts, a labyrinth that confused and disoriented newcomers. But I knew every inch of it. Every turn, every junction, every hidden passage.
I made my way to the lower levels—the maintenance tunnels that ran beneath the compound like veins beneath skin, carrying power conduits and air circulation ducts through the bowels of the city.
Down here, the air was thick with the smell of rust and decay, and the only light came from flickering emergency strips mounted to the walls at irregular intervals, casting everything in shades of sickly yellow and deep shadow.
Roone was waiting for me in the junction where three tunnels met, his small form nearly invisible in the dimness.
He looked up as I approached, his large dark eyes reflecting the dim light like twin moons, his whiskers twitching as he assessed my approach.
"She's safe," he said immediately, before I could even ask the question burning in my mind. "Got her to the shack. Showed her the hiding spot—the loose panel in the floor where she can hide if anyone comes looking. Left her water and supplies."
Relief flooded through me, so intense it was almost painful. My chest loosened, the crushing weight of worry easing just slightly. "Thank you."
"Don't thank me yet." Roone's ears swiveled forward, a gesture I'd learned meant he was alert to danger. "We've got a problem."
Of course we did. In Fange City, there was always a problem.
"Tell me."
"Persico." Roone's voice dropped lower, barely above a whisper, and he glanced toward the tunnel entrance as if worried about being overheard. "He's not running things anymore."
I went still, every muscle in my body tensing. "What?"
"Hewes made his move hours ago when Merrilee and I were escaping the city.
Took control of Persico's inner circle—bribed half of them with promises of slaves and profit, killed the other half when they refused to turn.
Now Persico's locked up in his own throne room, chained like an animal, while Hewes runs Fange City from his seat. "
Fuck!
Hewes had taken over.
Which meant everything had changed. All my calculations, all my plans—they were based on a power structure that no longer existed.
"How do you know this?" I asked, needing to be certain. Roone was reliable, but this information was too critical to accept without verification.
"I hear things." Roone's whiskers twitched.
"When I got back to the city, I heard some of the guards talking, so I went to investigate.
I'm small. People don't notice me. And the vents go everywhere—I can access nearly every room in the compound.
I've seen it myself. Watched Hewes giving orders from Persico's throne while Persico sits in a cage six feet away. "
I believed him. Roone had survived in Fange City longer than most because he knew how to be invisible. How to listen. How to gather information that kept him alive when bigger, stronger beings had fallen.
"Persico's still breathing?" I asked.
"For now. Hewes is keeping him alive as leverage—Persico still has loyalists in the city, fighters who respect the old ways.
If Hewes kills him outright, there'll be a war.
Blood in the streets. Chaos that could tear Fange City apart.
But if he keeps him caged, makes an example of him, shows everyone that even the mighty Kerzak crime lord can fall...
" Roone trailed off, letting the implication hang in the air.
"It keeps people in line. Makes them think twice about challenging the new order. "
My mind raced, calculating, weighing options, running through scenarios and outcomes.
Hewes in control changed everything. It made him more dangerous because he'd consolidated power. More protected because he'd surrounded himself with enforcers who owed him everything.
But it also made him vulnerable in ways he might not realize yet.
"Persico wanted Hewes gone," Roone said slowly, his voice thoughtful. "Before all this happened. He saw Hewes as a threat to his authority. Complained about him constantly—said he was getting too ambitious, making moves without permission."
"He was right." My tone was grim. "Hewes was planning this coup the whole time."
"So it would appear," the Negita agreed, looking disgusted.
"Then maybe..." I looked at Roone, an idea forming in my mind. "The enemy of my enemy."
Roone's ears flattened against his head, a sign of distress. "You want to make a deal with Persico."
"I want to kill Hewes." I kept my voice flat, emotionless, stating it as simple fact. "If that means working with Persico to do it, then that's what I'll do."
"Ahrick—"
"Hewes tried to use Merrilee as a pawn in his schemes.
He would have given her to Korroth without a second thought.
Would have let that sadistic bastard break her, torture her, just to expand his business connections.
" The words came out edged with the fury I'd been keeping locked down.
"I'm not letting him walk away from that.
He threatened my mate. He dies for that. "
Roone was quiet for a long moment, his dark eyes studying my face in the flickering light. Then he sighed—a sound like air escaping through a crack, weary and resigned.
"You Vaktaire," he said, a hint of exasperation in his tone. "Always so dramatic. Always so willing to die for honor and revenge."
Despite everything, I almost smiled.
"Can you get me to the throne room?" I asked.
"I can get you close. But once you're inside..." Roone shook his head, his whiskers drooping. "You're on your own. I can't protect you from what happens in there."
"That's all I need. Just get me to the door."
Persico's compound occupied a section of Fange City that had been carved out of an old cargo hauler's hull and reinforced with scavenged military-grade plating.
It was the most secure location in the city, designed to withstand assault from multiple angles, guarded by Persico's most loyal fighters and monitored by surveillance systems that covered every approach.
Or at least, it used to be.
Now, as I approached the entrance through the maintenance tunnels, emerging into a corridor that smelled of ozone and gun oil, I saw new faces.
Hewes's people. Mercenaries and thugs who'd sold their loyalty to the highest bidder, their armor mismatched and weapons held with the casual confidence of those who believed they were untouchable.
Roone led me through a series of narrow passages, his small form moving with practiced ease through spaces that forced me to crouch and squeeze.
The metal walls pressed close on either side, and I heard the distant hum of machinery, the occasional clank of pipes settling, the muffled voices of guards on patrol.
Finally, he stopped at a junction where three passages converged. He pointed to a small access panel set low in the wall.
"Through there," he whispered. "Supply closet. Rarely used. Opens into the main corridor, twenty meters from the throne room entrance."
I nodded, already calculating the approach, visualizing the layout from what I remembered of Persico's compound.
Roone's dark eyes studied me for a long moment, his whiskers twitching with emotion I couldn't quite read. "Good luck, Ahrick. You're going to need it."
I reached out, placing one hand on his small shoulder. The gesture felt inadequate for what I needed to say.
"If things go badly," I said quietly, "please take care of Merrilee."