Chapter 25
Scourge [ skurj ] noun
Member within the Sons of the Messiah tasked with hunting down and exterminating Talents. The most violent and depraved of the sect, they require handlers.
– Excerpt from A Treatise on Talents , Third Edition
“No man can fight a successful war on two fronts. As much as it pains me to leave an enemy at my back, the Assembly’s by far the lesser of two evils. Henceforth, Glynfyls’s military is seceding from their purview. My forces will be concentrated on the border, and every one of you goddamned civs can hang when it bites you in the ass.”
– Lord Stonefist, Commander of Glynfyls’s Forces
Flynn stroked Kara’s hair, watching the trees go by. The thick conifers had thinned out as they’d started up the long incline bringing them to the top of the plateau. Something of a geological anomaly, it stretched for miles, all the way to Casmot’s Bay…and the city of Glynfyls, squatting on its rocky shores.
Flynn pressed his lips against Kara’s temple, his emotions running riot. The last fucking thing he wanted to do was to go back to that shithole. Goddamn?—
A large explosion rocked the train from its tracks.
The car blew over onto its side, everyone thrown from their seats into the far wall and peppering them with anything not bolted to the floor. Flynn turned, shielding Kara with his body and hitting hard. A crystal carafe shattered against the wall by his head, spraying them with glass. Goblets went off like bombs. He bellowed, the edge of a heavy serving tray striking him and falling to his side with a dull thud. His arms gave out, flattening Kara beneath him. Groaning, he clambered upright. Fucking thing must’ve weighed ten pounds.
He shook the shards of glass out of his hair and sucked wind at the stabbing cramp lancing through his back. Christ, that was gonna leave a mark… Kara got to her feet, taking in the damage wide-eyed. She was freaked out but didn’t look like she’d been hurt.
Cal staggered over, a jagged cut across his cheek. Screams from outside the car and the smell of smoke, another loud explosion. The car lurched. A discordance filled Flynn’s mind and his stomach sank. Someone was using a nullifier.
This wasn’t an accident. Fuck.
“Everyone ok?” Cal wheezed, patting his pockets. The triplets huddled around Jon. He cradled Miriam in his arms, her face awash with blood. Kara hurried over, hiking up her pants.
“She got hit with one of those fucking glasses.” Leo anxiously watched Kara inspect the deep gash across his mother’s temple. Jon rocked against Miriam, gripped by one of his panic attacks. Shelby moved closer to him, putting her hand on his shoulder. He kept rocking, unresponsive.
Kara pressed Miriam’s wound closed, her hands slick with blood. “Somebody hand Flynn a knife.” Without hesitation, Leo pulled one from his pocket and held it out. “Cut me some long strips from those curtains behind you.”
Flynn grabbed the knife and flicked it open. Source issue. He set to work slicing up the thick velvet curtains and passing the strips to Kara. She bandaged Miriam’s head as best she could. The dark green fabric immediately soaked through, going black.
“Is she gonna be all right?” Graham’s voice was a study in carefully controlled panic.
Fuck. Flynn couldn’t fault him for it. The smell of smoke was getting stronger. It wreathed in through the broken glass behind them, flames following it up the doorframe. Tight bursts of gunshots sounded. He slipped the knife into his pocket.
“If we can get out of the nullifier’s range, she’ll be fine,” Kara replied briskly, taking one of the extra strips of curtain and threading it through her belt loops.
Flynn edged away from the flames. “We can’t stay here.”
Another explosion lurched the car violently. Stumbling, he picked his way through the debris to the rear door and pulled the handle. It slid open about an inch, then jammed. An arctic blast of air swept in.
“Shit, it’s stuck.” Flynn wedged his fingers into the gap. Damn it. He couldn’t budge it.
“Let me try.” Kara came over and pulled. It moved another couple inches and froze. “I need more leverage, pick me up so I can reach that.” She pointed to a small table bolted to the wall above them.
Flynn lifted her up. She grabbed on and hung, slipping the toes of her boots into the gap and forcing her legs down like a jack. He stepped back at the crackle of wood splintering under the strain.
The door slammed open.
She dropped to the floor grinning. Goddamn she was fierce. A wave of need came over him.
“Not the time, Laughlin,” Cal snapped. “Come get Miriam.”
Christ, that was inconvenient. Flynn took a deep breath and coughed, choking on the smoky air. They needed to move.
He gingerly scooped Miriam up and stumbled, his back spasming with the added strain. She looked like shit, her face grey beneath the gore. Jon wasn’t any better. Leo and Graham each took an arm, hauling him out. The man had totally shut down.
“Hand her up to me,” Kara said when everyone was clear. Wordlessly Flynn did, marveling at how easily she took Miriam’s weight.
The car lurched again at another explosion, metal squealing. Flynn fell back, hitting the ground hard as it tore loose from the car in front of it, skidding down the embankment. Jesus fucking?—
It jerked to an abrupt stop, rattling his teeth. Dazed, he grimaced. He’d wrenched his shoulder and his back was on fucking fire. Goddamn, that hurt… He stared up at the far wall trying to get a handle on it. A woman screamed. The concern he was feeling from Kara turned to panic. Fuck, he needed to—Panting through the pain, he got to his feet.
Flynn pushing through the wreckage, climbing out of the car. It’d slid half-way down the slope and come to rest across the tracks, stopped by the massive berm of snow it’d scraped up. Below him, people climbed from the rear cars, milling about. The wind ripped their voices away, but by their body language, none of them were going to be any fucking use.
Motherfucker. What he wouldn’t give for his squad right about now.
He pulled out his beanie and jammed it on his head, keeping low as he picked his way up the icy embankment. More shots came from above and a dog barked. Another answered it. His stomach clenched at the sound. God, he hoped they were just dogs… Right before the crest of the plateau he flattened himself, peering over the top.
Jesus fucking Christ.
Thick pillars of oily black smoke defied the blustering wind, billowing up into the air. The main engine was across the tracks, listing heavily. Directly behind it, cars had been blown completely apart, mountains of twisted metal flung across the wind-whipped landscape. Others lay on their sides. Whoever had done this wasn’t gonna stick around for long. Someone would see the smoke and investigate.
Clear of the snow gathered on the side of the slope, the plateau remained scoured clean by the ever-present gale. It lashed across the frozen ground, stunting and shaping everything upon it. Sparse vegetation offered no cover, and he was still caught inside the nullifier’s field .
Not that it would’ve made a fucking difference.
A mutie trotted into view, followed by a nasty looking pit bull. The attack wasn’t from the Source—they didn’t run mixed packs. Cal was right, the Sons had been using Hamlin to stage an attack. Where the fuck was Stonefist? Glynfyls’s general should be on top of this shit.
Flynn watched a group of men with guns herding shellshocked passengers toward a craft. Others pulled cowering Talents from the cars, inspecting the women’s halos. Flynn’s stomach clenched again, pretty sure he knew who they were looking for. He scanned the crowd for Kara. Where was she?
He tensed at the crunch of snow behind him.
A dozen Northern Breakers from the train had climbed the slope, their expressions grim. The lead moved up beside him. “How many?”
“Thirty, give or take. How long will it take Stonefist to get here with troops?” Flynn blew on his hands, damn it was cold.
The Breaker snorted. “That ain’t gonna happen after his last blowout with the Assembly. Unless that nullifier goes down, all them civs is dog food.”
Goddamn it… Flynn scanned the crowd again for Kara. There. She glanced up, uncannily looking right at him. Her emotions made him break out in a cold sweat. She was about to do something stupid.
Christ. Not if he did it the fuck first.
“Take your men and sweep the perimeter east. Hold until I draw their fire, then rush the craft. Find that fucking nullifier and disable it, priority on getting that woman in the orange coat clear.”
The lead looked at him like he was delusional, opening his mouth to argue. Glaring at him, Flynn’s hackles rose with a surge of temper. He didn’t have time for this shit. The man’s nostrils flared, and he pulled back from him in surprise.
“That’s a fucking order!” Flynn voice could crack stone. He stood, the wind tearing at him, trying to hold him down. Hunching his shoulders against it, he jammed his hands in his pockets and walked toward the craft like he was joining them for fucking tea. Behind him, Glynfyls’s Breakers took off in the direction he’d indicated.
Flynn glanced up at the heavens and fingered the blade in his pocket.
Kara pulled the fur-lined hood closer around her face, trying to blend into the crowd. Despite the cold, she was slick with sweat. She ducked behind another woman in full skirts. So many people… And Sons. They’d been separating the dark-haired women and loading them into the craft. They’d grabbed Shelby a moment ago, and Kara wouldn’t be able to avoid them much longer.
Feeling the weight of Flynn’s regard, she looked up and met his eyes across the barren expanse. It steeled her resolve. He was going to do something stupid. She needed to stop dithering and do what Rogan had trained her for. Now wasn’t the time to worry about what people thought.
The pack started howling. She bit back a laugh. Flynn was walking toward them. What was he thinking? The Son nearest to her swore, swinging his gun around. Kara got behind him and snapped his neck. She melted back into the crowd with the sidearm he’d been carrying, her heart pounding.
The next man went down just as easy. She passed his rifle to an older Breaker from the train who’d followed her from the first body. One of the muties started baying beside it. Her stomach clenched. They’d scent she was responsible.
“It’ll go quickly now.”
“No use waiting then.” The Breaker racked the rifle, turned, and fired on the Son standing by the craft’s door. The back of his head exploded and pandemonium ensued. People screamed, scattering across the crash site.
The Breaker shadowed Kara, making for the craft. She needed to stop it from leaving, Shelby was in there?—
Someone fired on them from the right. Kara dove behind a pile of twisted metal. Pressing her back to it, she rocked on her heels, sliding out the magazine to look at her ammo. Four bullets. Her hands trembled, nerves coiling in her gut, feeling the Breaker watch her…he’d seen…
It didn’t matter what he thought if they were dead.
She pulled a stream of bloodlust, steadying herself. The cold metal stung her hands as she slapped the magazine back in, buoyed by the blackness.
Come on Kara, you can do this.
That baying was getting closer, drowning out the panicked screams of the passengers. A sense of foreboding filled her, and she laughed, Rogan’s tales of the wild hunt running through her mind. She peered around wreckage at the craft, then turned to the Breaker.
“How many rounds?”
“E-eight,” he stammered, staring at her halos.
Stupid… Ugh! Kara looked away, wrapping ’lust around her like armor. “Cover me.”
She bolted from behind the wreckage, a slug hitting the ground behind her. There was an answering shot from the Breaker, then two more. At least one of them found its mark. She ducked behind another heap of sheared-off metal and raised the pistol. Siting the front of the craft, she drew a bead on the pilot, squeezing off two shots in rapid succession. The first shattered the glass, and the second took him out. He slumped over the controls.
Something scuffled behind her and before she could turn, the pack was on her.
A shot rang out, and Flynn broke into a run. People scattered, screaming. The mutie lost interest in the body Kara had dropped and loped off after her. That was gonna be a fucking problem. He reached the craft just as a man rounded the side and pulled up short.
“Wolf!” He laughed, his breath spiraling away behind him. “You sorry son of a bitch, thought you’d try to skip out again, huh?” The man grinned, his grey waxed mustache making it look like his smile wrapped around his ears.
Flynn’s throat bobbed, seeing his old handler.
Shit. They didn’t kill him.
“Skir. What the fuck are you doing here?”
The man trained his gun on him, keeping a healthy distance. He was well aware of what Flynn was capable of. Fuck .
“Messiah’s been callin’ in all the chapters. Judgement day’s at hand, my man. But this here? Quick job, smash and grab for some Binder cunt. You’re just gravy, and I owe you after you left me to take the heat in Versham. Get in the fucking transport. Victor’s letting me have whatever’s left when he’s done with you.”
Flynn glanced at the gun in the man’s hand, frowning. The Sons wanted Kara, and he was just gravy? That didn’t make any sense.
“Since when do the Sons work for the Source?”
Skir laughed and the muzzle of the gun lifted a fraction. “That’s a good one, almost as funny as finding out a dirty fucking Talent was snuffin’ for us.”
A burst of Kara’s adrenaline slammed into Flynn. He tasted bile, crumpling backwards. Skir fired. The shot went high, the bullet searing across Flynn’s collar bone. He lost his grip, the darkness in him surging.
The tactical knife dropped into his hand. He was on the man before Skir could take another shot. The soft flesh of his belly welcomed the blade like a lover.
Flynn took a shuddering breath, a smile flitting across his lips, watching the man’s face as he twisted the knife. That pained surprise… ah, ah, a little to the left …
Agony bloomed in Skir’s eyes, the tang of offal wafting up between them. Flynn grinned, gutting him in one smooth motion. His blade slashed across the man’s throat as he dropped. He grabbed Skir’s sidearm, racked it, and started in Kara’s direction.
The Breakers from earlier stood there, gaping at him.
Motherfucker.
“I gave you your orders, MOVE!”
They jumped to a man and ran past him to the craft. He had to get to Kara, what he felt from her made him want to vomit. Pelting through the piles of twisted metal, he followed their bond like a tether. It grew fainter and his stomach clenched.
The pack was close and they had something.
Flynn took off toward the sound. He tore around the wreckage?—
She was on the ground, one of the muties over her. The red- brindled beast had her arm in its mouth, shaking her like a doll. Its stance tensed. A low growl of challenge rumbling from its chest.
Something in him let go. Darkness welled, churning outwards. The mutie dropped Kara’s arm, cowering as he advanced, rolling over and showing its belly with a shrill whine.
Flynn fired twice. Its body joined the rest of the pack littering the ground around her. Christ, there’d been more than a dozen of the fucking things.
He dropped to his knees at her side, a heaving cry of denial escaping him. She was hurt. Hurt really fucking bad. He pulled off his coat and wrapped her in it, cradling her against him, trying to staunch the worst of her wounds…her abdomen…
She moaned weakly.
“Fuck, Kara, don’t move, don’t go…please, don’t leave me…” Helpless, he held her, watching her bleed. Jesus fucking Christ, there was so fucking much of it… He wept great wracking sobs, hot trails burning down his cheeks.
Please God, let her live, I swear I’ll do whatever the fuck you want, I just can’t—don’t make me do this again, please… I’m fucking sorry…don’t take her away, too…
The nullifier cut off, talent pricking at him.
Flynn opened himself up, gorging on it. Molten power scorched through him, hollowing out and burning his core. Lights flared behind his eyes, the walls of his channel stretching dangerously thin.
He offered all of it, himself, to her.
“Heal yourself,” he begged, pressing his lips to her forehead. He was sure his light wasn’t golden, but he prayed she saw it and it brought her back, like she’d done for him. Talent charred his insides as he held it, begging for her to take it up. She was limp, the rise and fall of her chest so fucking slight. He clung to her, sobbing into her hair. A bullet ricocheted and embedded itself in the ground by his boot. He stared at the hole, ready to crawl into it if it would save her.
Lifetimes ticked by before he felt her pull a whisper of what he was offering. It slowly increased, and he fought to hold steady, his channel fraying. The damage the pack had inflicted on her melted away. Flynn held her close, running his hands over her torn and bloody clothing, his hand lingering on her abdomen. His chest got tight and his face crumpled. She would live, but the baby…
His kid. They’d tried to take them both.
The feel of the wind came back first, stinging his bloodshot eyes and freezing the snot on his upper lip. Then the sound of gunfire.
His fucking past.
A piece of it had found him, and he wasn’t the one to bear the brunt. Kara, his kid…
Christ, his fucking kid.
A primal howl clawed up his throat, tearing out of his belly and past his lips. The wind gleefully carried it away, then returned laden with the acrid stink of terror. A burble of manic laughter escaped him, his senses suffusing with otherness as he let the darkness roil through him. He gently set Kara on the frozen turf, kissing her brow and phazing her. His talent wrapped with the tenebrous inferno building within. Flynn stood, letting it rage through the tinder of his soul, burning hotter than any earthly flame.
Just a taste…
It licked up through the void where his emotions should be, filling him with black fury. Righteous and divine, his eyes rolled back as he breathed it in and held it, savoring its seductive pull until it felt as if his lungs would burst. Then, with a great outpouring of breath, Flynn welcomed the animal.
Scorched metal, burning oil. Cordite. Wolf turned, scenting the air. His lip twitched up. Fear. Ruddy-brown like a sick animal’s shite, it threaded through the wreckage. The man pulled talent, shielding them from gunfire and leaving them visible. He wanted their prey to know death was coming.
They were one in this.
Stalking across the plateau, he pushed the darkness outwards. It seethed from him in a dank cloud, blanketing the crash site. All cowered beneath it, flattening themselves to the ground as it rolled over them. Weeping, they covered their heads and hid their eyes, unable to escape the paralyzing hysteria gripping them.
Wolf passed them by, his quarry elsewhere.
He clutched the knife, grip rough against his palm. Fingers sticky with the blood of his mate. They would pay it back tenfold. He followed the threads of terror on the wind, his nose twitching at the pungency. The first of the Sons he came upon Wolf decapitated in his fury, wasted meat left heaped.
Wrath rolled off him in tangible waves. Sweat and gore fuming. Sons fell beneath his blade, slick with their blood and offal. It spattered across him, flecking his lips. The white of his grin. His sleeves heavy and red, slapping against his wrists, splitting another from neck to navel. The man’s intestines glistened, sliding from his abdomen like weighted ropes. Steaming in the frigid air, they squelched down upon the unforgiving tundra a moment before the body.
Wolf sniffed. The last of them huddled inside the burning engine compartment, trapped between the fire and a contingent of Breakers. He stalked forward. The troops drew back. Their nostrils flared and they dropped, prostrating themselves as he passed.
Ignoring them, Wolf stepped into the engine compartment, heedless of the flames.
Riegel finished his breakfast beneath a tropical canopy of greenery, pensive. He had a vague recollection of a shadowy figure injecting him with some foul brew, and freeing him from Ielle’s torture chamber. He’d blacked out, then awoken on a couch in what he assumed was a private pleasure dome. All the damage she’d inflicted had been rectified and a feast awaited him.
He finished his meal, questioning his good fortune, but not about to fritter it away. Wiping his lips with a linen napkin, he set it beside his plate. A sub appeared from behind a bamboo screen and collected it, averting his eyes and bowing, as was proper.
Riegel looked around the garden paradise, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
It didn’t take long.
An enormous blonde woman waddled toward him down a stone-lined path. He attempted to hide his distaste. Judging from the look on her face, he wasn’t entirely successful .
“BrNC37,” she began, lowering herself into the rattan chair across from him. It was quite a process. “Riegel, I believe you prefer. I represent several concerned parties. After watching this feud between Titus and Albanach play out, we’ve concluded that we need to step in. The escape of the Jester girl creates a myriad of potential legal issues for the Corporation. My associates and I are no longer confident that Titus and Albanach are objective enough in their dealings to grasp the gravity of the situation their pissing match has put us in.”
Riegel pursed his lips at the woman. “I can’t imagine what any of that has to do with me. Nor do I care.”
The woman smiled, her piggy little blue eyes swallowed by her cheeks. “That’s a shame. It’s been noted that you are, shall we say, less than satisfied with your status. I’ve been authorized to offer you an opportunity to change that.”
Riegel leaned back in his chair, templing his fingers. “You have my attention.”
“We need someone with a vested interest in retrieving the Jester girl to do so. When Titus removed you from his stud roster, he effectively erased Talent BrNC37 from existence. You’ve been digitally culled, and with you, the Corporation’s liability. We’ve taken the liberty of having the damage done by his whore repaired as a good-will gesture, in hopes that you’ll agree to assist us.” The implication of what would happen if he refused hung in the air between them.
Riegel sat forward, leery of having his most fervent desire served up like filet. “I’ll admit, that sounds appealing, but other than the pleasure of doing the job, what’s in it for me?”
Her smile was unpleasant.
“When we repaired your damaged bits, we added a few things tech’s been working on. The first is something they’re calling a boost. It’ll increase the amount of talent you can pull. However, I warn you, it’s possible to burn out your channel if you’re not careful. The band on your wrist will tell you when you’re endangering yourself. Heed it.”
He focused on a small palm at the side of the clearing. His halos flashed and it vaporized. A searing pain shot across his left eye and the band chirped.
“I don’t recommend pulling any more than you just did. ”
Riegel panted, feeling a high that was beyond that of bloodlust. Close to the amount of talent he’d enjoyed through his partial bond, the erection it’d given him was painful. Looking at the emissary was certainly effective at quelling it.
“You’ve also been fitted with several fail-safes. We’ll be monitoring your progress and be able to cull you remotely, should you stray from your objective.” Riegel’s temper spiked and she raised a bloated finger. “When you’ve returned with Kara Jester, we’ll deactivate them. The boost you can keep, with our thanks.”
Riegel drummed his fingers on the table. He wasn’t stupid enough to think they’d actually keep their end of the bargain, but it gave him more options than being strapped to Ielle’s rack, twitching. “You’ll get me to Glynfyls, then what?”
“The clock begins. We have someone established up there to help you integrate. You have two weeks to retrieve her before we hit your kill switch. We don’t care how you do it. We just want results.”
Riegel nodded his acceptance, eager to begin.
Cal took a long drag of his cigarette, wishing it was a goddamned cigar. He was too old for this shit. Leo had taken the others to the infirmary in the city as soon as the nullifier had cut out. Presumably, he’d sent up the cry for help; Fetches had started to arrive with medical personnel not long after. Now every medic in Glynfyls was out on the plateau seeing to the wounded. Cal had been waiting in the triage tent for Kara and Flynn to turn up, fully expecting he’d have to do damage control.
He sure as hell wasn’t wrong on that count.
The boy had carried her in from the crash site, wrapped in his coat. The brown corduroy was mottled crimson. Cal knew for a fact the lion’s share wasn’t Kara’s.
It wasn’t Flynn’s either.
He’d ignored Cal, briefly speaking to a group of Breakers. They’d saluted the boy as a superior and fanned out, keeping everyone that didn’t need to be there at a distance .
Adding to Cal’s feelings of disquiet, every last one of them had pulsed their halos, trying to read Flynn’s goddamned runes. Far as he knew, the boy didn’t have any…yet. Cal ran a trembling hand through his hair. Flynn was closer than he’d thought. He needed to get him back to Glynfyls and have him ascend to First before anything else happened.
Cal glanced at his grandson. Everyone gave him a wide berth, with good reason. He’d felt that storm of fury pass and wasn’t ashamed to say it’d put him on the ground same as everyone else. What the hell had Deirdre and Lot brought to bear?
Shit, what had he?
Flynn stood over Kara as a Fetch shifted another cryopack of blood into her. The poor man was sweating profusely beneath the boy’s malevolent gaze. Flynn had flatly refused when they suggested shifting her to the infirmary, and no one had pressed him on it. Cal couldn’t blame them. His hand shook, pinching another drag off his cigarette. Boy looked straight up murderous.
The Fetch’s halos winked out, and he gathered up his gear, fumbling in his rush to leave. Cal took his place at Kara’s bedside. Her color was better, but that wasn’t saying much. His nose twitched, picking up a pervasive mineral tang hanging in the air. Didn’t have anything to do with the transfusion. He’d sensed Flynn was cloaking something, and now he knew what. Boy must be covered in gore. No wonder he wasn’t touching anything.
“They were up here for her.” Flynn’s voice rumbled out, slow and lethal.
Cal frowned at the tremor in his hands, rolling another smoke, hearing the accusation in the boy’s tone, the pieces clicking together in the silence that stretched between them.
The pieces he’d been given, at least. That this was enemy’s doing, Cal had no doubt…but as far as the boy was concerned…
Cal lit his cigarette off the smoldering nub of the last one and exhaled, waiting for it.
“You knew she wouldn’t be safe.”
He met Flynn’s gaze. His mother’s eyes in his father’s face. Those weird blue motes churning dangerously. Deirdre’d had them too, but hers never made you want to shit yourself.
“Kara will be as safe as you make her. War’s coming, Flynn. We’re too far down the path to stop it. I don’t know what the hell the Sons want with her, but I was betting on Titus following her up. If we’re gonna have any chance of surviving this, I need him to be the clear aggressor.” He took another drag. “And I need you focused on doing what you were meant to.”
Flynn snorted, running a hand over his jaw, the air in the tent thickening. The Breakers along the perimeter all fidgeted uncomfortably. Several fell to their knees. Cal took an unconscious step back, hitting the stretcher behind him.
Flynn planted his fists on Kara’s gurney, cracking his knuckles and looming over her inert form at him. “What I’m fucking meant to do. And exactly what do you think that is, Cal?”
Cal took another shaky drag, standing on the hill he’d die on. One way or another. His eyes flicked to the spatters of blood and chunks of God knows what falling from the boy onto Kara’s grey blanket.
“Kara’s Titus’s catalyst. I need you to be the spark that gets the Assembly back on track.”
Flynn laughed, pushing back. A discordant note beneath it resonated through the tent. It was harsh and alien to Cal’s ears, raising the hair on his body like lightning was about to strike. The Breakers were prone. Flynn’s eyes bored into his, churning with otherness.
“The fucking spark… Nah. After this? Titus, the Sons…every single one of those motherfuckers in the Assembly, they’re all gonna burn.” He gently scooped Kara up and strode over to one of the Fetches. The man swallowed and pulled talent.
Cal collapsed against the gurney as they shifted out. He took another drag, his hand trembling.
His Hail Mary had become an Oh God.