39. Aron
ARON
She is gone.
The bed is empty, cuffs hanging limp from the headboard.
Her clothes have disappeared from the floor.
Just a faint ghost of her scent remains.
I rush to the bathroom and then back to the main room.
I slam the door against the wall. Fragments of limestone fall to the ground.
The wood lets out a creak as a fresh fracture runs from the handle like a scar, thin and insignificant.
Rage tears me apart. I ball my fist. Slam it into the wood over and over until it splinters. Blood soaks my glove and drips from my knuckles, but I feel no pain. All I feel is an overpowering surge of panic.
She is not here. She is gone. She is fucking gone. And I don’t know where she is or if she’s safe. I don’t know if they have caught her. I don’t know what they’ll do to her if they do. I can’t bear to think about it.
My insides twist, my pulse pounding in my ears, my whole body an electric wire about to snap. The pressure builds and builds until I explode, roaring, the sound raw and inhuman.
There is no time to lose. Urgency sears underneath my skin, burning me from the inside.
I rush out, slide down the ladder, gripping the sides, landing hard.
The impact jars my bones and jerks my knees, but I don’t stop for a second.
I turn on my heels and run towards my bike.
Some men are already returning from the Abyss Gorge, covered in blood and soot, shining eyes jubilant in the slits of their skull masks.
I shout orders at a few of them, telling them to hustle the others, to hustle everyone.
No one rests. No one eats. No one does anything but look for her until she’s found, until she’s back with me.
I need to know she’s unharmed. All other needs become irrelevant.
It only takes one hour to locate Corrado’s body on a deserted road surrounded by whispering oleanders, grass bursting through the cracks in the asphalt.
The road slopes down gently into a valley of long-abandoned olive tree farms, the first glimmer of the sea just about visible in the distance.
The blood runs down the hill in thin rivulets, the taste of salt and metal fusing in the air.
The body is still warm, and so is the engine of the overturned bike, just barely.
There’s no way to tell which way they went.
The urgent panic tearing at my gut turns into cold dread, a heavy weight crushing my chest.
“We have to chase them down,” I grit through my clenched teeth, my breath hot in my mask. “Call the others over here.”
To cover as much ground as possible, I’d split all the Retrogrades into search groups just large enough to discourage random coastal patrols from interfering with them.
Now our search area has narrowed down considerably, but there are still at least ten possible routes from here to the official Continuum border.
“Aron ...” Alex addresses me carefully.
“Not now.”
Kneeling, I examine Corrado’s corpse more closely. I peel the glove off his left hand. His old wedding band is still on his finger.
“Military. Not raiders,” I say. “They didn’t rob him, and the shot is too clean, too precise.”
“Aron ...” He lays a hand on my shoulder—I debate hacking it off with my knife.
“We need groups of ten to fifteen. And whoever spots them first calls for backup.”
“Aron!”
“Fucking WHAT?” I shoot to my feet.
I’m the larger man by far, and he cowers.
“It takes one hour to get from here to the Continuum. Even if we don’t wait for the others, even if we get lucky and guess correctly what route they’ve picked ... we won’t catch them before they make it across.”
All oxygen disappears from around us. Without looking at them, I feel the other men stiffen.
“What the fuck are you even saying? We have to try!”
With my fist raised, I advance upon Alex, making him back away from me until he’s bent backwards over the seat of his bike.
His eyes are wide with fear, his breathing shallow and ragged.
But he holds my gaze as he objects in a shaking voice, “No. What we have to do is clear out, fast. Aron, she knows our location, she knows the way in ... we have to move. You can’t get her back anymore. ”
I bring my fist down sharply, but twist around midway, punching air instead of his scrunched-up, frightened face.
Seeing I’m not going to hit him, he straightens but keeps his cautious eyes on me. I tear my mask off and pace around, raking my hand through my hair.
I shouldn’t care so much. She’s just a prisoner, just a fun toy. Right? Or else I’m a fucking liar.
Why does it feel like torture? Why is this raw ache the worst thing I’ve felt in my whole life?
“You don’t know what it’s like,” I snarl at Alex, my voice breaking.
“I do,” he counters grimly. “But she’s out of your reach now. You can’t help her. And we must relocate. You know I’m right.”
I do know that. His words penetrate the fog and breach that part of my mind that can still think clearly, even now. Especially now.
And that part is telling me there is only one possible reason why I’d rather tear my own heart out than let them have her for one more minute.
The realisation is staggering and more terrifying than life and death and everything in between. But at the same time, it feels like nothing more consequential than opening the door of a familiar house.
Finding what I’ve always known I would find on its other side.
Something I was just too stubborn to admit to myself until now.
Riley is under my skin. She is constantly on my mind, whether I want her to be or not. She is who I think of when I wake up, and every night I fall asleep with her name on my lips.
And now, at last, there’s no way for me to hide from the truth.
She’s right in the centre of my breaking, bleeding heart.
Reminding me, all too fucking late, that I have one.
By nightfall, we’re all back at the caves and nearly packed and ready to go. The roar of engines fills the air, light from headlamps spilling across the exit passageway, dust rising from underneath the boots of rushing feet.
I’m not really here anymore. I’m a ghost, wandering a different plane than those still living.
My mind is reeling. I’m going round in circles.
This is ... my fucking fault. I drove her away.
With the words that I said, the way I treated her.
The way I wounded her. The way I made her think that facing all the danger out there was better than facing me.
She ran away because I was more worried about losing my face and my pride than I was about losing her.
I’m done with the last sweep of the place. I’m walking back towards the cluster of bikes and men impatient to get out when my eyes land on two clean, unmasked figures approaching me. They’re just silhouettes, but I recognise them all too well. And I know everything’s about to get much worse.
“Hi, Lena,” I greet the smaller one neutrally, but have nothing but a snarl for the taller one. “Tristan.”
“Krasnik.” His voice is low and cold, the movement of his lips barely perceptible in the groomed expanse of his full beard.
His eyes are pitch black, inscrutable and severe under the steeply arched eyebrows. Our gazes clash. I hold his glare for awkwardly long, refusing to give up.
Lena steps from one foot to the other.
“What the fuck happened, Krasnik?” he finally asks. “How the fuck could you let her run?”
His words are a knife to the gut, his accusation punching all the air out of my lungs. I can’t even formulate a fucking response. I just gape at him.
“Oh, Aron,” Lena tuts gently. “You idiot.”
“Yes, that is correct. You idiot!” Tristan repeats after her, but in a very different tone. “Do you have any idea how many pardons we could have exchanged her for?”
“What?” I ask dumbly. I’m too keyed up to even bother trying to understand what the fuck he’s saying.
“Hell, if what Phoenix said about Volker being as obsessed with her as you are is true, we may even have had a chance to come to a truce. And you squandered it.”
Lena hisses with a sharp intake of breath. His words finally register. My anger flares, then fades into something cold and far more lethal.
“You,” I growl. “You would have sold her for a truce? A fucking truce with the fucking Continuum?”
“Yes, I would have sold her for a truce!” he snaps at me impatiently. “One bitch of questionable loyalty in exchange for fuck knows how many of our lives saved? Of course I would have!”
“Did you know about this?” I turn to Lena, my tone measured.
“No,” she assures me quickly. “I most certainly did not.”
She shoots Tristan a scalding look, and he withers, deflating. I’ve heard rumours he has it bad for her, but I never took them seriously until now, seeing the effect she has on him.
“Since when are we after making peace with them?” I demand.
“Oh come the fuck on, Krasnik!” he scoffs. “We’ve been fighting a hopeless fight with no progress for years. There is no point, no reason for men to keep dying. What we need is a change in strategy, tearing them apart from within. Phoenix said—”
“I do not give a flying fuck what Phoenix said,” I cut him off. “Why the fuck are you here? You already know all the facts. What do you want?”
“Aron, we—” Lena starts carefully, but Tristan speaks over her.
“I want you to relinquish your command of Retrograde. I’m here to ensure ... a smooth transition.”
“Darling, we both feel that ... maybe the strain of everything has taken too much of a toll on you. We think it’s in everyone’s best interest that you now ... step down.”
Well fuck me. I should have seen this coming.
I have seen this coming. Sure, the scenario unfolded a bit differently in my mind.
When I pictured it, it usually ended with a knife in my back, and some scared little shit scampering away.
But I did expect to be discarded. What I didn’t expect was that when it finally happened, I would no longer give a fuck.
“Bold of you to come tell me accompanied only by a woman,” I snarl.