Chapter 58 #2
Everywhere I look, I see dead bodies. It’s not everyone, but it’s enough.
Banks is lying on his back, an arrow sticking out of one of his eye sockets.
People I recognised from Foreen who laughed and somehow made it out.
Omegas and alphas that were in the camp, twirling and dancing with us.
They were alive, so alive, and how quickly their lives are snuffed out.
For what?
Anger is a hot coal burning in my stomach, one that has me staring intently at Theo, wishing there was something, anything I could do.
A familiar figure slides between us, and I recoil. He sees and smiles widely. His black-striped gold mask catching the torchlight.
“You’re next,” he whispers to me.
I stand in the cold of the pre-dawn and shiver at all the death, while the Beta’s Fang watches me and slowly, meticulously steals Theo’s life from him. We’re helpless, and this execution is a display, an example.
“There are only fifty,” Mordecai whispers to Legion.
“I know,” Legion says back, though he never turns around.
“He got the rest out and led the Path back here so the Resistance could escape, didn’t he?” I ask.
I feel guilty for having doubted him now. Theo is a hero. He volunteered to come back, buying time and saving the bulk of the Resistance and its children.
“Are you incapable of actually killing him or are you trying to bore us to death?” I say coldly. If there is anyone who can goad him into ending it faster, it’s me.
The Beta’s Fang’s head snaps around and, like I knew he would, he stalks towards me, shivering with fury.
“No one suffers quite the same as you do, snow, I so do look forward to having you back on my rack.”
I yawn.
His jaw twitches.
“Sorry, I didn’t realise you were talking.”
His hand lashes out, slamming across my face. I let out a whimper despite myself.
He steps towards us, and before I can react, Cadel breaks the chains holding him, grabs his head, and twists. The pop has an echo. It runs up and down every person in the line, every person in black.
The Beta’s Fang is dead.
I stare at the body as it collapses to the ground in a heap. Lifeless. Just like that.
The person who hurt me and dogged my nightmares is dead.
“No one touches Kaida Keres,” Cadel announces in a dark and terrifying voice. I bite back a whine, but I can’t do anything about my scent that spreads. My alpha saved me. He saved me from my worst nightmare. So easily.
I stare at Cadel, needing to touch him, needing to…he stalks over to me, ignoring the shouts and swords, and shoves his fingers through my hair. I stare at him, barely breathing, seeing only him.
“You killed him.”
“He touched you,” Cadel growls.
I don’t know who moves first, but in the next moment, we’re kissing. It doesn’t last long, but it eases the panicked, unsettled feeling inside me.
The Warden nudges his horse forward. “Since he’s dead, and the entertainment is done, let’s get moving.”
The Beta’s Claw is staring at his counterpart’s body, obviously struggling with the rage. His eyes glitter as he stares at Cadel. He takes one step and is stopped when the Warden moves his massive horse in between them.
“She wants them alive,” the Warden hisses.
The Beta’s Claw shakes, his whole body trembling with emotion, then quicker than I can imagine, he throws a knife, burying it in Theo’s chest. Theo groans, and I realise he was still alive. I’d assumed he was dead, that in those moments where I’d distracted the Fang, he’d passed quietly.
“Let’s go,” the Warden orders, and the Path shoves us into a brisk march.
What are the chances of escaping a fourth time?
Of everyone making it out alive with me?
I almost collapse with the agony of it, but I turn my head and see something in the grey light. Charlotte lies against a boulder, her face as white as it can go, her hand cradling her wound. Ava lies with her head in her lover's lap. Their fingers tangled together.
They could be sleeping.
They fought until the end. They lived and died with honour and by their beliefs. How can I do anything different?
I am so scared.
He’s dead.
There will always be someone else just as crazy, just as dangerous, maybe worse.
I need to survive and escape again. We can kill them. There has to be a way.
Is life worth living if I don’t have my alphas?
On and on, my thoughts send me flying into a dizzying spin, leaving me hollowed out. By the time the sun rises, hidden behind those dark clouds, I have no hope left.
No fight left.
I’m tired.
Just tired and wondering how we could possibly fight a goddess and win?
It’s preposterous.
Three days later, the collapsed wall comes into view and the burnt husk of Foreen. The burial city of alphas and omegas.
“Welcome home,” Walker says softly.
I look up at him, expecting to see something different, to see something human in him, but no, there’s nothing.
“I go to meet my mother,” I say to him, assuming he won’t be listening. Just because I can, I repeat the words she used to say to us when we amused her. “Waning, waxing, and aglow.”
Walker stops his horse, his hands tight on the reins. He looks sideways, and his gaze lands just in front of me.
“Why didn’t you run?” he hisses. “Why would you stay?”
I stare at him, but he doesn’t wait for an answer; he just kicks his heels into the horse and leaves us there, staring at his dust.