For the Reign

by Debbie Cassidy

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  I took a step and the office floor blurred, and I was in a bland corridor blocked by two hulking figures. Beasts, monsters with metal for skin.

  They turned to face me, revealing a flash of the door beyond, and through the thick reinforced glass I caught a glimpse of Logan’s face. He slammed his hand against the glass but then was hidden from view. My tulwar was in my hand.

  A god. I was a fucking god.

  It lit up with green flame, and my heart leapt at the injection of power. This was the power of death, the power of the path, the power of the immortal souls. This was mine. I attacked, slicing through their armor with ease and pulling their souls from their chests. They resisted for a moment, like sticky taffy, but then they were mine, settling in me, washing through me, burning me with the delicious energy.

  This.

  This was who I was now.

  “Eva!” Logan hammered on the glass.

  Logan … Shit. I shook my head. I had to get them out. I’d barely taken a step when the disturbance in the air behind me had my instincts kicking in. I dodged in time to avoid a body slam from the final weapon.

  Tobias hit the door, carried forward by his momentum, and then spun to face me. His lip curled back in a horrific snarl, exposing fangs that would do Claws justice. But it was him. It was my Tobias, and the influence of the Hunt, the power, my godhood—everything faded away. It was just him and me. Both altered, yet both essentially the same.

  I lowered my sword. “Hey, Tobe. Long time no see.”

  His lip dropped back over his fangs.

  “I get it, you’re confused. Probably raging with adrenaline right now, but stop for a second and look at me. Look into my eyes. Yeah, I know I’ve changed too, but you see me, right? You always saw me, even when I couldn’t see myself.” I took two steps toward him, and his body tensed, haunches bunching, ready to attack. “Hey.” My voice was soft, the voice used by the old Eva in the first blush of dawn as we’d laid our heads down to sleep, limbs entwined. The voice of the girl in the first flush of love, desperate for her best friend not to see. “I see you.” We were barely a foot apart now, and his piercing emerald eyes were fixed on me. “Do you see me, Tobias?” I reached out to touch his face, skin roughened by the change. “Do you feel me?”

  His eyes fluttered closed and then his nose wrinkled as if in pain. “Evaaa …”

  My name was a hoarse plea on his lips. It set my pulse galloping. “Yes. Tobe, it’s me, Eva.”

  His clawed hand came up slowly, hesitantly, to touch my hair; his fingers curled in and he brushed my cheek.

  “I see you.”

  A raw sob bubbled up my throat, but I bit it back, blinking away the hot tears. “I see you, babe. I see you.” I wrapped my arms around his waist and hugged his cold, metallic, armored frame. His powerful arms embraced me in return.

  “Eva. I can’t … I can’t hold on much longer.”

  “What?” I lifted my chin to look at him.

  “Protocol Oblivion. I have to … Have to purge the oxygen from the access corridor.” He stepped away from me, his body rigid. “Can’t resist the protocol. Please. Go. Get them out and go now.”

  He shook his head as if trying to dispel the commands running through it. “Now!”

  The release button to the door was a palm print thing. Using the hilt of the sword, I smashed it and then tore at the wires. The panel fizzed and the locks on the door clicked. Logan barreled out and put himself between me and Tobias.

  “It’s okay, I’m fine, you need to get out and take the humans with you.”

  “Emergency exit is open!” Noah shouted. “Eva must have killed the system.”

  Logan looked torn.

  I gave him my sternest glare. “I’m fine. Go. I’m a god, remember.”

  He grabbed me, kissed me hard on the mouth, and then hurried back through the door. My attention went back to my best friend. The friend I’d failed. The one I’d left to be turned. He was slipping. I could feel him slipping away.

  Tobias’s green eyes glittered with a strange sheen. “Eva …” There was torment in that sound, wrapped around that word. “Love you … Need to know… how much …” His back straightened. “Run.”

  He was gone, and the beast was back. I visualized Jace’s face and took a step back. The corridor blurred, and I materialized in a gray chamber streaked in sunlight streaming in from a domed glass roof, a roof that was cracking open to let in the sky. The hum and whirr of machinery surrounded me. It was coming from the hundreds of drones parked on parallel bays a couple of feet wide and a couple of feet apart. The whole area was wreathed in green mist and two Vladul, a male and a female, lay on the ground dead.

  Caister appeared out of the mist. “We have taken the souls you offered and any that threatened the creatures you put in our charge, but there are many souls here. Many like those you permitted us to take. Let us have them.”

  His words seemed to clutch at my brain. He was using some kind of influence on me, but I was stronger than him, more powerful. I was his master. “No. They’re innocent, and you won’t touch them.”

  “As you wish.” He bit out the words.

  Yeah, I’d have to get him into line quickly. He and Dia were the voice of the Hunt, and if I was going to control the Hunt, I needed to get them in line and fast. A hound bumped my shoulder, and I reached up to pet him without thinking.

  Caister canted his head and melted into the green smoke. “Are we dismissed?”

  “For now.”

  Lightning flashed, and the Hunt vanished along with the green mist and hound. At least the hounds liked me.

  “Eva!” Jace waved me over from his position at a workstation built into the wall. “We’re ready for take-off.”

  Elias and Deana emerged from the other side of the chamber carrying empty trays. Elias’s gaze slipped over my shoulder. “The others?”

  “They got out.”

  Elias’s look was probing.

  “Later. Let’s get these in the air before something happens to—”

  The doors behind me opened with a slam, and a roar filled the room.

  Tobias.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Noah

  According to the schematics, the emergency exit leads out into a courtyard at the back of the facility. We’ve done it. We’ve gotten the humans out. Almost. A door appears up ahead—our way out. Logan hits the bar and pushes it open, letting in the sun.

  There are sighs and sobs as we spill out into the fresh air, and then there is the sound of weapons being cocked.

  “Um, Noah …” Kira stands with her back to us, facing the line of Vladul guards who have guns trained on us.

  Shit. Of course. The lockdown and the beasts won’t have been the Vladul’s only defense. They probably have sensors and goodness knows what to keep tabs on the humans, and this is the only other exit out of the cattle floor.

  “Don’t move,” one of the guards says. His attention is on me and there is definite shock on his face. “This is the imposter. Don’t be fooled by his face.”

  The other guards hold steady, guns trained on us.

  We’re fast, but not faster than a bullet. My heart sinks. We’d almost made it, but we can’t fight bullets, not while protecting the humans.

  I hold up my hands. “Don’t shoot. Please don’t hurt them.”

  The guard’s face is impassive. “The humans won’t be harmed if you cooperate. Back up. All of you. Against the wall, single file.”

  The building stands behind us, the stone wall gritty and gray, and a pit opens up inside me, because I know that look in his eyes. It is resigned determination.

  They mean to kill us, to execute us here and now.

  “You don’t need to do this. We’re not that different, you and I.”

  He trains his weapon on me, aimed at my head. “I’m sorry.” And he sounds it.

  “No!” Logan’s yell is short and sharp.

  But the guard’s atte
ntion shifts to something to my left. I follow his gaze to see the human male beside me grow and expand until he is a hulking figure with ember eyes and a square jaw, until he is a djinn, and he isn’t the only one. Humans begin to morph into djinn, five, six, ten at least, and then they charge the guards. Weapons discharge and bullets ricochet off the wall behind us, and then the guards are unarmed. One of the djinn grabs a guard’s head, ready to snap his neck.

  “Stop! Please,” the older guard says. “Don’t kill him.”

  The djinn slowly turns his head to look at the guard. “Why not? You kept us imprisoned for decades.”

  “Because we’re prisoners too. The only difference is we’ve had to work for our oppressors.” He looks to me. “This is it, isn’t it? This is when it ends. Is Elias with you? Are you working with him?”

  Elias had mentioned a rebel group, a faction that is against Malcolm’s rule, and my gut tells me that this guard is part of that.

  Despite appearances, we are on the same side. “Yes, this is where it ends, and if you want freedom, then we’re on the same side.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Tobias entered the hangar, his powerful body running at me full force. I spun to face him, drawing my sword in one fluid motion. It sliced across his abdomen, glancing off as I knew it would. But this wasn’t about hurting him, it was about distraction.

  Elias ran toward me. “No, get back. Jace, do it!”

  Tobias’s head whipped around, and he fixed his attention on Jace and the workstation. Hell no. I charged and slammed my shoulder into his chest, pushing him back several feet. Shit, he was heavy. He shoved and sent me back a meter. Fuck, I was strong too. Green mist seeped from my pores and wound around my wrists. The power of the Hunt.

  “Sorry, Tobe.” I pulled back my fist and slammed it into his face. The impact reverberated up my arm and knocked him on his ass, but somehow, some way, I was still standing. Tobias lay silent and still on the ground. Oh, God. No. I didn’t want to hurt him badly, just enough to keep him off Jace while he got the drones going.

  The hum intensified. The drones were taking off.

  “Tobias?” I took a step toward his prone form.

  “Eva, watch out!” Elias’s voice alerted me a second before Tobias leapt up and sliced at my gut.

  The blow stole my breath and raked a path across my torso, blood spattering his face. I grabbed at the wound, expecting my intestines to spill out, but my skin was smooth and unmarred even though my hand came away bloody.

  Godhood rocked. I ducked another swipe and hit him in the gonads. Fuck, he was metal there too? He sliced at my face, but I evaded, dropped, and knocked the feet out from under him. He hit the ground hard and stayed there. I leapt back, my heart soaring. The drones were up. They were out. The cure was out there. My whoop echoed around the chamber and my mist-wreathed fist punched the air. “We did it.”

  “Um, Eva. We still have a problem.” Elias joined me to stare down at an unconscious Tobias.

  “Deana, where do we take him to fix him?”

  “We need to get back to my lab.” Deana’s voice trembled.

  I crouched by Tobias. “Elias, help me with him.”

  I had my arms around his chest when he opened his eyes and stared right at me. “Eva?”

  “Tobias … Hey. You’re okay.”

  He blinked slowly. “Something happened. Something changed. Oh, God. I changed. I—" His eyes widened. “I can feel it in my head. Words, commands. Eva … I don’t want to go.”

  “No. No, you don’t have to go. We can fix you. I promise we can fix this.”

  “Eva, it hurts.”

  I turned to Deana. “What’s happening?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know.”

  “Eva … E … va … E …” He stilled, eyes open but blank.

  “Tobias!” I shook him. “Dammit, Tobias!”

  Deana was shaking her head. “I don’t understand …”

  “Well, how about you let me explain.”

  I tore my gaze from Tobias’s frozen face and up to the figure standing in the doorway. The voice was familiar; the face was familiar. It was Noah, but not Noah. This was the real Malcolm, haughty and older and furious.

  “In fact”—he tapped his chin—“why don’t I show you. Protocol Marionette.”

  Deana let out a strangled gasp.

  Tobias’s body jerked in my arms and the life bled back into his eyes, but this time when he looked at me there was only ice. He grabbed my shoulders and shoved me so hard I went sliding across the ground on my ass for several feet.

  Tobias slowly stood, his body moving strangely, jerkily, like a marionette, like a machine.

  “Deana?”

  “I’m sorry, Eva. I’m so sorry.” She shook her head vehemently.

  “What the fuck do you mean? What did he do?”

  “He wiped him. He wiped him completely, Eva. I left part of him intact, to allow for decision-making in the field, that element of humanity that makes him human, but Malcolm just activated Marionette. He just killed what was left of Tobias.”

  Icy fingers crushed my lungs. “No. You can fix him. Put him back.”

  She shook her head and backed up. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, he’s gone.”

  “That’s right,” Malcolm said. “He belongs to me. And you, whomever you are, need to die.”

  But my attention was on Tobias, scanning his face, his eyes for any glint, any gleam of real life. But there was nothing. Just a blank glare waiting for instruction. Rage swelled in my chest.

  “Kill her, Alpha X,” Malcolm said. “Kill them all.”

  Tobias attacked, faster, smoother, his body moving like a blur. His blows landed hard and fast, and I countered as best I could, my heart breaking with each blow. Elias and Jace fought alongside me, picking up the slack where my body refused to hit with full impact, where my mind refused to accept that he was truly gone and that this was simply a machine that needed to be destroyed.

  I had to know.

  I had to know for sure.

  I had to know if he still had a soul. I had to see. Green mist wound up my arms and tingled at my fingertips, and this time, when he attacked, I pushed into him and wrapped my hands around his throat.

  My power reached out, seeping into him, hungry and searching and … Nothing.

  “No.” My lips trembled. “Where are you? Where the fuck are you?”

  Pain ripped through me as he buried his claws in my stomach.

  “Eva!” Elias grabbed him around the throat and yanked him backward.

  His claws slid out of me and my body knit, taking the pain with it, numbing my body and mind. I strode past Tobias, leaving Jace and Elias to hold him still.

  “Kill them. Kill them!” Malcolm was screaming now.

  And as I got closer, the fear was sharp and potent in his eyes. He knew it was over. He knew his empire was dead, and he was nothing but an old Vladul ready for the grave.

  There was no talk, no final witty phrase, there was only my fist punching a hole through his chest and the squelch of his heart as I crushed it. I pulled the mangled organ from his body and dropped it on the ground. He stared at it for a long beat, his mouth a silent ‘o,’ and then he followed it to the ground.

  Behind me, the world was silent, but in my head the Hunt whispered, sated and pleased. I turned back to Jace and Elias to find Tobias thrashing in their arms, still propelled by his puppeteer’s final command. Kill them.

  “Eva, he’s fucking strong,” Elias said.

  “I know.” I came to stand before him and stared into his eyes for the last time, and then I slit his throat.

  Jace’s radio crackled. “You did it!” Logan said. “You fucking did it. We see the drones. The mist is everywhere. We did it. We saved them all.”

  Life bloomed outside, but in my heart, there was only death.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  How the world can change in the blink of an eye. As the cure fell from the skies, each Feral i
t touched was healed, and as the Feral healed, I knew that the world would soon be whole again, because I’d be leaving it in good hands.

  Noah and Elias would run the Genesis Foundation. Jamie would take over the labs and work on any kinks that may come out of the cure we’d created. They’d build a new world where Vladul, Fang, Claw, and human would live in harmony. Ash, Logan, and Jace would play their part also, traveling the island to spread the word, to build bridges and alliances. Sage would find his connection to the djinn realm, and his people would walk this world once more.

  The balance of the mortal realm would be restored. I could see this future as clearly as if I were writing it myself.

  But right at this moment, people milled about—humans and Fang, Vladul, djinn and Claw. There was noise, so much noise. Exclamations of joy and sobs of relief. There was crazy laughter and there was the shrill cry of a baby. I stood in the foyer of this once grand prison and watched the prisoners who were finally free. Not just those that had been held in cages, but the Vladul themselves. They’d been prisoners in mind and action. Forced to do Malcolm and his minion’s bidding, and now that he was dead, everything would be different.

  Yes, there was much life here, but it was dimming, becoming muted in my head as if I was drifting away from it, or maybe it was drifting away from me?

  “Eva.” Logan jogged up to me, his dark eyes narrowing. “Eva, can you hear me?”

  I wanted to hear him, but there was another voice in my mind now.

  It’s over. Your task here is done. Time to go, Caister said.

  No. Not yet, just a little while longer. I projected the thoughts easily.

  You belong with us, to us, and Faerie is calling. You feel it. You must return.

  I did. It was a tug in my solar plexus and a deep ache in my bones. But the thought of leaving made my heart squeeze painfully. How much longer would I feel this? How much longer would I feel.