by Raine Thomas
“Jenna…”
“No, Scarlyt. I’m your commander, and it’s my job to look out for you. How do I know he didn’t just kiss you like that to convince us to help them?”
Scarlyt frowned. Kyr was about to speak up to defend Gren, but picked up the other female’s thoughts and shut her mouth.
“Gren wouldn’t do that,” she told Jenna. “Tell the others we’re going hunting.”
Jenna pursed her lips, far from convinced. But she did as ordered and flounced from the room, grabbing her weapon along the way.
I like her, Sem conveyed.
Kyr had forgotten he was listening. For some reason, the thought made her want to smile.
“Will your Peace Keepers follow Jenna’s orders?” Gren asked.
“No,” Scarlyt said, her gaze steady. “They’ll follow mine.”
Chapter 40
Another unvoiced scream woke Ty.
He opened his eyes and fought to control his harsh breathing. Sweat once again coated his skin. Tears blurred his vision. He struggled to get the image of Kyr’s dead body from his mind, but knew it would haunt him forever.
Sitting up on the hard surface of the storage unit floor, he wearily wiped his face. If he’d slept for longer than an hour, he’d be surprised.
“Kyr. No, Kyr! I love you, Kyr.”
Ty glanced over at the mocking tone to find two new guards standing nearby. One was tall and built like a stone wall. His deep skin tone indicated that he was from or had once lived in the Borll megai. His head was bald, but Ty suspected that was by choice. Malak wouldn’t put a freshy on guard duty. The second guard was shorter, but just as thickly built. His dark hair snaked out of his head in short dreadlocks.
Both guards wore derisive grins. The shorter one was clutching his chest in a parody of pain. Ty knew they had heard him in his sleep.
He couldn’t be bothered enough to care.
“Is there someplace to urinate around here?” he asked.
The bald guard jerked a thumb towards a small pot in the corner. Ty pushed himself to his feet and walked towards the pot.
“That’s not necessary,” Malak said in his smooth voice. “He can make use of the facilities. We’re not heathens, after all.”
Ty turned and spotted the Marauder leader strolling out of his office. He had changed his clothes and washed all of the blood from his hair and skin. He was wearing another suit, this one black with pinstripes. The Marauders clearly weren’t hurting in the clothing department. Malak’s statement about them being prosperous appeared to be true.
“Right this way,” Malak instructed when Ty just stood there.
Figuring he had little reason not to, Ty followed him through the storage unit to a section around the corner from his office. As they passed the office, morbid curiosity had Ty glancing over to watch several Marauders scrub the floor and walls. Coll’s body had been disposed of right after Ty’s conversation with Malak, which hadn’t lasted long once it became clear that Ty had no plans to become a Marauder.
He returned his attention to Malak as they rounded the corner. They stopped in front of a rusty metal door leading to a nice-sized water closet. Through the doorway, Ty saw a sink, mirror, shower, and excrement tank.
“Feel free to wash yourself, clean your teeth, drink some water, and whatever else you may need,” Malak said. “Should you get the idea of creating a weapon to use against us while you’re in there, you should know that these facilities are monitored. We’ll also be patting you down once you come out. Alternatively, should you think to create a weapon to use on yourself, we’ll be forced to come in and stop you. Don’t bother pretending that the thought of taking your own life never occurred to you. We both know otherwise. I’ll see you once you’re through.”
Ty stood there for a moment and watched Malak walk away. The Marauder leader was one of the strangest individuals he had ever met. Shaking his head, Ty went into the water closet and closed the door.
He didn’t shower, knowing the facilities were monitored. But he relieved himself and washed as well as he could with a washcloth he found in a cabinet beneath the sink. It was a relief to rid himself of most of the blood that had dried on his skin.
There were disposable teeth cleaning supplies under the sink, as well…supplies that reminded him of those the Vawn used in the palace for guests. It was something else that told Ty that Malak and his Marauders had a closer connection with the palace than one would expect of Outcasts.
He decided to cleanse his teeth while he was in there. It was a simple task that made him feel a little less like a lifeless derelict. He made sure to swallow a healthy amount of water after rinsing, too. He had no idea when he’d next get anything to drink.
Malak was true to his word. He had the two guards who had been standing with Ty when he woke up pat him down for weapons after he exited the bathroom. They then escorted him back to the front of the storage unit.
“There you are,” Malak said when he spotted them coming. “I’m sure you feel more human now.”
Ty wasn’t going to reply, but Malak stood there looking at him expectantly, so he went with, “Yes, thanks.”
Malak smiled. “Excellent. So nice to see manners out here in the Dark Lands. But here is where we’ll part ways, TaeDane. I have some business to conduct here and will be unable to personally escort you to the mine. I’ll leave you in the capable hands of my commander, Cerybus. I’m confident he’ll hand you safely to the issuer of the bounty. And if it turns out the bounty is worth more when you’re dead, I’m confident he’ll kill you.”
Once again, Ty was stymied by Malak’s demeanor. The Marauder spoke of such things as suicide and murder in an unruffled, sophisticated tone.
“Normally, I would have attempted to serve you food or water tainted with a sleeping potion,” Malak said. “But as we both know, you would taste it. Ironic, isn’t it, that you ended up killing the woman you trained so thoroughly to protect?”
Ty just stared at him. If Malak expected a response to that, he’d wait all damn day.
Apparently reading as much in Ty’s expression, Malak clapped his hands together and said, “But I digress. Since we can’t have you knowing our location to share with others, we’ll have to blindfold you for the journey. I’m sure you understand. Garze, Bayt, he’s in your hands now. Restrain him and escort him onboard ship.”
Malak nodded at the guards standing behind Ty, who secured his hands with the same restraints they had used the evening before. The taller guard put Ty’s goggles on, followed by his air canister and mask. He then covered the goggles with black disks, blinding Ty.
The guards took advantage of that once they got him on the vessel. They led him into a low beam, slicing his forehead. They failed to warn him about a step up, causing him to go down hard without the ability to break his fall. At another point, something struck him in the gut, making him double over and dry heave.
That time, he was pretty sure someone just used their fist.
Through it all, he focused on where he was going. Once they got moving, he knew that the vessel they were on wasn’t the same one as the day before. It had even worse stability, making it easier for him to feel the subtlest change in direction. He mentally combined their route with the internal map he had started the evening before. Although there might be some slight adjusting needed, he was confident he’d remember the way back to the Gift.
A loud shout had Ty’s head turning. The sound of raised voices came from somewhere outside of the place he was being held. He was grabbed and shoved to the floor.
“Stay put,” the bald guard hissed in his ear. He used his boot to hold Ty down, digging into his spine.
“Move, ya bloody bitches!” Cerybus demanded. “Unless ya want ta be blown outta the goddamn sky.”
The commander was using an amplification system. He must be addressing someone outside the vessel. But who had stopped them and why?
An amplified female voice replied, “We’re not going anywhe
re, Marauders. You have something we want. We’ve come to take it.”
“Shit!” The curse came from someone inside the room with Ty. “The Peace Keepers must have learned about the bounty. How the hell did they find us?”
“I have no idea,” another close voice said. “We’re outnumbered. There’s no winning this. What’s Cerybus going to do?”
Ty tensed as he felt the subtlest pressure on his mind. He was instantly transported back to the judgment chamber when Vycor influenced him to kill Kyr. His reaction was instinctive and visceral.
He completely lost it.
The restraints came off first. He had learned five ways to get free of them during his first few months of training. It was child’s play. The black disks on his goggles followed suit.
Next, he grabbed the tall guard’s ankle where it pressed against his back, turning his body so he was no longer facedown. The guard lost his balance, falling hard. Ty brought his leg up and down, slamming his heel into the guard’s solar plexus while getting him in the balls with his calf. Even as the guard wheezed airlessly and bent over to cup himself, Ty grabbed his weapon and skulled him with it.
This all happened so fast that the shorter guard had only started lifting his weapon by the time Ty brought him down with an uppercut to the jaw, followed by a hard left jab, topped off with smashing his head into the closest wall.
The two other guards in the tight space were armed with blades. They looked at Ty, then at the two larger guards he had taken out, then at his weapon. They quickly tossed their blades to the ground.
Ty used the projectile weapon he held to point at the panel on the wall that would open the escape hatch. One of them reached over with a shaking hand and pressed a series of buttons. The side hatch released.
Edging over to it with his weapon trained on the two conscious males, Ty glanced out. He didn’t see anyone on this side of the vessel. In the near distance, he spotted the wreckage of a large building that would offer him a chance to lose anyone who might pursue him. There was a high likelihood he’d get shot or otherwise hurt during the escape attempt, but he was willing to risk it.
He wasn’t going to be yet another person’s victim.
Just as he jumped, the vessel surged forward. Ty rolled as he hit the hard ground, using his momentum to return him to his feet. He took off at a run towards the building, not bothering to look back. Vaguely, he noted that the Marauder vessel was leaving. He heard weapons firing, but none of the projectiles landed near him. He deduced that the Peace Keepers were attempting to stop the Marauder vessel. Hopefully they were so distracted that they didn’t notice him.
“Ty!”
He staggered to a halt less than fifteen feet from the building. Nothing else would have made him stop but that voice.
Her voice.
Kyr’s voice.
Not possible, he thought. Run. Get away.
But he couldn’t move.
“Ty. It’s me! Please don’t run!”
He turned. A female had disembarked from one of several vessels he now realized surrounded the area. She was running towards him. All he saw outside of her tinted goggles and black mask was her orange hair.
He lifted his weapon. She stopped running.
“Ty, please,” she said. “I know you don’t understand what’s happening, but it’s me. It’s Kyr. I’m not dead. Please.”
Pain ripped at his chest. Anger rose like scorching acid inside him. He wanted to scream his fury.
This was how these Peace Keepers intended to lure him into coming with them so they could collect whatever bounty was on his head? They intended to lie to him? To use his love for Kyr as a weapon against him?
“No!” she cried. She reached up and yanked off her goggles. “Look at me, Ty. Please!”
There were tears running down her cheeks. It wasn’t Kyr’s face, not exactly.
But those were her eyes.
“Yes, Ty. I had to hide my identity because everyone at the palace thinks I’m dead. I think maybe I was dead, but I healed. I woke up in a death box and everything. I’ve been trying to find you…trying to get to you. I had to stop Vycor from convincing the Vawn council to name the Guardians as rulers over Alametria, and I had to get some of your abilities back from Shaya, who never gave them all to you in the first place.”
The more she rambled, the more he believed her. He saw the desperation in her. She almost vibrated with it. He moved closer to her, one step at a time. He lowered his weapon, holding her gaze as she talked.
“Of course, Sem had to share some of your abilities because they almost blew my mind up,” she said, her hands flailing wildly to punctuate her manic explanation. “And I saw you in this tunnel and heard these guys threatening you and—”
He reached out and removed her mask. “You didn’t change your lips, either,” he said, his voice barely qualifying as a whisper.
Those lips trembled. “No, I didn’t.”
He pulled off his own mask and yanked her against him, bringing his mouth down on hers. She issued a soft sob of relief as her arms went around him. Her lips parted beneath his so he could taste her.
And he knew.
Now, when she touched his mind, he recognized her essence. He knew it had been Kyr scanning the Marauder vessel in search of him. If he hadn’t been so stressed and exhausted, he probably would have noticed that before.
It took him a moment to notice the flow of his abilities shifting from her to him as they kissed. Gradually, the thoughts of others entered his mind, sounding chaotic and confusing after so many days of silence. Ty welcomed them back, though he would have done without them for the rest of his life just to have this one kiss with Kyr.
I love you so much, Ty.
Hearing her in his mind again completely undid him.
I love you, Kyr. God, I love you.
Their joint emotion spilled into their kiss, making him ache for her. He felt his abilities cycling through him more strongly the longer they kissed. The power of those abilities was somehow enhanced after flowing through Kyr. She was infusing it with her own abilities.
With her love.
The kiss seemed to go on forever. Only when Ty finally felt steadier did he dare to part from her. He only intended to catch his breath before kissing her again, but the moment they parted, Kyr dropped straight to the ground.
He stared down at her lifeless body. In an instant, he was transported back to that moment in the judgment chamber.
Once again, he had killed her.
Everything inside him, every bit of hope she had just rekindled, died right along with her.
Chapter 41
For the first time in days, Kyr woke up feeling rested. She didn’t immediately know why she wasn’t weighed down with the pressing urgency and fear that had been plaguing her, but she took a moment to appreciate it.
The side of her face felt warm. It was pressed against a firm, fabric-covered surface. Turning slightly, she breathed in a familiar warm, spiced scent.
Ty…
She was almost afraid to open her eyes. What if he wasn’t really there? What if this was all a dream?
I’m here, Kyr.
Her throat tightened as emotion inundated her. Her eyes opened. Discovering that she was lying in a bed beside Ty, she lifted her head and met his silver gaze.
Thank Yen-Ki, she thought.
His grip tightened around her shoulders. She smiled up at him, but he didn’t return it. A sense of wariness touched on her thoughts. Her heart began pounding uncomfortably.
She eased herself up into a sitting position and turned so she faced him. His hand slid from her shoulders down to the mattress, so she reached over and picked it up to hold in both of hers. Her gaze moved over his features, really absorbing the fact that he was there.
And he wasn’t the Ty she had once known.
He had showered and was dressed in different clothes than the ones they had found him in. He hadn’t shaved in a while. A short, dark beard covered his jaw,
making him look rugged and dangerous. He had lost weight. She saw it in his cheekbones and the line of his jaw. His hair was even shorter than his beard, little more than fuzz.
But the biggest change was in his eyes. They carried apathy and a hardness that they never had before. He looked years older.
She searched his expression for a sign of happiness over their reunion, but found nothing. It was as though he was sitting with her because he felt obligated to. Even the emotion she could pick up from him was tempered, as though he was suppressing it.
Vycor had done this, she thought. He had taken a part of Ty that they might never get back.
Tears filled her eyes. When she had thought of what Ty had gone through, she hadn’t fully understood. She knew that now.
He was broken. He was scarred.
He was lost to her.
Don’t cry, Kyr, he thought, pulling his hand from hers so he could reach up and brush away a tear. Please. I’m so sorry for everything.
Ty, this wasn’t your fault. You know that. Vycor is to blame. Why do you feel you have to apologize?
She inferred his answer as he looked away. He was responsible, at least in his mind. He had made the wrong choices that allowed Vycor to defeat him. Because of him, she had died. He would live with that memory forever. And he couldn’t live with the thought of it possibly happening again.
He saw himself as a potential danger to her. They could be used as weapons against each other. Vycor had proven it.
He couldn’t allow himself to love her like that again.
An anguished sound came from her throat as his thoughts struck her. He was rending her heart in two. Despite everything, Vycor really had managed to take everything from them.
“No,” she whispered.
She did not have to be okay with this. Vycor was a monster. He was a cruel, vicious man with a deep-seated jealousy over the power that he craved but had never been able to claim.
And she was the Ascendant.
Do you trust me, Ty?
He met her gaze. Of course.
She moved closer to him until she straddled his lap. It carved at her heart to feel his reluctance towards having her so close. To feel his fear rather than his love.