I NOT-SO-SLOWLY BUT very surely lose my mind being stuck in the Draven mansion.
I mean, I knew it was coming, but with every day that I’m feeling better and needing less sleep, the itch to go and do things gets worse. Gryphon tries to tamp it down by thoroughly destroying me in the gym, but that only pisses me off. North’s attempts are more about coaxing more information about the five years I spent alone, firsthand accounts, because he wants to know everything in case we’ve overlooked some vital information.
That only makes me feel useless and morose about leading the enemy to my Bonds.
Gabe does the best job of distracting me, but only because he offers to chaperone for Atlas and I to hang out, and the three of us spend hours trying to figure out how the hell to get out of this place. Atlas is good at this game, mostly because he has so much experience in escaping from well-connected people, and some of his suggestions astound Gabe and me.
Nox disappears again.
I’m not surprised, but I am a little envious that he’s allowed to just come and go freely. I have the ability to literally rip people’s souls out, and yet I’m the most protected person on the freaking planet at this point, I’m sure.
One incredibly slow and boring week after I come home, the Resistance finally make their next move against us.
I find out mid-training session at the gym a little before dawn while I’m sweating my ass off on the treadmill. Gabe and Grey are on the weight machines while Gryphon is sparring with Sawyer, Felix, and Sage. Well, Sage is mostly trying to get out of the sparring, but every time she inches towards me, Gryphon sends her a look that terrifies her into going along with his sadistic circuit of evil.
She’s getting pretty freaking impressive at taking down men twice her size though, so I’m not going to fight him over her treatment.
North arrives at the door with Kieran in full Tac gear and three other TacTeam operatives the same time that Gryphon’s phone starts blowing up. I hit the stop button on the treadmill and climb down, grabbing a towel to wipe off my face as I stalk over to the crowd. Sage glances over at me and comes up to my side, eyeing Kieran. It’s still super freaking weird around them at the moment while they figure their shit out, but I also like him a lot after our time in the camps. I’m all for them figuring this shit out together.
I’m more for him than I’ll ever be for Riley, even knowing he’s been manipulated. I can’t just forgive and forget, that shit isn’t in me.
“There’s been an attack at Draven and in the surrounding township,” North says. Gryphon is cursing viciously under his breath as he stalks over to the changing rooms to get into his gear.
Sawyer shares a look with North and walks out without a word, which seems weird to me, but I’m too worried about what is about to happen to ask about it right now. “Is it still happening or is this a cleanup? Let me grab a shirt. I’m going too.”
North steps in my path with a look right as Gryphon walks back out of the changing room, fully dressed in record time as he adjusts the straps on his holsters by feel alone. Both of them are death glaring at me like I’m being an unruly child right now, and I’m not. I’m being totally reasonable.
“It’s a cleanup, and only fully trained, active TacTeam operatives are going, which means Gryphon is the only one in our Bond Group going. We also don’t want to be moving in large numbers at the moment unless there’s a good reason for it, so you’ll be staying here with me and everyone else.”
Gabe grabs my towel off of me and uses the dry side to wipe his own face down, knocking my arm with his in his quiet show of solidarity, but it only itches at my skin today.
My bond is also hungry right now, which makes the irritation a million times worse. “I’m more help out there than I am in this stupid house!”
North shakes his head and Gryphon just turns on his heel and moves to stand with Kieran, the two of them disappearing with a pop.
I want to scream.
“We’re all staying here for now, Oleander, but you can all come to my office and watch the reports come in until we decide what the plan of action will be.”
I share a look with Sage and we both nod, following him out without another word. Everyone chooses to come as well and when we get there, Sawyer is already set up at North’s desk with a laptop, tapping away furiously. North grabs one of his spare chairs to direct me into with a hand to my shoulder, giving it a squeeze as he gets his phone out and starts texting someone.
“What’s happening? What are you doing?” I murmur, nosy and grumpy at being left behind in this freaking house, but he’s good about it.
“I’m calling Bassinger down to watch with us. He has been very good about giving us information, and there might be something here that flags with him. I’ll use every resource at our disposal if it will keep you safe.”
My cheeks heat and Sage perches on her chair, holding a hand out to me for comfort. I take it, giving her fingers a little squeeze. When North finds an extra chair for himself, he pulls it up to my other side. Grey stands behind Sawyer and watches him work, while Gabe and Felix both grab chairs from the dining room to sit by the wall together, murmuring quietly about what this all means for us. I try not to think about it too much.
Atlas arrives after a few minutes, ignoring everyone and making a beeline for me. The office chairs aren’t really big enough for the two of us to share one, but when I stand up to give him a hug, he just maneuvers us around until I’m perched in his lap.
North gives him a very unimpressed look. Atlas just shrugs it off, drawling, “You’ve kept her as far away from me as you can manage without it hurting her, you can get over it for now.”
Sage bites her lip to stop herself from smirking and then Sawyer clears his throat. “I’ve got it. I’ll get the streams on the big screen. Shore, Black, and Rockelle are all wearing cams, so we can see what they’re seeing. They all have comms as well, so if you need them to backtrack on something, just tell me.”
Atlas nods and North shoves his phone away to watch as the large flatscreen on the wall lights up and we can see the footage of three cameras up there.
The area hasn’t just been raided…
It’s a massacre.
We all sit there in silence as the three operatives walk around the area and we see the carnage. There are bodies everywhere. Top Tier Gifted and the lower families alike, there are corpses littering the streets for everyone to see. Kieran walks past a Non-Gifted reporter trying to get past the barriers and talking a whole lot of bullshit about the situation, not surprising, but the Tac guys there won’t let her through.
After a few minutes of watching, North says to Atlas, his voice low, “Do you see anything?”
I feel Atlas shrug. “I can only guess for most of it… except the scorch marks. That’s absolutely Peter, one of my sister’s Bonded. The patterns? A dead giveaway for his gift. Wait! That, there. Sawyer, can you pull it back? Three seconds. Yeah, pause it. That injury? That’s pretty specific. My father was definitely a part of this too. Fuck. Okay, that helps. He has a team of people he won’t work without, so that narrows the list down greatly on where they’d be taking people. Dad only works with three camps. Oli took out one of them, and I can make an educated guess on which of the other two he’d pick.”
I lean into him. “Has your mom told them? That you’re in this Bond Group yet?”
He glances at me and shrugs. “The last I heard from her before I gave up my phone, she hadn’t. Things could have changed. North would know more if she attempted to contact me about it.”
We both glance at him, and he shakes his head. “She hasn’t sent anything through. If we all go to the camp for a clean out, you’ll have to be prepared for them to know.”
“Can’t we just… keep Atlas here? Won’t they change things up if we go now?”
North shakes his head. “We’re already about to change everything around, this raid has just sped that process up a few weeks. As long as Bassinger is sure he’s given us all of the information we need, then it’s a risk we’re taking.”
Atlas nods. “It’s everything I had stashed away as important and everything else you’ve asked for. If I think of anything else or something comes up, I’ve already said I’ll give it to you. Whatever keeps Oli safe, it’s yours.”
My heart spasms in my chest like I’m having some sort of episode over his words. He’s so loyal to me, even before he met me, and I feel so unworthy.
North glances at me and shakes his head. “You withstood two years of torture without ever giving any of us up. No one deserves our loyalty more, Bonded.”
I blanch and then groan under my breath, “Don’t tell me you can see in my head now too. I can’t take much more of this.”
He sends one last text on his phone before he slides it into his pocket, loosening his tie as he prepares himself for the change into the Tac gear that’s about to happen. “No. I’m just getting better at reading your facial expressions. You really don’t see yourself the way we see you, not at all. We’re going to have to change that.”
I don’t have anything to say back to that, so I turn back to the screen and keep watching the bloodbath. When Gryphon turns to the grassed area, all of the air leaks out of my lungs.
There’s a white sheet covering some of the carnage, but the little row of legs sticking out are clearly small, grade school and under. The Resistance wiped them out as easily as they’d murdered the grown men and women who had chosen to stay behind.
“I’m going to be sick,” Sage mutters, and Felix jumps up to grab the wastepaper basket and shove it under her nose. She retches a little, and while my stomach cramps and roils as well, I choke down the bile creeping up my throat.
I already knew this sort of retaliation was coming, we all did, but to see it is something else. To know that… that I’m responsible for it in some way is truly horrifying.
The children.
Of course he’s gone after the children. This is Davies’ way of letting me know personally.
“How? How does this let you know?”
I didn’t realize I’d said it out loud.
I glance up to find that not only are all of their eyes on me, but that Nox has snuck into the room as well while I was transfixed by the horror on the screen.
I try not to lash out at any of them because of how uncomfortable it’s making me. “Towards the end… of my time with him, Davies figured out that the best way to get to me was through kids. I couldn’t handle what he would do to them. My Bond took over without the pain it usually took because I would let it just so I didn’t… have to watch.”
The disgust on Nox’s face has me wanting to curl up and die. I get it entirely. I hid from the pain and the horror of what was happening and was no use at all to the children—
North snaps, “Stop it. You didn’t do anything—”
“Yes, I’m aware, please don’t rub it in.”
He grabs my arm and jerks me around to face him, almost pulling me out of Atlas’ lap in doing so. “Listen to me, Bonded. You were a child as well. You were fourteen when he took you and sixteen when you got out, no one here thinks you’re responsible in any way for what that man did. No one.”
My eyes flick to Nox because, well, he’s the one who judges me as harshly as I judge myself. If anyone was going to tell the complete honest truth here about my responsibility, it’ll be him.
He doesn’t even bother to return my gaze.
“Well, Black caught wind of their Transporter’s trail, right? Let’s go kill the sadists and get this over with. They all need to die screaming, and I think we can do something about that,” Nox says, turning his back on us all and walking out of the office.
North stands up and helps me to my feet with a warm hand on the base of my spine, murmuring quietly to me, “I’d rather you stayed here but if you want to come and do your part, then we need to move now.”
I glance up at him, but I already know what my answer is.
I’m going to let my bond kill as many of them as we can find.
Gryphon’s voice pops into my head without warning. That’s my girl.
I want to wear what I’ve already got on, but my Bonded are having none of it. I’m manhandled, coerced, snapped at, and forced into a full set of Tac gear by North, which I complain loudly about because I’m sure I look like a toddler in her dad’s wardrobe.
It also doesn’t help that when I step out of the changing room and into the foyer where everyone is waiting, Gabe cackles at the sight of me, slowly dissolving into full belly roaring laughter.
I shoot North a savage look, but he ignores me. Gryphon, who had returned with Kieran to transport us all in, smacks Gabe in the back of the head and snaps, “Shut up, idiot, before she starts whining about it all over again.”
“What are you talking about? She never stopped,” North drawls, and I discover the advantages of the heavy-soled boots when I stomp on his foot and the surly Bonded actually winces.
I’m taking the win.
Atlas walks out in a modified Tac suit, mostly because there’s less protective panels on it, and my heart skips a beat for a second until I realize that he’s indestructible and there’s no need for them.
“If you get shot, does the bullet just, like, bounce off, or do you just heal faster? How much am I going to have to worry about you?”
He grins at me and slings an arm around my shoulders. “It bounces off, which is another reason why I’m allowed to come today. I’m your human shield for the trip, your Gifted shadow following your every move.”
I blink up at him for a second, trying to imagine bullets just bouncing off of his skin and then grin, grabbing his hand and tugging his body close to mine. “Perfect. Get ready to meet my bond. Try not to judge me too harshly when she starts torturing everyone in our general vicinity.”
He smirks back at me, dropping his head down to murmur, “I told you before, I already know all about your bond. There’s nothing that could happen that’ll scare me away. You and I, nothing can come between us.”
If there weren’t a million other TacTeam operatives swarming around us in the tight space, I would kiss him, but it feels wrong to start making out with him around them all, so I take a little step back and a deep breath.
Gabe glances between us both and then steps up to flank my other side, making me feel tiny between them both. Gryphon finishes up his planning session with Kieran, barking out orders to each of the teams, and North is having a quiet discussion with Nox in the corner. They look as though they’re both itching to go and, sure enough, there’s a dark ring of smoke around North’s wrist, one of the few signs he has of being close to the edge with his power. He feels just as responsible for the attack as I do, but from the other side.
He’s the councilman who is being hamstrung at every turn, trying to get as many people out of this situation alive as he can, but the other Top Tier families want to hide in their money and do nothing. They want to waste their Gifts and Bonded power because they feel above this sort of work, no matter what he’s said to them all.
Still, he feels like he hasn’t done enough.
Get your head in the game, Bonded, or I’m leaving you behind.
I snap my attention back to Gryphon and raise an eyebrow in his direction. I am. Nothing will make my bond angrier than Resistance scum upsetting my Bonded and my Bonds. It’s very touchy about what belongs to us.
His mouth quirks up just a little at that and then he’s barking out more orders, reeling out jump times that have everyone preparing around us. We’re going with Kieran, naturally, and jumping as the third wave. All of these terms I’ve never been taught before and am learning on the fly are kind of fun, and when both of the Dravens walk back over to our group so that we’re all going together, I feel a little rush of adrenaline in my blood.
Look at me, getting worked up about being a monster for good.
No monster talk either, Gryphon says. I answer him out loud. “I’m harnessing the monster for good. Like I give a fuck what anyone else thinks of what my bond can do.”
Kieran glances at me, then around the group, before murmuring, “That’s the spirit! The more you take out, the less of them out there killing innocent little kids. Kill them all, Fallows.”
I just might.
Then we’re all being thrown into space by his gift, popping back into existence on the edges of a camp, the sun already set in this part of the world and visibility shitty.
Gryphon comes to my side and murmurs to both Atlas and me, “Stay where I can see you at all times. Black will take you home the second either of you step out of line.”
I nod, trying to look as obedient and solemn as I can while Atlas just gives him a curt nod.
Harrison scoffs and snarks, “We all saw what she did to the last camp, Shore. She’s the best defense we have. You should really ease back on her a little.”
Gryphon gives him a look that I’m sure is shriveling his balls and North steps up to my side, pulling his own riot helmet over his perfect hair, and snaps, “Get your eyes and your opinions off of my Bonded before I set a nightmare on you, Rockelle.”
He blanches a little, freaking out even more when August bursts out of North and immediately turns to heel at my feet, his jaws opening so his tongue can loll out as he gives me a silent plea for pets.
I bend down to give them to him as I bring Brutus down from behind my ear at the same time, stroking them both and murmuring about all of the bloodshed and horror we’ll be doing here together for the night.
There’s a moment of dead silence around me and then Rockelle mutters, “That is fucking terrifying—”
Kieran cuts him off. “I told you! I told you to just stay away from her. You have to be the idiot that sticks his nose in where it doesn’t belong. Shore will reach down your throat and rip your spleen out with his bare hands if you so much as look at her again, just keep out of her way. In fact, all of you should just treat Fallows as though she’s a shadow creature as well, because if her bond decides to join the party, she might as well be a rabid, bloodthirsty shadow, because she’ll kill you just as easily as they do. Keep. Fucking. Clear.”
The group murmurs their compliance and then scatters obediently, moving into the formations that they’ve all been trained into by my Bonded. I watch them go and then straighten up, snapping my fingers to get the pups to follow me, which they do like the perfect boys they are.
“Tell me if you recognize anyone,” I murmur to Atlas and he glances down at me, faltering just a little. He thinks I’m doubting him, and I immediately feel guilty as hell about it.
I rush to reassure him. “I just mean that if there’s anyone worth keeping alive for North or Gryphon to question. Most of these people are worth more to us dead but… if there’s someone who might know what’s being planned, Gryphon should talk to them.”
He nods and pulls his helmet off, throwing it to the ground. “I can’t see as well with that thing on. Let’s go burn this hellhole to the ground. Preferably, with my father still in it.”
