Kieran is far more confident moving through the Wasteland with Nox at our side.
He’d given a quick and dirty debrief of what had happened when they’d arrived a few hours ago, about the ambush that was waiting for them here, and the massive amount of resources the Resistance were willing to sacrifice to capture one of my Bonded. There’s no doubt in anyone’s minds about whether or not that was the plan. They had made it very clear that Silas Davies wants my Bonded Group.
He honestly thinks he’s strong enough to capture and keep us all.
Stupid, stupid man.
I managed to stay calm for as long as it took to hear Nox out, and the moment he was done, I’d demanded to leave, my eyes still blue but my bond coming out in my voice a little bit, just as impatient as I am, at this point.
I need to find my Bonded.
As we all move out, following Nox as he leads us to where he’d last seen North, we find signs of them everywhere. There are bodies torn apart and the greenish acidic goo stuff that the shadow creatures sometimes leave behind.
The area is full of slopes and dips, which makes it an ambush nightmare. Every time we start on an incline, there’s a moment where I know we’re exposed, not able to see who might be hiding in the valleys ahead of us, or even beside us, making us a giant moving target.
Except Nox sends out his shadow creatures out all around us to scout, screams and gunshots ringing out around us as they find our enemy lying in wait. My bond is still warm in my chest and limbs, poised at the edge and ready for the moment that I finally let go, but I’m not ready to tap out yet. I’m not ready to miss out on seeing my Bonded and knowing that they’re healed up.
My legs speed up all over again.
Atlas moves with me, still intent on staying close to me and using his Gift to protect me fully. Gabe is taking up the rear with Kieran, one eye on me and the other looking around in case the shadow creatures miss someone.
I don’t think we’re going to miss anyone.
Nox stops abruptly and speaks without turning, “The main fight is happening over that ridge. There’s another Shield in place, it’s why you can’t hear anything. The moment you cross it, it’ll feel as though you’ve stepped through a portal. North is in there. I was as well. Gryphon was pushing the front lines forward to get to Unser, and we were cleaning up everything he sent our way. He had a small team with him. I’d guess it’s him who’s hurt, but he’ll still be pushing forward. We made the call not to withdraw until we got Unser.”
A shiver runs down my spine.
I haven’t said it to any of them yet, but my plan isn’t just to find whoever is hurt and heal them. I’m also going to start funneling power to the rest of them. I’m going to use my ability to turn the deaths of our enemies into a weapon to use against the rest of the Resistance until we’re all safe.
I don’t care if that makes me a monster.
”Bassinger, stay with Fallows, no matter what happens. You can all speak to each other through the mind connection now, right? Use it,” Kieran says, and then we move together down the last slope and into the next phase of hell in the Wasteland.
We’re immediately split up by a Flame, a wall of fire heads towards us that we all have to dive away from and take cover. Atlas shoves me behind an overturned truck, our feet stumbling over the asphalt that is unexpectedly underneath us as we hit a road of some sort. Visibility is freaking terrible, and I have to duck my head to stop my hair from being set alight.
Brutus trots around the side of the truck, unbothered by the heat of the flames, and he sits obediently the moment he gets eyes on me.
Even if Nox still sees me as poison, his bond wants me safe.
Atlas pushes me further into a crouch, his body covering me more fully. There’s the sounds of screaming around us and the smell of burning flesh that’s indescribably horrifying wafting over to us.
Atlas makes a sound like he’s trying not to puke, and I feel a little better about how my stomach is doing flips like I’m about to puke up whatever is left in my guts.
I glance around until I find a small area to one side of us that we can move to and find a more comfortable position. I squat down fully and shuffle over, following the side of the truck until I squeeze through the gap there. Atlas moves with me. When I stop, worried about whether or not he’ll fit through the same gap, because it’s pretty clear he won’t, he just puts a hand on either side and I watch as the metal crumples like wet paper under his strength.
It’s a much hotter act than it should be while we’re about to be turned into freaking barbecued ribs.
Check in, Gabe. Please tell me you still have your eyebrows.
I try to make light of the situation, but I’m anxious as hell about where the hell he is now that I can breathe again.
I got Kieran out of there before he needed a new face. Nox is with us. He’s sending his shadow creatures to take the Flame out now. Just sit tight, Bonded.
Easier said than done.
From the corner of my eye, I see a member of the Resistance taking refuge a few feet away from us. Brutus hadn’t alerted us to the tiny, huddled form, and my bond doesn’t react to her either, but she has a gun strapped over her chest and a vest on that clearly marks her as our enemy.
I can’t take the chance.
I make the decision to take her out right as she lifts her head. She’s young, around my age, but she doesn’t look scared. She looks… ready to die.
Is that comforting?
Should I feel less guilt for doing it if she’s miserable?
I lift my hand as though I’m going to take her soul as well, but then our eyes meet across the blood-soaked path, and… I can’t.
I can’t take her soul.
I mean, I can. My power is sitting there and waiting to rip her soul out for me to consume, but even my bond is pausing, hesitating.
I need her alive.
I drop my hand and swallow, praying that my bond isn’t leading me astray. It can’t be, not really, because it’s always so ready to kill anyone outside of our Bonded Group, so it must mean something.
Right?
Fuck.
Why is this so hard?!
Atlas notices her and gives me a look, but I shake my head at him, not ready yet to let the others know about her. Nox will just kill her, I know it, and… I can’t figure out why I don’t want to do the same.
I wait until the wall of flames finally dies out, more screaming tearing through the air, and then I make my move. I run towards her, still in a crouch, calling for Brutus to follow me. As I awkwardly hop over two bodies on the path, an insurgent Transporter pops into reality next to the girl and lifts a gun, aiming right at my chest.
Before my bond has the chance to deal with him, the girl lifts her hand and his eyes roll up into the back of his head, hitting the ground in a faint. She then aims her gun at his head and shuts her eyes as she pulls the trigger, killing him instantly.
Atlas finally catches up to me and curses under his breath as he shoves me behind his body, but I’m already speaking to the girl as he does it. “You just killed a bad guy, but you’re also a bad guy.”
She swallows and glances around. “I’m a captured girl, actually. I saw someone who might believe me, and I’m taking the chance. Help me. Please. I’m begging you, don’t let them take me back there. You’re with the Tac guys, right? The clothes kind of give you away.”
Atlas stops me from stepping around him and snaps, “We’re not a fucking taxi service, and you’re holding a Resistance issue weapon. You’re saying you’re not a sympathizer?”
She frowns and looks down at the gun, clearly detached from the reality that she’s found herself in. “You can have it. You can take whatever you want from me. I’ll tell you everything I remember. Just, please, take me with you… or kill me. I’d rather be dead than go back there.”
Atlas flinches when she says that, and I reach out to him in our mind connection to soothe whatever it is that’s upsetting him.
My sister said the same thing. She said she’d rather be dead than go back.
I press a hand against his back, a small reassurance I can give him, and then I see three of Nox’s shadow creatures pop between the gap in the truck that we’d squeezed through. The others have found us.
Kieran comes through first, lifting his gun immediately, and I have to fling out an arm to stop him from shooting the girl. “Hey! We’re keeping her, so stop with the murder plans, Black!”
Kieran’s eyebrows shoot up his forehead as Gabe pushes his way through the small space, Nox coming right after him. He’s the one I’m really worried about taking the girl out before we have a chance to explain… whatever the hell it is that’s going on here.
“What’s your name?” Atlas asks, and I give him brownie points in my mind. It hadn’t even occurred to me to ask her.
“Aro. Aro Han. I’m a student from Austin, and I was taken by the Resistance… maybe three months ago?”
Kieran scowls at her, but I keep her talking. “Three months? And they trust you with a gun here after only that long?”
She shakes her head. “No, I had a handler, but the… dog things ate him. I grabbed the gun, and I’ve been trying to get out of here since.”
Atlas glances over his shoulder to catch Kieran’s eye. “A handler means she has a Gift worth keeping. She’s a Neuro, must be strong.”
Kieran doesn’t look happy about that. Then, surprisingly, Nox is the one to make the decision for him.
He stares at her for a second, then his eyes flicker to black. “Take her back to the Sanctuary and lock her up. My bond wants her alive as well. It’s probably just pandering, but now isn’t the time to stand around chit-chatting.”
Kieran doesn’t bother asking questions, just grabs a hold of Aro’s arm, and then they both disappear with that trademark pop sound.
We stand in silence for a moment, and then I feel it.
My Bonded is here.
I’m drawn to him like a moth to a flame, my feet moving without much thought from me. I hear Atlas cursing under his breath as he jogs to catch up with me. Brutus stays at my side, and when I spot August padding towards us both, I almost burst into tears at the sight of him.
“There’s my pretty baby! Are you okay? Have you been eating all of the bad men and women for us? Of course you have, you perfect boy!” I gush, falling to my knees to love on him.
I’m probably a little more dramatic than usual, but it’s a relief to see him here and to know that North has to be alive and well for his shadow creatures to be happily walking around like this.
I bury my face in August’s smokey fur, and I feel North finally reach me at the same time as he says, “What are you doing here?”
I have to take a deep breath and keep my face buried in August’s neck. I’m sure it’s written clearly all over my face how pissed off I am that he’s even asking me this. “I felt one of you getting hurt. If it’s not you, then Gryphon is out there injured right now. I had to use every skill and trick in the book to keep my bond from coming out and throwing a full-blown tantrum about it. Then I had to convince everyone around me to let me come so that my bond didn’t just walk out of the Sanctuary itself to find you.”
I glance up at him to find him grimacing, wiping away sweat on his forehead and leaving a trail of blood from his hand behind. There’s none of the sophisticated councilman left on his face at all. Here, he is the Death Dealer, someone who I’m sure is the worst nightmare to the men that we are around.
He glances over at the others and then reaches down to help me to my feet, drawing me away from the shadow pups. “I’m sorry if I sound unreasonable about this, Oleander, but it’s a major distraction to us for you to be here. Things aren’t going according to plan.”
I shrug. “Not as much of a distraction as a bullet hole in Gryphon’s shoulder. At least, I hope it’s just a bullet hole and nothing… worse.”
I don’t mean to be snappy, but my nerves are completely fried from feeling Gryphon and the pain he’s in.
Nox looks between the two of us and then gestures behind us to an area I hadn’t noticed as I’d raced towards August. There’s a shimmer in the air where the Shielding here is different somehow.
“While we’re here, you might as well take care of that for us.”
I frown, but then I see it.
The shimmering is the spot that the Resistance are using for Transporters to arrive, a small space that they are keeping unshielded to bring in more Resistance.
There’s an arrival while we all are standing there, a dozen men who look fresh and ready to fight, appearing out of thin air.
I’m a little leery of just wiping people out, thanks to finding Aro, but without so much as moving a muscle, I wipe out everybody that is standing there. The collective sound of their bodies hitting the grass is loud enough that a shiver runs down my spine.
I don’t feel guilty.
North’s eyes are hard on me as he watches me struggle with this, but I shrug and attempt to convince us both. “I do not feel guilty, because all of them are a part of the Resistance. All of them. Aro was an exception.”
“Who the hell is Aro?” North snaps, and I cringe a little.
His eyebrows creep up his forehead, and I rush to finish speaking before he can freak out about it. “I found a member of the Resistance who was not here willingly, and my bond doesn’t want to kill her. You guys have all said that we need to trust my bond because it knows more than the rest of us. Well, the girl is coming home with us, has come home with us. Kieran has already taken her to the cells.”
North blinks at me as though he has never seen me before. I think my arrival might have broken him a little, and he’s not coping with me being here, as well as hearing about Gryphon’s injury and our separation from him.
He still has questions, because of course he does. “Are you sure that it’s coming from your bond? Are you sure that it’s not just you seeing a little girl?”
“She’s not a little girl. She is at least my age, and I have killed people my own age a million times before. Okay, that’s an exaggeration.” I feel the need to point that out before anyone freaks out about my death toll.
Nox rolls his eyes at us both. “My bond agreed. Both of them wanted her alive and with us.
That gets North’s attention.
He flicks a look his way but, without even acknowledging it, Nox continues, “All of the research says that we need to do better about listening to the things living inside us. I’m listening to mine. Fallows is listening to hers. You need to accept that that bond is a part of you, and listen to it as well, brother.”
Oof.
That is a fight I do not want to get into.
I glance at Gabe, and he looks the same way that I’m feeling. Atlas steps over to us all and nods politely at North to indicate that the transporting has stopped. I think they finally figured out that my bond has arrived and anybody else they send is going to be cannon fodder.
We all take a second to breathe, our next big mistake.
There’s another explosion on the other side of the Wasteland.
Screams of pain and terror fill the air, and I feel searing burns down my legs. Gryphon was close to the explosion.
The look of horror on my face tells all of my Bonded here everything they need to know. I take off at a run, disregarding my own safety entirely as the pain ripples through my legs. The shadow creatures take the lead, bounding before me as I sprint over the carnage to where the explosion was.
I reach out in my mind to him, but there’s a wall there, a blankness that I can’t get around, and the panic bubbles in my chest.
I can feel Gryphon’s pain, but I also can feel him in my chest still, so I know that he is conscious and alive. I’m pissed that he’s blocked me out of our mind connection, but I also understand that he is probably in a lot of pain right now and can’t focus enough to speak to me.
I hope that the explosion wasn’t Unser, because I think that the TacTeam professional that I had met only a few days ago would be furious to find out that he had been used against his own men in such a way.
My eyes shift to black as we move together through the Wastelands, visibility already an issue, and there’s a few times that Brutus or August have to catch me as I stumble a little, but I refuse to slow down.
I don’t know what was here before the Resistance turned it into this battleground, but there’s a lot of debris on the ground, rubble and charred wood, enough that it’s clear that people definitely lived here before all of this chaos and death arrived.
There’s a small hill that we have to climb to get to the area that the smoke is billowing from. There are crowds of people streaming down from the top, most of them wearing Tac gear and very clearly ours, but there are some Resistance running along beside them in fear of what is happening down there.
I scan all of their faces just in case I see someone that I recognize from Gryphon’s TacTeam, but I don’t see anyone or anything else that is of any use to us. We slow down a little as the crowd gets closer to us.
It’s harder when they’re moving like this, and I have to raise a hand just to steady myself, but I pick them off one by one, until it’s only TacTeam personnel making their way down the incline. I can feel the ripple of frustration from North that I’ve been the one to take them out. I know that this will be something that is brought up later, but I also think that it’s better to be safe than sorry. Especially when, in this case, sorry is a knife in the back.
North breaks away from us to start directing the men, issuing a retreat now that we’ve arrived. Nox continues up the incline and I follow him, desperate to find Gryphon. I’m terrified of what I’m going to see on the other side of this small hill. If I were with any of my other Bonded, I would be reaching out to hold his hand right now for some comfort. Instead, I reach down and place one hand on Brutus’ head, a small connection to the man I have tied myself to for all eternity. I’m sure he would rather die than accept that affection.
When we get over the top of the hill, I regret having my eyes shifted as I see the damage wrought beneath us with crystal clarity. There’s bodies strewn everywhere, except instead of the clean death of a soul being ripped out of them, or the blood-soaked demise of a shadow creature, these ones are unrecognizable, in pieces around us.
Please, please tell me where you are. We’re here. We’ve come for you. Please, just tell me where you are.
I’m desperate to hear back from Gryphon, but there is still nothing down the line from him, my words bouncing off of the barrier in his mind. There’s only the small reassurance that he is still breathing, his heart is still beating somewhere
“Let your bond out,” Nox says, his voice grave as he looks over the damage.
If anyone’s gonna find him, it’ll be the bond. I let my eyes slip shut and then I surrender to the dark god inside of me.
It’s not happy.
Oleander’s bond
The Damaged Dark One and I spend over an hour searching for my Bonded One.
My other Bonded all move off to help the survivors of the explosion leave this area and take out any new enemies that arrive while they’re doing so. I can feel that my Bonded is alive and in pain, but it’s still difficult to pinpoint exactly where he is in the mess and rubble that has been left behind by the Trigger.
He has to be unconscious.
I’m tempted to request that my Dark Bonded One bring me some Resistance to snack on to get a power burst so that I can find my Bonded One a little faster, but I become single-minded in this search.
The girl is terrified inside of me, fretting about our Bonded. No matter how hard I push, she doesn’t go to sleep, always aware in the back of my mind as I work. There are a few survivors. My Damaged Dark One mostly directs me to kill them, whether they’re ours or not.
“They’re too far gone,” he says quietly, glancing up at the smoking epicenter on this godforsaken field that we’re stuck on. “We don’t have any Healers with us, and to Transport them… they wouldn’t survive the jump.”
I nod and do as he directs, happy for his humanity to direct what is right in this situation.
I’m almost ready to cast my Gift out and tear everyone to shreds, when finally I feel him nearby. The relief from the girl and the echo of the others realizing we’ve found him is palpable, all of them checking in with the girl while I work.
I go to my knees beside him, looking over the damage and fighting the urge to wipe out every living thing in a ten mile radius.
He’s a mess.
A bullet wound in his shoulder, burns up his neck and face. He looks as though he was attempting to get away from the Trigger as it went off. From the position that he’s fallen in, he had gotten pretty close, but there’s a tree that has fallen over the lower half of his body, knocked down in the explosion, that’s pinning him to the ground. The fact that his chest is still steadily moving up and down as he breathes is a miracle of its own.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” the Damaged Dark One mutters as he kneels beside him, taking his pulse at his neck.
There’s no real need to try and administer any medical assistance. I am his Bonded, and I will fix this. They’ve only ever seen me heal them in bursts of uncontrolled power being drawn out of me and into them during times of crisis, but this is different. I was hunting for him to find him and heal him. I know exactly what I need to do.
I lean forward and press our foreheads together, conscious that he must be in pain, especially when he grunts under the slightest amount of pressure against his damaged skin. The few souls that I had consumed on the way to finding him have given me more than enough of an extra kick, but I’m careful about how I slowly funnel that energy into him. I need to be careful to make sure that it is the least painful way that I can, not wanting to cause any more harm to one of my own. My skin begins to glow and then, starting from our connection at our foreheads and working its way down, his skin begins to glow with that same light.
Slowly, gently, we watch as the bullet hole knits back together. The bullet slowly pops out as my power pushes the foreign object out from where it doesn’t belong. The red and damaged skin gradually begins to change and heal, the swelling going down and the skin slowly healing from the red shiny burns until it is once again the perfect tanned skin of my Bonded.
Two shadow creatures approach and work together to remove the tree trunk from my Bonded’s legs, and he groans at the pain of it. I send a savage look to my Damaged Dark One, and he murmurs back,
“They’re doing it as gently as they can, but his legs are crushed.”
I let my eyes slip shut, and then I gently funnel that same healing light down to the shattered bones. Slowly, carefully, gently, we knit him back together, me and the souls that I have consumed for this exact purpose, making sure that I can protect and love my Bonded exactly how they deserve and give them everything they could ever possibly require.
I heal everything that I can find on his body. I heal the blisters on his feet from tracking through the mud when they’d first arrived. I heal the splinters in his hands. I heal anything that might give him any sort of trouble, until he is returned back to the perfectly healthy Bonded that I had said goodbye to as they had left, only the scar over his eye left behind..
When the healing light slowly dissipates away from the two of us, I stay exactly where I am until his eyes blink open. He doesn’t look startled to see me in control of the girl’s body, and he doesn’t look concerned at having me so close to him either. One of his hands comes up to cup my cheek, and he murmurs, “How did I know that you would come looking for me when all of this blew up.”
I press forward the few inches it takes to kiss him gently, and then I murmur back, “You’re mine. There’s no getting away from me, so stop trying to find death by throwing yourself into these dangerous situations just to try and get away from the monster I am.”
He frowns and pulls me in for another kiss. “You’re not a fucking monster. Even when you’re in Oli’s head, thinking all of that crazy shit about being a god and ripping people’s hearts out, that still doesn’t make you a monster.”
“No, it makes her right,” says my Damaged Dark One, and my Bonded glances over at him.
He doesn’t look outright shocked that my Damage Dark One has said that, but he does give him a once over. “Is the Trigger dead yet? This wasn’t Unser. This was the other one.”
My Damaged Dark One curses under his breath and stands up, pressing the earpiece and muttering, “The bomb is still live. Do you hear me, brother? The bomb is still live.”
I glance back to my Bonded One. He props himself up on his elbows slowly, beginning to move as though he’s checking that his newly healed muscles will actually hold up underneath his weight.
“Unser can go off once or twice a day, at most. If it were him, we would be safe by now, because he wouldn’t be able to go off again. It’s the other one. Unless you have taken out someone very strong and not told us, then there is still a bomb somewhere in the Wastelands.”
I shake my head, glancing back at my Damaged Dark One as he scans the area around us more critically now that he knows the danger he is looking for. “I haven’t consumed anyone of that level of strength, but I would like to.”
They both share a look, and then my Bonded One stands up to stretch out. He holds out a hand to help me to my feet. I enjoy the sight of all of my hard work. The smooth skin of his face, healed again, is a glorious sight.
“Glorious, huh?” he says with a grin.
I agree, and then I remember, shoving at his chest a little bit and enjoying that I caught him by surprise, and he rocks on his heels. “Don’t you ever ignore me again, Bonded. If I call for you, you will answer me.”
He smirks and does a full body check of his weapons. More than half of them are missing, and I can tell that he is disheartened by how little ammunition he has left.
The Damaged Dark One hands him a few clips that he secures to his chest immediately. “It’s hard to answer someone when you are unconscious, my Bonded, but I will take note and try to do better in the future.”
It sounds as though he’s teasing, but I nod because whether he’s joking or not, that is the correct answer.
Once we know that he is steady on his feet, we move together towards where we had left the rest of our Bonded Group. The terrain is the only thing that stops us from moving as efficiently as I would like to. The shadow creatures move around us, more thorough in their search of the bodies now that we’re looking for some sign of the Trigger.
He’s nowhere to be seen.
We find my Shifter Bonded first, standing with a gun in his hands at the edge of the explosion site, the last line of defense before the Resistance could come to find us.
He looks at my Bonded with such relief, clapping him on the back as he joins us. “North and Atlas have gone to escort the last of the TacTeam back to the Transporter zone. Kieran came back for us, but he’s been working overtime getting people out. He’s the strongest transporter we have.”
He directs the last bit at me and I nod because this is information I already know.
We make it a few hundred feet before the next explosion hits.
It comes from further in the Wastelands, right where North and Atlas are escorting TacTeam personnel, and it’s clear to us all that they’ve come across the Trigger.
While I don’t feel pain immediately from that, a minute later there’s a searing heat in my stomach that says that North has been injured over there. This time, I cannot stop myself from going straight in that direction. My Shifter Bonded looks at me and nods, pulling his shirt over his head. “I’ll shift and get to them faster. They’ll need backup.”
His bones and skin morph and twist into a giant feline predator.
I shake my head at him. “Think bigger.”
My Bonded looks at me with a raised eyebrow. “He’s a leopard, the biggest Shifter I’ve ever seen. What could be bigger than that?”
I reach into his chest, bond to his bond, smaller and quieter than I am, but still there and alive and more than anyone else’s outside of our Bonded Group. As I lean down and look into the perfect, honey-colored eyes of the leopard, I say, “Think. Bigger.”
His eyes shift to white as the change starts and then to a gold-amber that isn’t human at all, and my other Bonded both falter to a stop to watch as his body writhes and grows, bigger and bigger and bigger, the fur slowly slipping away to reveal shiny black scales. His limbs all distort and lengthen, his fingers and toes turning into talons and an extra set of limbs burst from his back, shifting and morphing until, slowly, he has a set of wings protruding from his shoulder blades. Bigger, bigger, bigger, until suddenly, we’re staring at a monstrously large creature. One who has never walked the earth before now.
“What the actual fuck?” my Bonded sputters, and my Damage Bonded nods slowly.
“A fucking dragon.”
