Chapter 283
When the smoke clears, the world is sideways.
Or maybe that’s just me.
I can’t breathe. Can’t think. Everything tastes like ash and iron. The pressure in my chest is unbearable, like my heart’s trying to punch its way out. I hear shouting through the ringing in my ears, a familiar voice cutting through the chaos like a blade.
“Phoebe!”
Wake.
A pair of arms scoop me up—strong, warm, grounding. I’m lifted against his chest, the thrum of his heart loud in my ear. I reach for him weakly, fingers curling into the front of his shirt. He’s real. He’s here.
“Cora!” he calls out, voice raw, urgent.
“I’m fine!” she yells back. She’s across the room, helping Miore to his feet. She’s limping slightly, one side of her coat singed, but otherwise whole. “He’s a little beat up, but we’re good. We need to move.”
Footsteps crunch through debris.
Then—
“Wake!”
The voice drags across the wreckage like a curse.
Shoal.
I blink toward the source and find him trapped under a collapsed beam, one arm pinned beneath a support column, his expression twisted in pain and desperation.
“Don’t,” Shoal gasps. “Don’t do anything rash.”
Wake doesn’t stop walking.
“We’re very far past that,” he growls.
Shoal winces, coughing. “You need to stop being so damn stubborn! You think your only resources are in this building? You think everything depended on one human woman? You’re a fool if you believe that.”
Wake stops at the threshold of the blown-out lab door. The light from the emergency hallway strobes across his face.
He looks over his shoulder.
“For your sake, brother,” he says quietly, “please let this be the end of it.”
Then he turns and walks away.
“I tried!” Shoal screams after him, rage spitting out between gasps. “Remember this, brother—I tried to warn you! At World’s End, I will have my due… and you’ll realize that you chose the wrong side!”
Wake doesn’t look back.
He holds me tighter, and we move.
The halls are quiet. Eerily so. The wailing melody still echoes faintly over the facility’s PA system, haunting and vast. It rolls through the vents like a ghost, brushing against the walls, seeping into everything. The lights flicker, and for the first time since we arrived at this place, no guards appear. No enforcers. No automated defenses.
The siren’s song is doing its work.
The hive mind is pacified.
Miore limps beside us, his face pale, jaw clenched.
“Where are we going?” he asks, voice raw.
I suck in a breath, barely enough to speak. “The… docking bay,” I whisper. “Get me… to a ship.”
Wake looks down at me. “Phoebe, they’re still not responding. We haven’t figured out how to get them to move—”
“Trust me,” I whisper.
And he does. I see it in his eyes—no doubt. Just the fierce, unwavering belief that whatever madness I’ve walked into, I’ll find the way out. That if I say I can command a ship, then I can.
Wake nods to Cora.
“Call them.”
Cora pulls out her phone, eyes narrowing with focus as she accesses the PA controls. Her thumb dances across the screen.
A moment later, her voice echoes throughout the complex.
“Nereid to the docking bay. Nereid, report to the docking bay, immediately.”
We reach the long corridor that leads to the bay. The blast doors are already open, likely from Cora’s earlier override. Emergency lights sweep the chamber in pulses of crimson and gold, casting the hangar in a surreal glow.
The Nereid crew is waiting.
Delphi stands at the front, her hair pulled back in a short braid. Beside her is Peter, face grim and alert. A few steps behind them are Tyler, Malu, and Arista—armed and ready.
And then I see them.
Lile. Elanora.
Waiting at the edge of the dock, their expressions unreadable. Their Heir badges gleam under the red lights.
Trouble.
Real trouble.
The moment our group steps into the hangar, the room tenses—like a string pulled taut between two cliffs.
Miore hesitates, glancing at the other Heirs.
Then he steps forward and plants himself beside me.
On our side.
The other Heirs watch him like he’s sprouted gills.
Lile narrows her eyes. “Miore. What the hell are you doing?”
Miore’s voice is steady. “What’s right.”
Lile exhales through her nose, jaw tight.
“Don’t do this,” Elanora says softly. “It’s not too late.”
“Yes,” Delphi cuts in, stepping forward. “It is.”
The divide becomes visible then—obvious. A line carved in metal and blood. On one side, the loyalists. Lile. Elanora. A few armed guards who haven’t responded to the song. Hardened types. The kind Lily bred for war.
On the other?
Us.
The stand-off doesn’t last long.
Someone moves. It doesn’t matter who starts it.
The tension breaks.
And then everything goes violent.
Log in with Google Account
Chapters
Favorite
Settings
