Nyla empowered her hand and waved the flames away as she approached. Her eyes crawled across my figure shrouded by fire. They lingered even as she kneeled by Dave’s side. His figure was obscured by the soldiers surrounding him. All I could see of him was a limp hand. That was enough to know.

  The stench of smoke and burning fats stung my nose as the fire writhed and died at my feet. The scent would stick to my hair and skin for days.

  I willed away Jackpot inspected the sword’s blade. It was in dire need of repair. I sighed. When would I be able to find time for something so menial as blacksmithing?

  The street was filled with smouldering bodies of the beasts. At least half of them met their end here. Most did so at the hand of my chain explosion.

  I brushed the soot off my coat and trudged toward the others. Nyla pressed her fingers against Dave’s wrist to look for his pulse.

  “He’s dead,” I said and realized the coldness in my tone. They already knew that, of course. They just didn’t seem quite ready to accept it.

  Nyla closed her eyes in resignation and nodded. “We can’t stay here,” she said. “Daryl, bag him up and leave a tracker.”

  “We can’t leave him!” Daryl protested, still holding the stained club in one hand.

  Nyla tore her gaze from his, ashamed. He reached out to her, grabbing her arm softly. “The beasts will eat him. We need to bring him back for burial. We owe it to his family. We owe it to him.”

  “And who’s going to carry him?” I squatted down among them. Their eyes flocked to me, wide and wary, as if I was a monster too. To my surprise I much preferred the reverent gazes of the crazy fools back in the sanctuary.

  I nodded my chin at the professor and his assistant. “Will it be you two?” They shifted uncomfortably at my question. I let my eyes wander to the gathered troops. The words clung to my throat even as I spoke them. I knew very well the rifts I would create between myself and the others. But some things had to be said.

  “I’ll carry him,” Daryl muttered and stared daggers at me.

  I snorted and pointed the handle of my blade at the soldiers. “A stupid fucking idea. You know we can’t spare the manpower. Dave died because you all are too weak to protect the civilians. Now you want to protect his corpse too? Maybe you should learn to defend yourselves first.” I shook my head and glanced down at the man’s pale face. Colour had left his body along with his blood. His eyes were still opened, portraying the fear he felt as he died.

  “He was a friend.” Daryl stood up and looked down on me. The spite in his eyes made my skin crawl.

  “Was. He’s no more than a pile of skin, and flesh, and bone now.”

  Daryl’s fingers whitened around the club’s leather bound grip. “Tread lightly, little man.”

  Without my blessing his words might have been enough to scare me. But we both already knew the weight his threat held.

  I rolled my eyes and stood back up, craning my neck to meet his eyes. “Back in the Empire, one of my friends watched her sister die. Twin sister, actually. She got separated from the others when Elana betrayed us. And you know, Bea fought hard and all, she fought well. She’d been training to be one of the Solburne’s blessed her entire life.”

  Daryl’s nostrils flared. I shoved him back with a finger.

  “That training didn’t help jack shit when she got stabbed in the back. We watched her realize what had happened to her as the building crumbled around us.”

  Daryl’s eyes wavered, and I glanced at the others. “My friend, Nea, was seventeen then. And she was less of a bitch about that than what you lot are now. Trained soldiers and military personnel,” I scoffed and turned to Daryl. “Especially you, Mr Macho. So how about you grow the fuck up and realize what’s what?”

  “Enough.” Nyla said coldly. “Bag him up, Daryl. That’s an order.”

  He spat on the ground by my feet and did as instructed. With a soft brush of his hand he closed the man's eyes and tucked a small metal plate into one of Dave’s pockets. Had to be the tracker.

  On the off chance his body didn’t get eaten, they’d have something to come pick up when they regained control of the area. But they probably wouldn’t. Not if their forces were filled by amateurs like these ones.

  Nyla watched the other soldiers say their goodbyes to the middle aged man. I walked up to her and cleared my throat. “How about you let me know the plan now?”

  Nyla’s eyes whirled to mine, she was angry.

  She grabbed my collar and dragged me around a corner, separating us from the others. She pinned me against a wall and whispered, “Do you know what’s most dangerous to a unit like ours?”

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  The fear she intended to have me feel didn’t quite take root. Our contract was mutual, she couldn’t hurt me, and I couldn’t hurt her. My eyes didn’t waver from hers.

  I raised an eyebrow. “Scourge, I suppose? Maybe other blessed, looters?”

  She made a buzzing sound. “Wrong. The answer I was looking for is our squad fracturing.” She pressed a finger into my chest. “And that’s exactly what you’re doing. I know it’s nothing intentional. If it was, the contract would lash back against you. Which means you don’t know what the hell you’re doing. Let me clue you in. If you estrange the rookies, distrust grows, and the civilians die. Then my soldiers. Maybe even you. And with all the deaths, months of work turns into nothing.”

  I clicked my tongue. “I said what I did for their sake, their mindset is wrong. They think they’re in control of a situation that’s uncontrollable. They try to protect when their top priority should be to survive.”

  “They’re soldiers, Cal.”

  I rolled my shoulder and wriggled out of her grip and kicked a piece of rubble into a nearby pile, “They’re naive, and green.”

  “And you’re not? You can’t even grow a beard, yet you’re talking down to people who spent their entire adult lives as soldiers. They’ve been taught not to leave anyone behind.”

  “Things on the other side are different.”

  Nyla snapped, and threw a fist into the nearby wall. It shook and sent a hail of stone smattering against the street. “You think I don’t know that?! I’ve gone multiple tours. I’ve seen countless friends die in the most horrible ways imaginable.” Her eyes were somber as she spoke. She looked down at her hands. “And I’ve done unspeakable things, just to survive. They will too, one day. But they haven’t yet. All I want is for you to let them keep that part of their humanity for a while longer. Just until we get back.”

  “And risk myself?”

  She looked me up and down and chuckled. “As if you ever felt yourself in danger back there.” The tension between us simmered down, and I felt her airy demeanour return.

  She was right, I hadn’t felt like I was in danger. The fangs were nothing in comparison to the monsters I’d faced on the other side.

  “And if worse things come after us?” I pushed.

  She untied her ponytail and redid it, making sure to not miss any strands of hair. “Then we’ll deal with them as best as we can.”

  “And when more people die?”

  She pushed the cap down on her head again, obscuring the upper half of her verdant eyes. “We mourn and keep moving forward. Failing this extraction is no alternative.”

  “If it’s so damn important everyone gets out alive, then why didn’t COBA send reinforcements?”

  She eyed our surroundings and leaned in close, cupping my ear with her hand. “If I tell you I might have to kill you.”

  I brushed her aside and groaned. “Funny.”

  She covered her mouth with a hand and chuckled.

  She sighed and became serious again. “All you need to know is that reinforcements won’t be coming. Transportation isn’t going to happen. Contact is impossible. And we carry very precious cargo.”

  “What cargo?”

  “Your friend, the Professor. He’s our top priority. My plan was to leave him in your care, you seemed to hit it off. But then you went and scared him and the other civvies shitless.”

  And I’d been under the assumption that I was the special one in our merry band of soldiers.

  There was a lot to unpack, but ultimately our goal of returning alive hadn’t changed. In a way the situation felt very similar to the one in the Layered empire. And as that placed proved, I was pretty damn good at getting out of places alive.

  I rubbed my neck and cocked an eyebrow, putting the pieces of the puzzle together. “Do the others know that we’re stranded?”

  “They know what they need to know, just like you. Don’t go talking to the civilians about it though. Can’t have their spirits break on day one. Can you do that?”

  “I’ll manage.”

  “Good. Then let’s get the hell out of here already, all this dust is clogging up my pores.”

  I stayed in place long enough for her to turn back with a scowl. “What?” she asked.

  “I won’t have to apologize or anything, right?”

  She stared as if I’d said the most outrageous thing and muttered. “My lord, you really are just a kid, aren’t you?”

  “Young adult.”

  “Hardly. And no. A simple apology wouldn’t be enough to win them back.”

  I nodded, that suited me just fine. Apologies weren’t my forte. Especially if I didn’t feel sorry. I stood by what I’d said. I knew all too well how much it sucked to lose people, they all probably knew that already. My family’s case had gotten so much attention when my mother and grandmother's relation became known that I could barely leave the house. The journalists had hounded me like I was some kind of tragic celebrity.

  The boy who lived, they’d written in papers and web articles. Dry entertainment for the masses.

  We turned the corner. The others had said their goodbyes. Their dusty faces bore clean streaks where tears had fallen. Daryl and I hadn’t really had a good relationship to start with, he never liked me during the interrogations. Calling him a bitch in front of his squad mates certainly didn’t help improve his opinion of me.

  “Let’s move. Quinn, take point,” Nyla ordered.

  The soldiers moved like cogs in a machine, their eyes still red with grief. None of them dared voice their complaint at leaving Dave behind. Not even Daryl as he stared at me. I earned a few angered glances from the rest of the squad, but it wasn’t anything I couldn’t handle.

  They didn’t need to like me, I told myself. I didn’t need anyone else, I already had everyone I needed.

  We walked for a few more hours until the sun began to set. The broken cityscape still stretched to our sides when Nyla ordered us to a halt. She sent Quinn out to scout for shelter, somewhere to rest for the night.

  In the distance, the crackling gunfire had ceased. It happened a few minutes ago. Nyla’s face had grown stern at the realization. She tried to hide it, but she wore her heart on her sleeve, fickle as it was.

  Quinn returned and guided us to a mall. The place had held up remarkably well compared to the surrounding devastation. Just to make sure I watched the veil while the others prepared for bed and watch duty. It swayed with the wind, but no strings pulled taut from a blessing borrowing its power. We were alone.

  For now.

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