Book 3 in The Ephemeral series.
After the attack on Havenbrooke, Alex Kingsley―a social outcast turned war hero―is now the most powerful woman in Ells. But her life, along with Will's future and the fate of 2,000 demonic prisoners, rests in the han...
TRIGGER WARNING for sexual assault. As stated at the beginning of the book, nothing graphic will be described. But feel free to skip to the second chapter break.
I'd run for my life too many times in eighteen years.
I'd run from demons, monsters, and men. From grief. From heartbreak. From authorities. But never in my life had I run so hard for someone else.
Please be okay. Please let me find you with a bloody fist and a rat missing teeth.
Please, please, please.
The world blurred around me as I sprinted to the gates of Sidney's property, and I tasted iron.
A pair of military horses waited outside his luxurious stone house, each beast sporting hefty saddlebags and camping packs. One horse was ponied to the other, permitting a single rider, and my throat closed up when it occurred to me what—and whom—that second horse was intended for.
Had Sidney really planned to drug me, drag me across the Gorge, and broker a peace deal with Regulas?
Had he expected me to simply accept my fate come morning? Or did he have enough drugs on hand to ensure that the next time I woke up, I was back in that grimy palace dungeon?
The fool had left his front door unlocked, and I rushed into his cold, pristine home. A lamp in the foyer illuminated the empty kitchen and living room, and as my gaze lifted to the stairwell and the flickering candlelight beyond, pure dread burrowed into my stomach.
I suddenly remembered what the female prisoner had said to me that day in the Ground. She'd accused a Court member of assaulting her sister, and they'd thrown her in jail before she could ruin his life—and before the truth could spare another soul.
Shaking with terror, I scrambled up the stairs two at a time, rounded the hallway corner, and burst into the first bedroom I came across.
But the scene before me made my bones freeze over, and the air whooshed out of me in one horrified exhale.
What I saw inside that room killed something youthful in my heart. Something I'd clung to my entire life—a kind of denial that enabled me to live among, fight among, and die among men so easily. Something that allowed me to see my comrades as brothers, to sleep so soundly in my tent without Will or Tom there to stand guard. But that hope had shattered to pieces tonight.
And so had my pacifism.
Rage ripped through me so fast, I nearly lost all sense of control. But as unstable as I felt, there was no mistaking my target. Both spirits wanted one thing, and one thing only, and I slammed my hand to the wall to grant them their wish.
White mottled my vision, and thirty years of images tackled my brain. Then Sidney's limp body collapsed against Valerie's, and I instantly knew what I'd done.
I didn't have to check his pulse to know his wretched heart would never beat again, and perhaps I should have felt conflicted after murdering someone with their back turned. Perhaps my lack of restraint should have troubled me.
But in that moment, all that bubbled to the surface was good riddance.
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