A few minutes later, they were at the end of the emergency tunnel.
Ariella walked forward, her boots skidding on the slick, oil-stained rocks, her breath coming in ragged, freezing hitches.
Beside her, Mina was a twitching mess of adrenaline and terror, her copper-wired braids clinking frantically as she slammed her fist against the massive, rusted iron bulkhead of the mine.
“Open the damn door, Juno!
Open it now, you heartless bitch!
I know you can see me!” Mina screamed, her voice cracking.
Silence for a heartbeat, then a low, metallic rasp echoed through the speaker grate.
It wasn’t welcoming.
It was a threat.
“Piss off, Mina,” a woman’s voice snarled—deep, raspy, and sounding like she’d spent the last hour chewing on glass.
“The Ash-Walker gave a standing order.
No one comes in.
Not you, not the stray you’re dragging behind you, and definitely not the silver-blood circus following your scent.”
“It’s the Luna, you idiot!” Mina shrieked, kicking the door.
“She’s dying out here!
The Huntsmen are right on our heels!”
“I don’t care if she’s the Moon Goddess herself,” the voice—Juno—spat back.
“Until the Ash gives me the word, this door stays shut.
You step one inch closer to the sensor line, you little brat, and I’ll put a bolt through your remaining good lung.
I told you last time, don’t you dare step on my shadow.”
The heavy bulkhead groaned, and a small side-wicket opened just enough for a woman to step through.
Juno was a wall of muscle and ash-streaked skin.
She was dressed in a grease-stained tank top, her arms covered in old burn scars, holding a heavy iron pike like it was an extension of her own rage.
Behind her, a second woman emerged—Zuri.
She walked with a rhythmic, heavy thump-clack of a prosthetic leg made of scavenged brass and piston rods.
She looked tired, her eyes hard as flint.
“Mina, shut your trap,” Zuri snapped, leaning her weight against the iron doorframe.
“You brought the heat right to our doorstep.
You know the rules.
The Sanctuary is protected.
We aren’t opening the Rift for a Hayes brat who hasn’t even learned how to growl yet.”
“I’m standing right here!” Ariella snapped, her golden-silver eyes flashing with a sudden, sharp heat.
The silver spark in her chest was agitated, a caged bird slamming against her ribs.
“You can keep your ‘Sanctuary.’ I didn’t ask for a hole in the ground.
I asked for a way out!”
Juno let out a dry, hacking laugh.
“Feisty.
She’s got the Hayes tongue, I’ll give her that.
But feisty doesn’t pay the bills when the Council shows up with neural-purgers, sweetie.”
“Juno, please!” Mina begged, her hands shaking.
“The Ash-Walker…
he saved her in the tunnels! New chapters come out on g.com first.
He wants her here!”
“Then the Ash-Walker can come and tell me himself,” Juno said, stepping forward, the tip of her pike hovering inches from Mina’s chest.
“Until then, get her away from the gate.
I’m not risking a thousand lives for one Dilution.”
“Don’t call her that!” Mina lunged, trying to shove past Juno, but the Alpha woman caught her by the throat, lifting her off the ground.
“I told you,” Juno hissed, her eyes turning a predatory amber.
“Don’t test me tonight.
The Fracture is crawling with silver-boys, and I’m one second away from tossing you both to them just to keep the noise down.”
“Put her down!” Ariella roared.
She didn’t use the Command—she didn’t have the strength left—but the air around her suddenly shimmered with that strange, metallic mist.
The temperature at the gate plummeted.
Juno froze, her nostrils flaring.
She looked at Ariella, a flicker of genuine shock crossing her face.
“What the hell…”
“The scent,” Zuri whispered, her hand going to the hilt of a dagger at her belt.
“She smells like…
lightning.
Whoa, whoa, fiesty one.”
“Ariella!”
The shout came from the dark trails behind them.
Ariella spun around.
Five figures were emerging from the mist, their tactical gear shimmering with the oily light of Siphoner-tech.
Atlas was at the lead, his face a mask of frantic, duty-bound agony.
Beside him, Asher looked like a ghost, his good hand gripping a silver-tipped rifle.
And behind them, three Huntsmen moved with that terrifying, mechanical grace, their silver visors reflecting the orange glow of the mine’s emergency lights.
“Ariella, get away from those rogues!” Atlas shouted, his Alpha aura flared in a desperate, suffocating wave.
“They aren’t protecting you!
They’re using you as a shield!”
“They aren’t even letting me in, Atlas!” Ariella screamed back, her back against the rusted iron gate.
“So what does it matter?”
“The Council has issued a final directive,” the lead Huntsman said, his voice a grinding of stones.
“Remand the anomaly to our custody, Alpha Hayes.
Or we execute everyone in this sector.”
Atlas looked at the iron gate, then at Juno, then at his sister.
“Ella, please.
Just come with me.
I can…
I can talk to Father.
I can get them to be gentle.”
“This again?
And did I hear you say gentle?” Ariella let out a jagged, hysterical laugh. This chapter was copied from g.com without permission.
“Gosh, y’all disgust me!
Have you forgotten?
You sold me, Atlas!
You stood in that room and you watched them withdraw me from my life!
You don’t get to be the hero now!”
“We don’t have time for a family reunion!” Juno barked, slamming the wicket door shut and bolting it from the inside.
“Get out of here, Mina!
Take her to the East Ridge!
If they breach this gate, the Sanctuary is lost!”
“Juno, let us in!” Mina screamed, pounding on the metal.
“Go to hell, Mina!” Juno’s voice muffled through the steel.
“And take the princess with you!”
The Huntsmen moved.
Silver tethers lashed out through the mist, heading straight for Ariella.
Atlas shifted, his massive black wolf lunging to intercept the first one, but the second tether slammed into the stone inches from Ariella’s head, erupting into a web of liquid silver.
“No!” Ariella fought against the stone, her fingers clawing at the rust.
She felt trapped.
Juno and Zuri wouldn’t let her in, and her brothers wouldn’t let her go.
“We have to take her,” Asher shouted, raising his rifle.
“Atlas, she’s too far gone!
Look at her eyes!”
“Don’t touch her!” Mina screamed.
Mina looked at Ariella.
The girl’s face was white, her hands trembling.
Mina’s eyes darted to the Huntsmen, then to the closed iron gate, then back to Ariella.
A look of devastating, desperate resolve crossed the scout’s face.
“I’m sorry, Luna,” Mina whispered.
“Mina, what—”
Mina moved faster than Ariella could react.
She didn’t use a wolf’s strength; she used her old rogue precision.
She struck a specific nerve cluster at the base of Ariella’s neck, a move she’d learned in the Fracture’s fighting pits.
Ariella’s world didn’t explode.
It just…
stopped.
The silver fire in her chest gave one final, frustrated spark before the darkness pulled her under.
As she fell, her head hitting Mina’s shoulder, the last thing she heard was the deafening boom of the iron gate being struck by a Huntsman’s charge, and the raw, guttural roar of an Alpha—not Atlas—breaking through the forest.
Grimshaw.
Then, there was only the cold, silent darkness.
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