Vision blurring, Titus blinked and shook his head to hold onto the features of the man, which were fading into the fringes. His eye. The pupil of his left eye appeared elongated in a way that made it look like a snake’s eye. Such details were important to remember for when he’d ultimately take his revenge.
“Did I not tell you? These bullets could put down a rhino!” A second man flanked Snake Eye, one who didn’t wear the uniform of a soldier, but the slightly worn fabric of a marauder. A full head of thick, blond curls and bright blue eyes gave an air of youth that belied the cracks and wrinkles of his weathered skin. Where there should’ve been fingers on his right hand were nothing more than a thumb and a pinky, separated by a curved stretch of skin , giving the appearance of a claw. Like a lobster’s. Another deformity.
Not that they weren’t uncommon anymore, but Titus had never encountered as many outside of Calico, where they had intentionally created such defects.
“What do you call this again?” Snake Eye asked, examining one of the bullet cases that’d hit Titus earlier. “And where do you acquire such a potent concoction?”
“It’s called Red Lotus. Made by a slave of mine,” the blond said with an oil-slick voice that reminded Titus of the docs at Calico. “An older woman borne of the few tribes that survived the Dredge. They often laced their needles with it. Very effective against Ragers. And Alphas, as you can see. We’ll take both of them.”
Since when did Legion side with marauders? Their hatred for each other was on par with the Alphas’ loathing of the scientists who’d tormented them.
“No. My men were promised an Alpha. We’ll keep the one in custody. You can have this one.”
“He’s been shot. Many times. He won’t survive the poison.”
“Sir!” The voice arrived from somewhere beyond the men, and Titus desperately clung to consciousness in a slowly failing effort to know his fate. “She was hiding in the tent.”
From the crowd behind the two bickering men, a soldier shoved Senna forward, the force tripping her to the ground, where she tumbled just a few feet from Titus.
Each inhale burned like flames inside his chest. His muscles turned laxer with each passing second.
The blond marauder kept his eyes on Titus as he knelt down alongside her. The smile on his face carried an evil glint that prodded Titus forward, despite the weakness swallowing up the strength of his muscles.
“This is the beauty you killed my man to save?” The blond dragged one of his gnarled fingers across her jaw and licked the invisible path.
Fingers clawing into the dirt, Titus willed his arms to haul him close enough. Every movement felt as if boulders weighed him down, and the blackness on the fringes of his vision threatened with the kind of darkness from which he might never crawl out.
“Where I come from, vengeance is paid in like. Eye for an eye.” The blond held the blade up to her eye, and his grin widened.
“No.” Titus coughed, the spittle of blood hitting the dirt beneath him.
Head wrenched back, Senna whimpered, staring down her nose at Titus.
“What is the meaning of this!” The unfamiliar voice drew Titus’s waning attention toward a gray-haired man making his way through the crowd of surrounding Legion. “Who sanctioned the attack on this hive?”
The snake-eyed Legion soldier who’d doffed his mask snapped to attention, shoulders back and chin high. “I did. Sir.”
“You did.” The older man, who Titus surmised must’ve been his superior, stepped toward the soldier, who kept his eyes ahead, body stiff. “And by what authority did you carry out this ...” The older man looked around at the bodies lying about the camp. “Slaughter?”
“Our men didn’t--”
“You were to inquire about the location of the Alphas, and nothing more! And since when ...” The veteran soldier stared down at the blond, his lips peeled back with disgust. “… do we consort with marauders? Release that woman immediately, you impetuous lout!”
“I don’t take orders--”
Before Lobster Claw could finish his words, a hard punch kicked his head to the side, and with a smug grin, Senna scrambled away from him.
The fist around Titus’s chest squeezed tighter, banishing the last of the air from his lungs. On a reflexive inhale that crackled in his chest, like ground glass scraping the inside of his ribcage, he coughed and wheezed, gasping for a single breath.
The blond marauder growled and lurched toward Senna, but was stopped short by a gun pressed to his temple.
“You lay one hand on that woman, and I will blow your brain right out of your skull.” The older soldier stood over the marauder, looking far more intimidating in his black uniform. His gaze fell on Titus, his brows coming together in what almost looked like sympathy, if Titus thought them capable of such a thing. “Answer me!”
Snake Eye cleared his throat and rolled his shoulders back, as if the thought of following orders grated on his nerves. “These people were hostile. They refused to divulge the Alpha camp.”
“I don’t give a damn if they bloodied your eye and danced a jig on your face! You were not given the authority to attack! Your hatred for these people has gone too far this time. You’ve not only gone against my orders, but the pact that we established with the hives over the last two years! The clergy will have your head for this! God help you, they will, and I won’t have any say in the matter!”
The crack of a gunshot echoed through the camp. Another. Titus shifted his attention toward the blond marauder, waiting for him to fall.
Except, it was the older man who tumbled to the ground, and once he had, Titus got a clear view of the gunman behind him.
The other Legion soldier. Snake Eye.
More shots rang out. The half dozen, or so, Legion officers who’d arrived with him systematically executed the veteran soldier’s men as they rushed to his aid.
Once all the loyal officers were dead, Snake Eye sighed and stared down at where the older man seized on the ground, hand clapped over a bleeding wound at his throat. “I’m afraid God gave up on me a long time ago, my friend. This is nothing personal.”
Growling again, the marauder scrambled for Senna, dragging her beneath him by her legs.
Vision narrowed to a small frame, Titus palmed at the dirt.
The air withered in his chest.
The blackness closed in.
Before it took him under, he watched the blade slice a gaping hole in Senna’s throat.
Chapter 1
Thalia
Six months later ...
Gathering one unruly golden curl from my face, my mother pins it back into a graceful twist with a pearl barrette. “Beautiful.”
The day’s dirt has been washed away, leaving behind clean skin that glows in the dim light of my bedroom, as I stare at myself in the mirror. A single pearl, strung from a delicate gold chain, rests against my collarbone and matches the barrette in the same pure shade of white as my dress. I’m told the jewelry belonged to my maternal grandmother. I never met her. She was eaten alive by a horde of Ragers that passed through her farm.
The white lace of my dress scratches at my skin, while I sit before the vanity, allowing my fussy mother to place the finishing touches. The faint blush at my cheeks. The veil that she pulls down over my face, which fails to conceal the disgust staring back at me in my expression.