The back of my neck prickled. The sensation of eyes on me from the buildings had my gaze darting around with my gun out, primed to shoot. The howls of the hyenas in the distance spread goosebumps down my arms.
Though, it wasn’t them that had my heart beating in my ears; they would go straight for the easy meals. The ones that were already dead.
It was something else.
Intuition. A decade of training. Knowing the enemy so well I could feel them creeping in.
Surrounding us.
Lukas’s head snapped to the side, his muscles constricting. His reaction needed no explanation. He could feel it too. Besides his fae senses, his training was laced into every fiber of his being, ready to respond to a threat.
A disturbing growl emerged from Kek, her eyes darkening as her demon senses picked up on the danger.
Shit.
My mouth opened, ready to warn Andris, but it was too late.
A zing swooshed through the air, the sound of metal splintering through flesh and bone as one fae in the very front went down without a sound. The bullet went through his brain, killing him, before he could even cry out.
The reaction was instant. Andris’s soldiers dove for him, shielding their leader. Yells and commotion pinged off the buildings on either side. Weapons drawn as our group condensed together, trying to find the source of the threat.
It was silent for a moment. Even the air seemed like it was holding its breath as all of us coiled together.
Pop!
A girl behind me dropped to the ground, a bullet between her eyes.
Pop!
A shot came from one side. Then the other side. They were moving in, but able to hide among the narrow alleys.
Another one of ours dropped.
They were picking us off one by one.
“Go! Go!” I screamed, motioning everyone to head down a passage. We learned to sweep in training, but Bakos also had us do simulations where we were the ones being surrounded. To flip it around and get them all on one side, you had to break through one way hard and fast, spilling out of their circle like liquid, forcing them to regroup behind you.
Our movements flipped everything into chaos. Gunfire and figures darted everywhere, the shadows easily fooling the eye. Our group barreled forward, trying to break HDF’s line.
“Help! They have me and Caden as hostages. Help!” Hanna’s voice spiked up with the barrage of bullets bouncing off the buildings. Scorpion grabbed her, covering her mouth with his hand. She struggled against him, but he kept her pinned to his chest, trying to move her down the path, kicking and flailing against him.
“Stop shooting, or I blow your pretty prince’s head off.” Birdie shouted, clean and sharp, her words somehow making it above the pandemonium. Her gun cocked, the sound snapping loudly as she pressed the barrel to Caden’s temple. “Make a move, and you will be scooping up his brains with a shovel.”
A muscle under Caden’s puffy eye flexed, his jaw clenched so hard I could see the veins in his neck.
The firing stopped. The silence was louder than the volley of bullets.
I had no doubt they were struggling with what to do. We were taught to sacrifice ourselves for the greater good. One soldier was not worth the lives of our mission, but Caden was no ordinary soldier. He was HDF’s prince. Their future leader. Istvan’s only son and heir. They would not risk him.
Taking up the cue, our group made our escape down the alley, forcing Andris to move, though I could tell he wanted to be the one to make sure all his people made it first.
“No!” Caden bellowed. “Shoot now! Kill them!” Fury danced in his eyes, and I knew he hated that they waved the white flag for him. Caden was proud. He never wanted to be treated differently from the other soldiers. He wanted to earn his place, even if it didn’t really matter if he did or not.
“That is an order!” he screamed as Birdie and another guard yanked him back, practically dragging him. “Shoot them!”
They still hesitated.
Caden fought against Birdie and two other guards trying to silence him and move him away. “Sarkis’s ex-general, Andris Takacs! He’s alive! A traitor working with the fae. Kill them now. I command you!”
My stomach sank, knowing Istvan would learn his old friend was still alive—not only alive but leading the insurgent group against him and detaining his son.
Caden’s last instruction did the trick. Shells lobbied into the passage, zipping by my ear as I saw HDF uniforms hiding behind dumpsters and walls, progressing toward us.
Kek grunted next to me as a bullet nipped across her arm and blood began pooling out, her eyes going down to the injury. “Your little boyfriend is starting to piss me off.” She frowned at the wound. “And I liked this shirt.”
Another shell skimmed her blue hair.
“Oh, hell no.” A growl crawled up her throat, scraping fear into my spine, the sound more like some unearthly beast. Her eyes turned black, then her arm waved toward a dumpster. The entire thing skidded across the cobble, revealing a handful of HDF behind.
Their eyes widened, startled and scared.
I knew all four. One had been in my class, Rafe, the other three had been in Caden’s. Their eyes found me, rage and hate filling their features.
“Fucking traitorous bitch,” one yelled.
“Get them,” another added, not realizing they were about to face a demon.
“Go, little lamb.” She waved me off. “My demon wants to play with your friends.”
“You sure?”
She rolled her eyes at me before curling her finger at the men, her lips spreading into a chilling grin. “Come here, little boys.”
“Come on!” Luk yanked me with him as shots whizzed by, forcing us to duck. We weaved through the tight passage, spotting some of our group ahead, fanning out into the main streets, escaping the noose around us.
Luk was ahead, his long legs scarfing up the distance, while I struggled to keep up. I was normally a lot faster than this, but my body felt like it was stuck in slow motion, struggling to pick up speed no matter how much I pushed. Luk curved around a corner up ahead out of my eyeline.
“Lu—” My cry to him cut off.
Wham!
As if a train smacked into me, the impact sent me flying. Twinges wrenched through my nerves as my bones crunched onto the concrete, my gun skidding across the ground. A heavy body landed painfully on top of mine, a cry puffing from my lips. My legs and arms thrashed against my assailant, my elbow ramming back into his face with a crunch.
“Fuckin’ bitch,” he snarled, grabbing my arms painfully and pinning me down. “I have fought you so many times. I dreamed of taking you down one day.” The familiar voice vehemently hissed in my ear.
Rafe. A massive guy from my class, who I defeated almost every time. He was arrogant as the rest, but quieter. Socially distant. He kept to himself. I never thought much about him either way, except when he was across the mat from me. But I always felt him watching me, pissed every time he lost to me.
“You know, all the guys used to bet about you… who would fuck you. Though, Aron bragged all the time he got in there first, popped your cherry.” Hate and shame sizzled up my esophagus, knowing Aron had. “We also bet who would beat you in practice, put you in the clinic… or who could get your mouth around their cock first.” It was the most I ever heard him say at once, and suddenly I missed his silence. “The teacher’s pet. You are the last person I ever thought would become a fae-lovin’ traitor. Vile bitch. You should be taught a lesson.” He grabbed for his belt, spearing ice down my veins.