She disappeared from the clearing.
Crack.
Lightning flashed.
Alexis rematerialized on the tree line in a cloud of smoke, a foot away from me, looking shocked.
Not only had she leapt a short distance—highly dangerous because of the increased odds of slamming into objects—but she’d leapt directlytome.
“You could have decapitated yourself on a tree!” I lunged for her, snow crunching.
Alexis threw herself backward, grimacing when she backed into a tree. Leaping while injured wasalsoextremely dangerous. She’d exacerbated the hemorrhaging.
“Let me help you.”
Alexis moved away.
I stalked after her.
“Alexis, you shouldn’t leap when you’re injured. You could have hurt yourself!” Augustus shouted from the clearing.
He sprinted toward us with Patro and Achilles on his heels.
Alexis looked back and forth between the approaching men and the deeper woods with wild eyes, like she was debating her options.
She wouldn’t.
When injured, Spartans didn’t leap multiple times in a row because the odds of blood loss, permanent damage, and severe dismemberment were high. We were born with an innate sense of self-preservation.
Alexis took a deep breath.
Yes, she fucking would.
On instinct, I threw myself at her, my hand grabbing her bicep.
Crack.
The two of us were alone.
We were standing in a field of green grass.
The May temperature was mild. Shining softly, the sun was setting in a pink haze.
A hundred feet away, barbed wire fenced in a forest. A sign proclaimed in red letters, “Spartan Federation Militarized Protected Zone, Titans Beware.”
She’d taken us back to Montana, where we’d found her living under a fucking tarp.
“Do you have no sense of self-preservation?” I yelled in horror.
Alexis yanked out of my grip.
Stumbling, she ripped off her blood-soaked gloves and stared down at her trembling fingers. “Drex,” she mouthed silently.
Is there a faint glow coming from her hands?
She wiped it off and it looked normal.
“Leaping twice in a row? What were you thinking? Are youtryingto kill yourself?” I snarled.
