When.Not if.
I pull back from the door.
Force my hand to drop. Force my feet to move.
Every step away from that cell feels like tearing muscle from bone.
A distant alarm blares suddenly through facility corridors. Harsh, mechanical. Not my door. Different sector. Maybe a shift change. Maybe something else.
Radio crackle from approaching guards echoes closer: “Shift rotation complete. All stations report.”
I have seconds.
One final glance at the cell. At the dim light beneath the door. At everything I’m leaving behind.Her.The curve of her cheek. The line of her neck. The silvery tendrils that have escaped to cling to her face.
Then I move.
Deeper into facility shadows as guard boots echo closer. Every instinct screaming at me to go back. Every rational thought screaming louder to survive.
I navigate by training. Emergency exits marked in faded paint, personnel flow patterns readable in worn concrete paths.
Eventually, I find what I’m looking for. A maintenance area away from the main body of the facility: steel shelving units loaded with equipment, ventilation ducts, electrical panels humming with power. The smell of oil and old metal.
I squeeze behind shelving into a narrow gap against raw rock wall. Settle into the shadows. Force my breathing to slow, my heart to quiet, my body to stop shaking from adrenaline and rage and the fresh wound of walking away from her.
I wait.
The facility continues its rhythms around me. Shift changes announced over intercoms, equipment checks marking time, transport preparations proceeding on schedule.
I count minutes by the pulse in my wrist. By the throb of damaged ribs. By how many breaths I have left before dawn comes and Ember disappears into Syndicate headquarters.
And beneath it all, that ancient dragon heartbeat continues. Slower now, fainter, but present.
The mountain breathing.
The Sleeping King watching.
And me, hiding in shadows, alive and free and alone.
While Ember sits in that cell three corridors away, waiting for a rescue that isn’t coming.
Yet.
Chapter 18
Ember
The concrete wall digs into my spine. I’ve stopped counting hours. Stopped tracking the fluorescent lights that buzz overhead, white and relentless. Stopped trying to reach for the dragon that won’t answer.
The cuffs are tight around my wrists. I’ve tested them until my skin tore, until blood dried in dark lines across my palms. Nothing changes. The magic stays buried beneath layers of tech I can’t break. Magic I can’t access anyway.
And Luke is dead.
The thought circles back no matter how hard I try to push it away. They said dawn. They said execution. They said he served his purpose… and by now, he’s gone.
My fault.
If I’d been stronger in those caves. If I’d controlled my power instead of letting it explode wild and desperate. If I’d done anything differently—
