The rest are boot prints heading outwards, past the guard that is doubled over, holding his midsection that spills black blood, past the lilac-eyed one who is slumped and dead, and beyond the guard who, face twisted with rage, holds a gushing hole on his chest.
And for too long, I’m stunned.
Frozen.
In all the time I’ve spent in the blackout, with fae monsters prowling in the dark, I’ve learned how fucking hard it is to kill them.
The first fae who was hit died, or it seemed like it. The slap-happy one with lilac eyes, definitely dead.
It looks like the bullets might be aimed with more purpose than I first thought.
The kill-strikes are to the neck.
But this one, with the middle of his chest pierced by the metal of a bullet, punches up from the road.
His murderous glare turns on the boot prints that spear off around him.
In a blink, he’s charging after the runaways.
But the bullets don’t stop coming.
It’s hail raining down on us.
I twist onto my front, snow spraying all around me, and lean my weight back until I’m planted on my knees.
My shoulders curve inwards, as if to protect me somehow, but these people firing at us don’t seem to give a shit that they are striking humans, too.
Maybe they intended on it.
How it must look to them, from a distance, humans banded together in a dark fae unit, maybe willing slaves, maybe to them we have made deals to save ourselves.
Sort of true in my case.
I didn’t make the deal, but either way, I’m not taking a bullet for any fae or disillusioned human.
They can all fuck off.
I scramble to my boots and, leaving behind the few captives who remain in the circle, I run.
The slam of my boots pound down on the snow. Each kick of the soles under me threatens to slip back too far.
If they were shit for walking on the snow, then they are the worst for running. I wobble and stagger and stumble with every other step, until I throw myself to the side of a van.
For a beat, I flatten my back to the door and throw my gaze around the bridge.
Two captives barrel past me—
And the van crunches.
I cry out with the sudden shudder of the door against my back and I drop to the ground, a puppet with her strings cut.
Before I can even look up at the van, at what crushed it, a loud metal groan comes—and then boots smack down in front of me.
My wide gaze lifts up the leathers, the muscle, of the fae, a guard.
He throws me a dark look for the quickest moment, then he’s off.
Chasing down the captives.
