The rain’s still hammering outside when I throw my pack over my shoulder and head for the door. My boots splash through puddles of shattered glass.
The wind’s biting cold. Smells like rain and iron and smoke. I pull my jacket tighter and start running.
Down the narrow streets. Past the dead lights. Through the underpass where the city’s heartbeat slows to a crawl. Every sound echoes too loud—the slap of my boots, the rasp of my breath, the wind whistling between the old metal beams.
I keep replaying his laugh in my head. The way he’d shout for “sky growls” every time thunder hit. The way his eyes would light up when Takhiss walked in the room. The way his fingers curled around mine when he fell asleep.
Each memory’s a blade.
Each one keeps me running.
By the time I reach the outskirts, the storm’s tearing the sky open. Lightning splits the clouds in white veins, painting the world in brief, violent snapshots—rusted rooftops, slick pavement, the skeletal outline of the city beyond.
I spot an old transit tower ahead—dead since the war. Perfect. The signal scramblers there still work if you know how to talk to them. Clint taught me that trick once, back before everything went to hell.
He owes me.
He promised.
If anyone can trace a ghost signal through a blackout, it’s him and that crew of misfits he calls family.
I climb. The metal’s slick, cold enough to bite through my gloves. Wind slams into me with every step. By the time I reach the top, my hair’s plastered to my face, soaked through. I slam my pack down, yank open the console panel, and start wiring in a manual boost.
The system hums weakly. Half the circuits are fried. Doesn’t matter. I just need a pulse. A ping strong enough to scream across the void.
My breath fogs the glass as I lean over the old comm dish.
“Come on,” I mutter. “Come on, Rogers. Pick up.”
Lightning hits somewhere close, the shockwave rattling the tower under my boots. The console flares to life for one heartbeat—a burst of static, then a single blip.
Signal acquired.
“Got you,” I breathe.
The transmission line flutters—unstable, but alive. I route everything through. One final message.
Ella: Vex taken. Coalition marks. Ataxian sterilizer residue. Need Aces High. Find him. Please.
I hit send. The console sparks one last time and dies.
The sky’s howling now, wind and rain and thunder rolling together like war drums. The sound drowns everything else out—my fear, my anger, even my heartbeat.
When I open my eyes again, there’s only one thought left.
They took my son.
And I am coming for him.
No god, no priestess, no tribunal’s going to stop me.
Not this time.
Not ever.
CHAPTER 42
TAKHISS
