She goes completely limp, and for one terrifying moment I think I've broken her more than she already was. But no, she's breathing, just... gone. Blacked out from the stress or the force of my bark or both.
Raven snatches up the gun while Nikolai and Knight rush over, crowding around us.
I expect the fear and worry I find on Raven's face. The boy's obsessed. Clinically. As for Knight, he's pure obsessive devotion in mostly human form. Nikolai, though…
His gaze locks on mine briefly, and I find the same troubling combination of emotions I'm feeling right now reflected in it, along with the last damn thing I expected. Gratitude.
We can't get back to shooting each other fast enough for my liking.
"Is she alright?" Raven demands, his hands twitching like he wants to touch her but doesn't know where. Doesn't know if she'll shatter.
"Did any of that look alright to you?" I grumble, lifting Cosima into my arms as I stand. She weighs nothing, just a bundle of silk and trauma that we've allowed to drag us all into this mess. "This shit's gone far enough. We're aborting the mission, getting thefuck off this train, and finding the furthest, darkest hole to crawl into with our omega while this all blows over."
Our omega.
The words ricochet around my skull like the real bullet that damn well could have ended up in there if shit had gone south.
When the fuck did I start thinking that?
Before anyone can argue or call me on it—and I can see Nikolai and Raven both gearing up to do each of those things respectively—the train rocks on its tracks and chaos erupts outside our car. Voices shouting in Surhiiran, the sound of running feet echoing through distant cars, metal scraping against metal.
"What the hell was that?" Nikolai barks, moving toward the door.
Plague chuckles, the sound dark and satisfied despite his precarious position. "That would be the 'too late' I warned you about."
Raven's already moving, gun in hand as he heads for the door. I want to grab him, shake some sense into him, but my arms are full of unconscious omega and my patience is running on fumes.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" I growl.
"Having a look," he says, like it's the most reasonable thing in the world. "Cover me."
"Coveryou?" Nikolai bellows, reaching for him. "You suicidal little?—"
Guess I'm not the only one burdened with caring if two people live or die, after all. Normally, I'd be thrilled at discovering my nemesis has one weakness, let alone two.
Ifwe didn't happen to share them.
We both curse when Raven slips just out of his reach like smoke, hauling the door open, leaning out into the wind. His golden hair whips wildly around his face as he peers between the cars, and I watch his eyes go wide.
"Shit—"
Nikolai yanks him back just as a bullet screams past, embedding itself in the doorframe right where Raven's head had been a second earlier. The fucker has a sixth sense, I'll give him that. And I guess now I owe him my life, or might as well.
Fuck.
"We've got company," Raven mutters, his usual composure frayed around the edges. I've seen him under enemy fire before, cool and collected, but this is different.
We're not used to having something to protect.
Nikolai drags the door shut, the metal groaning under his grip. "Son of a fucking shitfuck," he hisses. "We've gotta get off this train."
"Is it the army?" I ask, shifting Cosima in my arms so I can reload my gun.
"Worse," Nikolai says, his gaze darkening. "It's the fucking Ghosts."
Before anyone can respond, there's a massive thump on the roof above us. The whole car shudders, and then comes the sound of metal tearing, as if someone's peeling back the roof like a tin can.
Knight roars in response, the sound primal and furious. He positions himself between us and whatever's up there, claws extended and ready to tear into flesh and bone.
