"Trust the music," Alaric whispers.
Elodie squeezes the trigger.
CRACK.
The bullet flies. It grazes Alaric’s ear—a sting of heat. It hits Thorne in the left eye. The Senator’s head snaps back. The gun falls from his hand. He collapses backward, dead before he hits the floor.
Alaric sags in the chains, his legs giving way. Elodie drops the rifle. She runs to him. "Keys!" she yells at Nyx, who appears in the doorway behind her. "Get me the keys!"
Nyx rushes forward, grabbing the keys from the dead guard. She unlocks the shackles. Alaric falls. Elodie catches him. She wraps her arms around him, lowering him gently to the blood-stained floor. She buries her face in his neck. She is shaking.
"I got you," she sobs. "I got you."
Alaric leans his head against her shoulder. He smells the smoke on her. The gunpowder. "Nice shot," he wheezes.
She pulls back, tears streaming down her face, cutting through the soot. "I aimed for the silence," she says.
He reaches up with his battered hand and touches her face. "Let's go home, Elodie."
"We don't have a home," she says, helping him up. "You burned it down."
"Then we'll build a new one," he says. "On top of their bones."
They walk out of the torture chamber. Past Thorne’s body. Past the dead guards. Into the smoke-filled corridor.
The war is not over. The Syndicate is vast. But tonight... tonight belongs to the duet.
CHAPTER 26
STEEL LULLABY
POV: Elodie Fray
Location:The Factory Loading Dock -> Westbound Freight Train (Car 409)
Track:Wicked Game– Ursine Vulpine & Annaca (Cinematic Cover)
Sensory:The rhythmicclack-clackof steel wheels on rails, the smell of straw and diesel, the stinging burn of antiseptic on raw flesh.
Mood:Broken Intimacy & Exile.
The extraction is a blur of smoke, shouting, and the screeching of tires.
Nyx drives the getaway vehicle—a nondescript delivery van she hijacked from the loading dock—with the cold precision of a machine. She weaves through the labyrinthine industrial district, running red lights, mounting curbs, putting distance between us and the carnage at the factory.
In the back, amidst crates of stolen engine parts, I hold Alaric. He is conscious, but barely. The adrenaline that sustained him through the torture and the standoff has evaporated, leaving behind a body that is rapidly shutting down. His head rests on my lap. His breathing is shallow, hitching with every bump in the road. His face is a roadmap of violence—one eye swollen shut, his lip split, fresh blood soaking through the makeshift bandages on his shoulder.
"Stay with me," I whisper, brushing the matted hair from his forehead. My hands are still black with soot and gunpowder. "We're almost there."
"Where..." he wheezes, his good eye tracking my face in the strobing streetlights passing overhead.
"The rail yard," Nyx calls from the front. "The airports are locked down. The roads are being watched. The only way out of the city is the Iron Road."
Alaric tries to nod, but the movement causes him to groan. He grips my hand. His fingers are weak, trembling. The Director—the man who held the world by the throat—can barely squeeze my fingers. The sight of his weakness doesn't scare me anymore. It enrages me. It fuels the cold, hard furnace that has ignited in my chest.
The van screeches to a halt. "End of the line," Nyx announces. She jumps out and throws open the back doors. The noise of the rail yard hits us—the grinding of metal, the hiss of air brakes, the distant whistles. "Train 409," Nyx says, checking her watch. "Westbound. Leaving in two minutes. It’s a slow haul cargo. Boxcar 7 is unsealed. I checked the manifest."
"You're not coming?" I ask, helping Alaric sit up.
