“It worked when we needed it,” I say, squeezing Eliza. “Not to stop the bond… to protect it.”
Ash’s face is a revelation. “Like the mountains protected us that night,” he says to Jo. She nods, eyes so filled with love for her man, it takes my breath away.
Until I look down at Eliza and see the same thing, amplified a hundredfold for me.
“Mine,” I whisper through the bond.
Her cheeks flush. She doesn’t get the word but the feeling. That there’s nothing on this damn planet that could keep me from her.
“And jewelry?” Ash adds, skepticism in his voice.
Of course, he wouldn’t know. They’ve got a lot left to learn. “Ancient alloy… from my father.”
He nods once, face unreadable.
The meeting breaks gradually, Wildbloods dispersing into smaller groups, voices low, movements purposeful.
Mags approaches once the others thin out. Her gaze flicks between me and Eliza again, her expression thoughtful.
“Been keeping an eye on your ranch,” she says.
Eliza looks up. “The cows? The horses? Are they okay?” What she doesn’t say, the unspoken sits heavy between us.
“Chickens, too,” Mags continues with a reassuring smile. “No new deaths. Animals are calm again.”
“And the crop circle?” Eliza asks. “Any other… activity?”
Mags hesitates, then nods toward the valley. “No repeats there either. That’s something to be grateful for.”
Eliza’s hand squeezes mine. “We saw something… with the glowing men. Insect-like creatures. But they moved in unison. Too perfect to be natural. I think they had something to do with the dead bull, though I can’t say why.”
I nod once. “Their tech went quiet,” I say. “When we broke it. Then the Sentinels vanished.”
“You broke it?” Jo chimes in, breathlessly. “With these?” She eyes the objects on the table.
“Seemed that way,” I say, though I’m still forming thoughts around what happened.
“Ash didn’t break them,” she whispers. “But he found the tether with his mind… how they communicate. He severed it.”
Mags’s face lights up. “Maybe that explains it. Without the tether to guide their movements, they transformed into an unthinking, uncontrollable swarm.”
A shiver travels down Eliza’s spine like cold ice, echoing in my body. “To think of Baylor going out that way…” Her voice throbs with horror. She shakes her head. “Raised that bull from a bottle-fed calf.”
I pull her close, kissing the top of her head. Reaching out to her with comfort and reassurance.
“We should explore this further,” Mags says. “And we shouldn’t discount the role the government men might play in this… or assume all the Ancients think the same.”
Her last words slam into me. Ash, too.
“All Sentinels can go back to hell where they belong,” he says too quickly.
My words are more measured. “Don’t like that… complication.” My father and mother’s fate flash in my mind. Cold-blooded deaths without hesitation by all accounts. Calculated. Efficient. It’s why I can’t deny my next words. “They didn’t move like hunters. More like something learning how to be something else. They weren’t like the stories. Not yet at least.”
Mags’s gaze drifts—not to me, not to Eliza—but somewhere past us. Like she’s remembering something she never put into words.
“Magdalena Redfern, whataren’tyou telling me?”
We’re back to the conversation in the feed store, my suspicions sharpening.
