Zion spread his arms wide. “Meet the renegades.”
I gaped at the mass of people milling about. The young lounged in circles near the cavern’s walls, their voices booming. Adults stood around the rough-cut wooden tables with old, weathered books supporting the too-short legs. Their chatter followed their movements as they sorted heaps of papers and hand-drawn blueprints and schematics.
The rest either quietly chatted in small groups or floated from one person to another, clapping their shoulders and embracing them with wide smiles.
“Zola.”
I whirled around, catching Rowan nodding a greeting to an elderly woman. Wrinkles framed her eyes as bright as the last time I’d seen her. She was the one who’d arranged the delivery of the soldier’s body parts to the intended recipients.
And her name was Zola.
“Rowan.” She smiled. “Could you please check the tunnels and bring any roamers back here?”
Dipping his chin in acknowledgment, he melted back into the shadows swirling in the closest exit.
Adjusting her silver, waist-long braid, Zola erased the distance between us, standing tall despite barely reaching my chin. “So, my dearest, are you ready to lead your army?”
9
ZION
Kali twisted to face me with such fury my heart skipped a beat. Her jaw practically creaked as she stared me down.
Ava clapped me on the shoulder. “Good luck.” Shrugging off her teal parka with the puffiest sleeves I’d ever seen, she disappeared into the crowd with Eli in tow, his high ponytail as tight as his mood.
Maybe Ava would be able to lighten him up a bit. He needed a release, and not the kind Eislyn had addicted him to.
He’d even ceased fighting me in our training rings. Apparently, I was too unpredictable and he “couldn’t afford any new injuries.”
As if the last one had been the consequence of my actions. He should’ve warned me at the beginning that fractures were off the potential outcomes list.
Plus, only two of his fingers had dislocated. He should’ve tumbled on his ass, not his side. Fault didn’t fall on me because the man had forgotten the proper techniques for falling safely.
“I climbed down a shaft so dark it felt bottomless, and you couldn’t tell me we were meetingZola?” Kali’s shoulders rose and fell in such a controlled manner my mouth watered.
Oh, how I adored her rage.
I flicked her nose. “Surprise.”
The crease between her black eyebrows deepened, begging me to succumb to its song and trace its contour until it smoothed out.
Zola laced her fingers, the sun-spotted skin paper-thin. “I guess Zion forgot to inform you of who I am.” She gave me a stern look.
“I could never forget.” Lightly clutching her shoulders, I kissed her dry cheek. “I barely contained myself from wrapping you in a bow as a gift to Kali.”
Zola shook her head, her gray hair glowing in the dimness. Rusted lanterns secured to the cavern’s domed walls failed to illuminate the space sufficiently. “As peculiar as you are, in the end, you’re a good man, Zion.” She patted my chest, right where Ilasall’s military usually had their knives strapped across their pectorals. “Please take care of him,” she told Kali.
“You’re getting soft with age, Zola.” I hooked my thumbs in the loops of my fitted cargo pants, a standard fit for the city’s soldiers. According to Kali, I had to look like one: foreboding, imperious, and ready to get my hands dirty.
Now, the latter was set to occur in a few hours. I couldn’t return to our compound without someone to occupy me for the night. Certain urges could be satisfied only by the sharpness of my knife and the blubbers and wails of my playthings reverberating off the earthy-smelling walls of our basement.
And then, naturally, I would taste my pretty birdie until her gasps and moans morphed into a melody loud enough to awaken the people residing on the floor below us. Which also signaled it was time to flip her onto her belly, stuff a pillow under her hips, and sink into her tight pussy to lure out more of her enthralling screams.
Zola’s smile widened. “And I bet you’re getting hard from whatever you’re daydreaming about right now. I may be old,but I can still feel things.” Laughing, she strolled off, toward the large table in the center of the chamber.
Feelings. Such an odd term to describe your world falling apart. Like the night Ilasall had invaded our compound twelve years ago, when Zola and her partner had been shoved into Ilasall’s military trucks and taken to the city for fertility testing, never to be reunited again.
“Zola. A bow. A present to me.” A heavy sigh rocked through Kali. “You can’t gift aperson, Zion.”
