I cannot use my physical voice any longer,she says.My power is depleted. It would only hasten my death. You mustgather all our sisters and prepare to fight. The monster escaped at dawn this morning. It’s only been hours, so you have a chance before he regains his full power.
Something happened to free him, but I don’t know what it was. A jolt of power struck through the lava, and then the monster clawed his way out from its depths. With his dragon’s fire, he melted the surface to conceal the cracks, and then he told me he would leave the maze and seek his revenge. You must stop him before he gets out of the maze!
I am frozen, processing what she said, a single piece of information rocketing around within my mind.
He escaped hours ago.
An hour in that realm is a month in the outside world.
If he got out of the maze already, then it’s been months!
I reach for Striker, my hand extending to his, my instincts screaming at me, but I can’t make sense of what I’m feeling.
More dread than I thought possible.
“He’s been out for months,” I whisper.
And yet, I never sensed it.
“Out and back again,” Striker murmurs.
He remains impossibly calm as he turns to me.
Before I can ask him what he means, he says, “I need you to do something for me, Peyton, and I promise it’s the last thing I’ll ever ask of you.”
I swallow hard, trying to breathe even though it feels like I want to tear myself out of my own skin. “Striker?”
He speaks quietly, calmly, but firmly. “I need you to go to Vanguard, leave the maze, and never look back. If you do this, your past will be in the past.”
“But—”
“You have every possible future ahead of you, Peyton.” A gentle smile lifts his lips. “Everything you want, you have thestrength to make it happen. You always did.” He pauses. “Will you do this?”
I don’t understand why he’s telling me to leave or why he’s phrasing his request in this way.
I want to say no.
But before I can object, Jonah grabs me, and the heat in his hands, the sudden unwarranted threat of his fire, startles me enough that he pulls me three paces away from Striker before my reflexes kick in.
Striker immediately turns to the clouds on our right, his voice rising. “Come on, then!” he roars, his beast’s fury filling his voice. “Come and get me!”
The clouds part in a rush of air.
A blur of claws and teeth and wings smacks into Striker, knocking him off the bridge so fast that I don’t have time to scream before he and his attacker plummet out of sight.
“No!” My scream finally sounds. “Striker!”
Jonah’s hold is unrelenting, and his voice at my ear is filled with determination and not a hint of regret. “You may hate me, Fury, but I will not let you die here.”
Then he’s pulling me along the bridge, and no matter how hard I kick and scratch, he doesn’t let me go.
31. STRIKER DRAVEN
My beast roars to the surface as I plunge through the clouds and into a dark night.
The impact of my attacker’s hit was so immense that he spiraled away from me, and then I lost sight of him. I’m certain he was aiming for the box, but I refused to let go of it, my arm clamped around it even now.
A vast field of yellow flowers rises rapidly up to meet me, and even though I know there’s no possible way for me to land safely, I manage to get my feet under me, crashing into the earth with athump.
