Searching the eyes of the people adorned in enough jewels and fine clothes to feed their people for a year, she lifted her chin high, looking down on the king who knelt before her. No one dared look away.
Her voice rose above the wind and carried throughout the courtyard.
“As the king’s eldest child, I challenge my brother for the crown.”
Miya regarded her father with one last look before slamming the palace doors shut on the shouts erupting behind her.
CHAPTER 70
Kira
The Territories
United Base, Caspador
833 P.C. [Post-Collapse]
The last time blood covered Kira, she lost herself so deeply that Zayne barely coaxed her back to herself. This time, he died if Kira didn't save him, and it didn't matter that his blood felt even worse than his mom's and the Followers’. Kira needed to stay strong.
The jet landed on an airstrip inside a large military base. From the sky, she'd seen how enormous the building was and how isolated they were from anything else. They'd flown over dark patchworks of farmland to make it here, but for quite a few minutes before landing, she didn't even see that. Only untamed green below.
Her first few steps were unsteady when she walked away from the jet, sick from the flight. They'd shot so fast through the sky to escape Ciondo that she kept getting sick on the way. Though they didn't encounter any fighter jets, she could hear her pilot talking through the headset about Ciondian missiles and decoys to protect their path.
A group of United soldiers rushed out to meet Kira. Before she saw the mother she spent most of her life longing for, before she even asked for a washrag, shelifted her chin at the closest officer and imagined carrying the authority of the Riven family. “Take me to whoever is in charge.”
“Ms. Stiles.” A soldier walked forward, his kind expression concerned. “You've been through—”
“Now.”
He paused and then turned away, calling someone on his phone.
Nausea battered Kira from the flight, but she refused to show any weakness. She might not know how to command soldiers, but she spent plenty of time watching Zayne, and he never showed his suffering. Kira knew the brokenness waiting for her the moment she stopped to rest or sleep, but right now, with her adrenaline pumping, she could fight through the worst injuries.
Brock stepped beside her, a mess of bandages and gauze. It hadn't been easy trying to take care of his wounds in the jet. She couldn't reach him, and he was forced to patch himself up while flying so fast he could barely move his arms.
He squeezed her hand, saying nothing, but looking forward with the same devastation everyone must see in her eyes.
“Major Tyndale says he'll see you and will gather whoever he can,” an officer said. “He's only a few minutes away.”
Kira nearly collapsed at the news, but she couldn't.
The soldier led her inside the massive hangar door and through a long hall to a bathroom, giving her washcloths and clothes. Kira avoided the mirror, not wanting to see Zayne's blood when she'd never unsee it.
Her hands trembled, and her stomach lurched. She clasped the sink, eyes closing.
Everything hurt.
Her heart was a massive, hemorrhaging wound.
Gushing blood like Zayne's chest.
Stop it.
If she let herself think about him, anything about him, she'd fall apart. Kira stripped off her ruined clothes and cleaned his dried blood from her skin in the sink. There was just so much of it. Her mind was caught in flashes of memory, of the bullets piercing the air, and his hot blood soaking her hands.
His tongue pressing against hers.
The fears beat at her mind.
