The Lightning Queen

Chapter 18

Mare

Airjets whirr overhead, I can feel the hum of electricity. Pulling electricity from the airjets, I can tell the Lakelander troops was not expecting that, a fiery explosion coats the already smokey field.

"Mare." Something inside me leaps towards the voice but my body stays put. Emotions cannot rule over me. I will not allow it.

Blue eyes wide with shocked. "I thought you were dead." His tone is mild but eyes blazing, a ferocity I've seen before. His hands cup my cheeks as hot lips slam onto mine, stealing the breath out of me.

Then his arms wraps tightly around my shoulders, the metal of his marine blue armor is dented at the chest area. I don't return the embrace.

A missile sounds overhead. Something in my chest blooms. My fist clenches at my side, nails digging into my palms.

He pulls back taking another look at me.

His thumb runs along my flushed cheeks, I tear my eyes off him and shove him away.

"Let's go." He pulls me back to the front and keeps me down low.

"We have a temporary truce." He clenches his jaw and nods.

"Stay here and keep pulling the aircrafts down." He says with a palm on my knee which I shove away. I need time to formulate a strategy.

He moves from where we are to the front.

I feel the heat from where I am. The aircrafts falls from the sky. The air is filled with smoke, I cough. The sounds of gunfire echoes across each sides of the field.

War makes monsters.

Something inside me makes me move and walk towards the front. The ground covered in water to my ankles, there are no more flames.

Water spirals, extinguishing the flames.

Iris came. Why? Of course to avenge her father.

My eyes meets hers, disappointments floods from both ends.

"Maven!" He glances and runs towards me.

"I told you stay in back." His voice holds edge.

"Look at the ground," He looks at the ground. "We have an advantage." Bullets fly but Maven melts them aways.

My magnetrons forms them into needles and angles then towards the Lakelanders troops.

I grip his arms. "Get our people off the ground." I push him lightly, he doesn't listen to me. "Please do it." He finally complies.

Lightning strikes the water, arms pulls me out of the water.

"You can still get hurt," I don't hear him. I hear the screams and I flinch.

He angles my face to his. "Focus on me." His eyes say. I feel like a monster.

I am a monster.

"We can't stay here forever, we can only fix this war from a political standpoint." He says. I instantly remember what I did today in Piedmont. We walk back to the barracks. Leaving behind other troops to hold to the front.

"I did something today?" I confess. When we're alone.

He chuckles and I feel it coming off in vibration. "I know you did." He points his head to the now electric pond. He's referring to me freeing Iris. But I didn't start this war, thing one, two, and three did.

"I went to Piedmont, emptied one of their treasuries and framed the Lakelander royals." Maven knows the Piedmont princes. He can negotiate and finally angle the tables differently in ways I can't.