─── ❝She was expensive,
like the piece of velvet she was wearing,
but she demanded his heart,
not his money❞
or
─── in which he finds his crow in the most unfortunate t...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
chapter fifteen, no time to die
THE EERIE ATMOSPHERE made the escaping group of people feel defeated for a split second. The Fjerdan soldiers, hooded, dressed in dark colours and silver, pointed their guns at them while the shrilling bells of Black Protocol announced their doom. There was nowhere to run, there was nowhere to hide as the Ash Tree, surrounded by the maze seemed to capture them once and for all.
Matthias felt immense fear choke him as he was holding the wailing body of a new Grisha, his friend. Watching in the eye of his previous comrades who now were pointing their guns at him, looking at him as if he was a traitor made him feel uneasy. Being on the other side of the war felt strange, holding Lavender felt strange – he felt like a traitor, and he felt as if all of his life was a lie.
"If this isn't Matthias Helvar," one of the soldiers in the back murmured, pushing down his hood while watching them all with a glint of evilness in his eyes.
Lavender squirmed in Matthias' arms from hearing the familiar voice and she slightly pushed his hand, letting him know that he should put her down. Once her bare feet touched the cold marble stone of the courtyard, not far from the Ash Tree, she felt as if she was going to fall, so she clung to Matthias' hand as she turned her head to the side, noticing figures moving in the shadows.
They were surrounded.
Matthias didn't have a chance to say anything as Nina raised her hands to drop the soldier's pulse, but a loop of cable struck her, binding her legs and arms together, keeping them still, so she wouldn't do anything. Others grabbed Aleksej and brought him down to his knees as they put a rifle behind the Shu scientist.
The Fjerdan soldier stepped closer, a few soldiers surrounding him, guns pointed at the traitor. In the hands of the leading soldier was a whip, it was with a long handle and the ends were made from a thin leather, little loops attached to the end made from pure metal.
"Thought you were dead. Appears you are just a traitor," the soldier admitted, raising the whip. "Remember this? You helped to design it."
Within these words, he moved the whip towards the squirming Heartrender, hitting her with the sharp loops of the whip, making Matthias release a grunt of disapproval.
"Leave her be," Matthias grunted out, ready to risk it all for this group of criminals even when he was standing in such a sacred place.
The soldier motioned four other guys, with the black and silver uniform, to surround the Fjerdan giant and push him down on his knees, making another guy grasp Lavender away, pushing her towards the soldier with a whip.
The man caught the limp Grisha, grasping her neck from behind, making her look at him as she clearly was having difficulty breathing. A satisfied hum left his lips her cheeks was drenched with blood and other fluid that came from her eye. He didn't even need strength to hold her down as he passed the whip to a soldier beside him, pushing the hair away from her face with a smirk as she was still crying.
