PROMISE

CHAPTER 37

Hain sat on his haunches, the bars of the cell behind him grating against his back. Lilith spoke, her words pleading. But her voice seemed far off. Distant. Like mouthed prayers in an empty church.

They couldn't stay, she and Hain. That was the essence of her plea.

A sliver of his mind knew she was right. The part that still distinguished up from down. Right from wrong.

And this–this was wrong. So, so wrong.

Sam's face, dotted with dried blood like the remnants of a corrupted baptism, was wrong. The dead women and men in the cells, their lives fed into the grinding clockwork of Vrai machinations. They were wrong.

Hain's cheeks were wet, and he swiped at them with the back of his hand. His knees popped as he rose.

A pit opened inside him. Black as death. Bottomless as perdition. Brimming with hate that burned away his fear, its depths thirsting to be filled by red violence.

Rise, he thought, though the voice in his mind was not his own. He turned his eyes from the husk that had been his cousin. Ringing filled his ears and his clenched fists went white.

Again, he heard the new voice in his mind. One that didn't jeer or mock. One of command. Of blood, and retribution.

Rise, Hain, this voice said. Rise, and lay waste to it all.

Hain did what he was told. And for the first time in his life he wasn't scared.

~~~

Hain gripped his rifle with steady hands as they ascended from the bowels of Sierra. They flew up the stairs, feet pounding the stone as shouts echoed from above. Someone had raised the alarm.

Good, Hain thought, and the hate gurgled like boiling tar inside him. More guards meant more would pay for what they'd done to Sam.

A guard crossed the landing at a run as they neared the top of the steps. The man skidded to a halt when he saw them, unsheathing his sword as his foot found the first step.

The hall filled with Hain's feral scream as he pulled the trigger on his rifle.

The guard met a wall of thunder. Some of the shots went wide, and they sang against the stone. But some found their mark. Enough to bleed. Enough to maim. Enough to kill.

Cotton ripped from the holes punched in the guard's quilted armor. The man staggered, steel meeting stone when his sword dropped about his feet. It wasn't until the guard was a still heap on the floor that Hain let go of the trigger.

"More coming," Lilith said from his side. "We need to move."

But Hain stayed rooted to the spot, staring through the acrid smoke at the unmoving shape. Blood glistened from the floor.

I killed him, Hain thought. The trio of words formed in his mind, unattached to feeling. Hain waited for the dam holding back his emotions to give. But nothing came. No remorse. No timid cringing. Not even the searing hate he'd felt at seeing Sam. Just numbness.

Lilith slapped his arm hard enough to leave a welt. "Hain!"

The sudden pain snapped him back to the present. He snarled and yanked his arm away.

"Don't touch me!"

Lilith took a short step back as though he'd punched her. "I just–"

"You just nothing." The words gushed from his mouth, but he did nothing to cinch the flow. Instead, he lanced a finger at her face. "Don't ever touch me."