Chapter 275
Elara’s POV
“Put the map where everyone can bleed on it.”
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Vessa slapped the vellum on the long table. Pins rattled. The hall smelled like oil and wet leather. Wolves crowded the rail, but the center belonged to my unit. Gamma Protocol filled the space like a drawn bow.
“Names,” I said. “Loud.”
“Vessa,” she answered, chin up. “Strike lead.”
“Ilia,” came from the shadow near the pillar. “Scout and climb.”
“Zara,” a tall woman said, rolling her shoulders. “Shields.”
“Serena,” soft voice, hard eyes. “Medic and blade.”
“Nora,” small, steady, knuckles taped. “Traps.”
“Leira,” braids tight, smile tight. “Locks and keys.”
“Eliza,” bow across her back. “Watch and rain.”
“Prisca,” fingers stained with soot. “Firebreaks. Not fire.”
Mira thumped her shield once. “Wall.”
I nodded. “This is the spear. The rest of you are the arm.”
Eden cleared his throat. “Citadel sits in the limestone cut beyond the mill. Three tiers. Outer wall is stone, inner is timber, core is iron. Two gates. One false. Wells inside are capped.”
“Hostages,” I asked.
“Moved between sunset and moonrise,” Eden said. “Dawn Wing eyes counted six girls, maybe eight. One fits Kaia’s size.”
A muscle jumped in my cheek. “We take them first.”
Mira lifted her shield to the map. “Outer wall here. Watch towers. Archers will expect us at the road.”
“We do not take the road,” Ilia said. She pointed at a scribble near the quarry, “Goat ladder. Narrow and mean. Leads to the back drain.”
Nora leaned in. “Traps?”
Ilia’s mouth twitched. “I cut three. They will set more.”
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“Good,” I said. “We bring three more cutters.”
Vessa tapped the quarry edge. “Dawn feints at the front with noise and smoke. Night climbs the goat ladder and opens the back. Gamma Protocol slices the spine from inside.”
Garron let out a short laugh from the rail. “Clean on paper.”
I looked up at him. “Stay long enough to watch it get dirty.”
He folded his arms and did not leave. Good.
I planted red pins. “Objectives. One. Cut the bells. Two. Find the hostages. Three. Lock the inner hall before Miela can run. Four. Take the core. No fires inside until all girls are out. Serena calls burn or no burn. Only Serena.”
Serena nodded. “I will mark doors with chalk. Green means clear. Red means wait. If you run past red, I break your legs.”
Nora grinned. “She will too.”
Eliza tapped her bow. “Signals?”
“Three notes from the whistle,” I said. “Open. Two notes. Close. One long. Down.”
“Simple,” Leira said. “I like simple.”
Eden rolled out a thin leather case. Vials clinked. “Smell masks. Not pretty. They keep seed oil and smoke out of your head for a while.”
Serena sniffed one and made a face. “Tastes like bad lemons.”
“Better than not waking up,” Eden said.
“Gear,” I called. “Check it now.”
Leather creaked. Blades flashed. Ilia climbed the stone pillar and hung there like a quiet cat, testing holds. Nora dumped a pouch on the table, counted spikes, wire, hooks, then counted again. Serena sorted bandages by size and blood. Vessa tested the snap on her vambrace until it stopped catching.
I touched the torque at my throat, Heavy, Sure, Mine now. The bowl flame in the corner burned small and steady.
“Before we move,” I said, “say why you are here.”
Zara spoke first. “Because men laughed when I asked for a shield heavier than theirs.”
Leira rolled a lockpick across her knuckles. “Because doors never open themselves.”
Prisca smiled without humor. “Because I was told to sew banners. I would rather cut them.”
Nora looked at her hands. “Because the girl they took last winter looked like my sister.”
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Serena tied off a roll of cloth. “Because no one dies thirsty on my watch.”
Ilia, still hanging, spoke calm. “Because I am good at climbing what scares other people.”
Vessa looked at me, then at the map. “Because this is what we trained for.”
I set my palm on the table. “Because Miela does not get to build crowns on girls.”
Silence hit like a fist and held. Then the horn outside answered. Not alarm. Muster.
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Eden’s bead clicked. “Scouts report light on the citadel wall. No patrol at the goat ladder. Bad sign. Either they sleep or they want us there.”
Ilia dropped to the floor. “I will find which.”
“Take Eliza,” I said. “Quiet. If you see a bell, cut it.”
They vanished through the side door without a sound.
Garron spoke again, voice low. “You named this unit after a rank no one took seriously.”
I faced him. “They will.”
He tilted his head. “They already do.”
“Then pick up a shield,” I said. “Or get out of the way.”
He did neither. He stayed and watched.
Mira set her shield into the slot on her back. “Orders for the first minute in.”
“Simple,” I said. “We do not hunt Miela first. We take her ladders and her light. If she runs in the dark, she trips.”
Vessa arched a brow. “And if she flies.”
“Then I clip a wing,” I said. “Leave the other for morning.”
“Copy,” she said.
Two shadows slid back into the hall. Ilia’s braid stuck with dust. Eliza’s bowstring was dark with dew. Ilia dropped a small sack on the map. Bells rolled out, cut free, throats muted.
“Dead,” she said. “Two towers empty. One with cards and crumbs. They left in a hurry.”
“Or they brought food inside,” Eliza said. “Doors barred. Lights strange.”
“Strange how,” I asked.
“Not torch,” she said. “Blue.”
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Nora rubbed her arms. “I hate blue fire.”
“Good,” I said. “Hate it faster. We move.”
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Vessa adjusted her bracers. “Each pair has their job. No one plays hero. If you get lost, smell for chalk and follow green. If you see red, yell. If you see a girl, hold your hands open and your blade down.”
Serena stuffed chalk into three more pouches and slapped them at Zara, Leira, and Nora. “Mark with full strokes. No thin lines.”
Eden leaned close to me. “One more thing.”
“Say it,” I said.
“I do not like the quiet on their wall,” he said. “If they wired the inner doors, you may get locked inside with hostages and blue fire.”
“Then we bring our own door,” I said.
He frowned. “Which door.”
I jerked my chin at Mira. “Her.”
Mira grinned. “Finally.”
We left the hall and stepped into night. The air held dew and cinders. The thin second moon rode low beside the first like a quiet twin. Boots whispered. Leather sheathed. No one spoke.
At the quarry edge, the goat ladder dropped into dark ribs of rock. A trickle of water ran in the cut. The citadel rose across the gap, tiered and black. A thin line of blue shivered under one gate. It looked like frost. It
was not.
I put Vessa’s hand on my shoulder. “Count.”
She counted in my ear. “One. Two. Three.”
On three, Ilia slid over the edge and vanished. Eliza followed, silent as her own arrow. Nora went next, wire looped at her belt. Leira kissed her lockpick and smiled at the black. Zara shrugged her shield higher and stepped into nothing like it had always been a floor. Serena waited for the last place that needed light hands. Mira lowered after them like a slab of living wall.
“Your turn,” Vessa said.
I went. The stone scraped my glove. Water sprayed my cheek. My boot found a rung I could not see. My stomach tried to leave. It stayed. The horns of the keep faded behind us. The citadel wall crept up. Ilia’s hand reached back and pulled me onto a ledge as narrow as a memory.
“Door,” she whispered, pointing.
A rusted grate crouched low under the tier. The bars were old. The lock was not. New iron. Fresh score marks.
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Leira slid in front of me on her belly and listened with her cheek to the keyhole. “Three pins. False gate.”
“Time,” I said.
She breathed in, slow. “One breath.”
She turned the pick. The lock clicked. She exhaled.
“Open,” she mouthed.
We slid through into a run of low stone and dripping shadow. Blue light pulsed from deeper in. It made the air look cold.
“Bells,” Ilia whispered.
Eliza pulled bent nails from her sleeve and handed them off. Ilia popped two tiny clappers and slipped them in her pocket. The silence felt awake.
A pair of rogues rounded the bend with a bucket and slow feet. They did not expect us. Zara took the first with her shield. Nora took the second with a knot to the throat and mercy in her hands. We dragged them into the drain and left them breathing.
Serena chalked a green mark on the wall with a firm hand. “Clear.”
We moved deeper. The blue light grew. It came from glass bowls set in iron rings. The bowls held fuel that was not oil. It burned without smoke. It reflected off the wet stone and made us look like ghosts.
“Break if needed,” Prisca whispered. “Blue burns low under water.”
“Good to know,” Vessa said.
We reached the first inner door. Iron studs. Thick. Two locks. Leira put her ear to it, then frowned. “No pins. Lever.”
“Then we bring our door,” I said.
Mira planted her feet. She dug her heel and shoved. The studs groaned. Wood screamed. On the third push, the frame cracked. Nora slid a wedge under to hold it. Mira pushed again. The lever gave. The door flew open and slammed against the wall.
A room spilled out. Straw, Cloth. Small shoes. A doll broken at the arm. Serena’s breath caught.
“Girls,” she whispered.
I lifted my hand. “Wait,”
Nora crawled forward, careful as light. She ran her fingertips along the stone where the straw met the wall. Her mouth went tight. “Wire.”
“Cut,” I said.
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She showed me the blade she would use. Not a knife. A scissor she had filed to points. She snipped three lines with steady hands. The air did not move. Good.
“Green,” Serena said, mark bold.
We rushed in. Six girls huddled together, eyes huge. One had a line of dried blood on her wrist. Thin. Puckered. Kaia.
Theo’s voice from the road ran through my ribs. I pushed it down. I went to one knee. I kept my blade low. “I am Elara,” I said. “You walk between me and the wall. You do not run. You do not shout. You do not touch anything with blue light.”
The smallest nodded like a bird. Kaia lifted her chin like she had a shield under it. “Is my brother alive.”
“Yes,” I said. “He sent me.”
She blinked fast and grabbed my sleeve. “Then I move.”
We moved. Serena counted heads with her fingers and mouth. “Six. We are six.”
“Keep eyes open,” Vessa said. “They did not leave the core for fun.”
We hit the second door. Iron again. Leira listened and shook her head. “Weight on the other side.”
Mira planted. We braced. She shoved. The door gave a finger. A voice on the other side cursed. The weight pressed back.
“Again,” I said.
We shoved. The seam opened. A knife stabbed through and nicked my shoulder. I bit my tongue and did not shout. Zara slammed her shield into the gap. The knife snapped. The weight fell. The door flew inward.
Two rogues scrambled back. Vessa was on them in three beats. Eliza’s bow twanged. One fell with an arrow in the thigh. The other dropped his blade when Zara’s shield kissed his mouth.
“Down,” I said. “Stay down.”
We pulled the girls through. Serena kept her body between them and the blue bowls. Nora snapped the wire above the lintel, then kicked the loose bell into a corner.
Ilia pointed left. “Core that way.”
We were four turns from it when the horn blew. Not ours. The citadel’s. A heavy sound that made the stone think about falling.
Vessa swore under her breath. “Front breach. Dawn went loud.”
“Good,” I said. “Stay the plan.”
We hit the last corridor. Iron door. No handle. Only a small slot at head height. The blue light was strongest here. It hummed. My teeth ached.
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Ilia climbed the wall and peered through the slot. “Empty hall. Then a chair. Then a banner.”
“Miela,” Vessa said, jaw tight.
“Not yet,” I said. “We keep the ladder and the light.”
Leira flexed her fingers. “If this is a slide bolt, it is inside. I cannot touch it.”
Mira rolled her shoulder. “Or I can.”
“Hit low,” I said. “Make them think we are small.”
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She hit low. The bolt held. She hit again. On the third, the frame split. The door lurched and then coughed
open.
A figure moved on the far end of the hall. Not Miela. A man with a reversed wolf on his ring. He smiled when he saw me. He lifted a hand. His fingers were inked with numbers.
“Welcome, Alpha,” he said.
Ruvan.
My throat closed for a breath and opened again. “I am not here for your welcome.”
He turned his hand. The blue bowls guttered and flared. The hall went bright and cold.
Behind me, Kaia squeezed my sleeve. Her breath trembled. Serena pulled her close, steady as rock.
Ruvan lifted his ring. “Pick, Alpha. Your girls or your core.”
Vessa’s voice was a blade at my ear. “Say the word.”
“I already did,” I said. “We take the ladders and the light.”
Ruvan smiled wider. “Wrong game.”
“Then I change it,” I said. “Open the next door.”
AD
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