Page 43 of Ashes of Honor

I gasped for air, my hands flying to my chest.No. It can’t be.My vision from only a few months ago was back, this time solid. Decided. Coughs emulated around me as Lilia fell to the floor, choking on the oxygen of the room. Guy and Aileen surrounded her, comforting her though they were in no condition to do so. Aileen’s gaze settled on mine, her face washed with pity.Whoever we were watching through, had died, and Amaia had been in the same room.

Amaia

Imade the decision a long time ago to keep who I was Before out of my mind. The girl I once was, carefree and optimistic … she had turned into a monster somehow, somewhere along the way. All in the name of preservation of others. My morality for theirs. The Compound represented everything and more to me but I think what I clung to the most was how much it encapsulated who I once was.

That person was never coming back. It was painful. But now, it was time for me to turn my pain into power. Fuck Ronan and fuck everything he stood for. I would destroy him for trying to take away my home. As the days went on, my path forwardbecame clear. A plan was already in motion and if I played my cards right in this meeting, nothing would stop me from succeeding.

Sunday. A day I used to rest once upon a time. I couldn’t remember the last time I had an entire day to just be still. It’d been months, actually, it was almost May. A few weeks shy of a year.

We crossed by the cliffside where it had all begun. Reina came to me in a hurry, telling me the worst had happened. She wrapped her arm around my shoulder and gave me a squeeze as she herself remembered that horrible fucking day.

“Can we jog?” I asked. Our packs weren’t too heavy.

Alexiares reached for my pack, wanting to give me the freedom to slip away—barely beyond the others’ reach for a few moments. Reina glanced toward Abel who nodded in agreement. They hosted a silent, quick conversation with their eyes, communicating about me I was sure. I needed a distraction.

The urge to spiral and thirst for a drink was strong. Physical challenges, exercise, those things helped. It was at Reina’s recommendation after all. She’d studied up on ways to help me, determined to keep me away from the bottle. I was grateful for her yet concerned. All of her focus lately had been others and none on her own grief.

This was a good group to send outside the walls. We could all use the time away. Truthfully, Abel was best suited expanding his knowledge with Riley at The Compound but I knew he needed this. A low stakes mission to help rebuild his confidence outside the gates. He put on a good show but it was my duty to see through the bullshit, and see through it I did.

He took charge against the few Pansies we came across. I remained quiet. Coaching him could come later. I wanted to see how he would react, what strategies he would utilize while he was in a safe environment. With us here around him, no harmcould come to him, at least from Pansies. I’d expected to come across a few the closer we got to where Ronan’s camp had been only two days before. A parting gift from a man I’d marked for death.

It wasn’t a guarantee he’d be gone when we got there but my gut said he would be. Ronan did not want to give me the opportunity to plot against him. Not from such a close distance. His intention on coming here was merely to show me that he could and that there was nothing I could do about it. Make it clear I possessed no control over the situation, our dealings—not to set up permanent housing.

We arrived at the thick stump that had been covered in vines that now lay bare. I brought my hand to it, resting it and searching for any unnatural ridges and edges to the bark. A hidden marking or note, some sort of evidence of invasive greenery, anything that let on that Riley and I hadn’t been hallucinating. There were none.

“You sure this is it?” Reina asked with curiosity.

She sported her old attire. Posing as an emissary the way she had been years ago when Salem was getting settled. Her pleated navy trousers were tucked into the black laced up boots that stopped right above the ankle. The white of her short-sleeved dress-shirt was coated in light dust, kicked up from our run. With the frills and fluffs of it and the soft pink of her lips, it was all too easy to forget the trauma of what she’d been through,almost. The sad blue eyes that matched her pants served a reminder that much had changed though she was the same loving Reina she’d always been at heart.

An uncomfortable chuckle escaped Abel’s lips. “Yeah, maybe she mixed it up with one of the many other trees around here,” he teased.

There were no other trees around us. His humor was forced, a thin veil over something else. His chocolate-brown eyes dartednervously, scanning the horizon as he and Alexiares fell into position, back to back, bracing for what was coming.

“We never actually went over a plan or anything and um, you know how much I enjoy being prepared,” Reina rambled on. “So maybe we can do that now?”

“If I say my only plan was to show up and hope they were waiting to make their move would that freak you out a bit?”

“Uh yeah,” Reina said. “It would freak me out a lot, actually.”

“Chill out. Take a breather.Weare the danger, remember that,” Alexiares attempted to soothe her worry.

Something was off. I sensed eyes on us but saw no one but us around. Alexiares’s hand fell to my wrist, and he pulled me and Reina between the two of them. We fell into formation instinctively. No words needed to be exchanged. Seasoned in blitz attacks and bullshit, it would take a lot to catch us unaware at this point. Abel passed Reina his spare Smith & Wesson M&P. She was the only one who’d come unarmed.

The bow and arrow at her back made for a strange introduction to someone we were calling a harmless emissary. A person in between to help us and whoever the hell we were meeting see eye to eye. Even with no weapons, Reina’s power was fierce, but there was no need to show our hand with her gifts before we were ready. Gifts like hers, like Riley’s, that was the kind of shit you left classified for a rainy day.

“Oh crap,” Abel muttered. “Someone cover me, I’m going down.”

It was the only warning we had to step in around him as he fell victim to a vision. Like Moe, some were more powerful than others. The closer they were to coming to fruition, the larger the impact they would have on your life, themore informationthe vision contained, the more likely it was to take them out. Birds fluttered a football field away from the empty pasture. Empty as far as we could tell that is.

“That’s convenient,” Alexiares said.

Reina tsked, bending over to remove his finger off the trigger of his gun, eyes still focused ahead. “Stop, he can’t help it.”

“Brother? Brother. Brother.”

We exchanged uneasy glances at Abel’s mumbling. It could mean everything—or nothing—at all.

He gasped, suddenly sitting up, his hands flying to his chest as he struggled for air. Abel was a Seer, but his ability didn’t compare to Tomoe’s. His visions didn’t come easily; he had to force them, whereas Tomoe’s arrived willingly, without effort. It was one of his many gifts, but far from his strongest.

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