Page 75 of Ashes of Honor

“Sorry, Alaric,” I murmured, standing and wiping the blade on his carefully folded napkin. The irony was not lost on me. Laughter found its way to my lips. I couldn’t decide if it made the act more poetic or more bitter. “It was you or us.”

Suckerpunch caught my attention in the kitchen window, peeking in with a soft whine. The sound of the front door opened. I had about thirty-seconds before whoever came through that door made their way to my little mess. Swiping my fingers in the blood dribbling out his mouth, I scribbledBloodhoundinto the maple round table, then sprinted through the back door. The distant shouts reached my ears as I slipped into the shadows of the back alley, Suckerpunch back at my heels. The air was cold, heavy with tension and the faint metallic scent of blood that clung to me like a second skin.

The alarm bellsrang far too fast. We barely made it out before the gates went on lock down. Not that we’d used them.

I wasn’t an idiot. This was their problem. To find the Bloodhound, you mustthinklike one. If they weren’t going to seal the manholes into the sewage system, then they should’ve at least had someone posted at the access points.

It became clear on the reason why the further we went. I had no doubt Suckerpunch could sniff out a threat, but his presence did nothing to ease the gnawing unease in my gut. Something was off.

The air shifted, thick with the scent of decay. I’d been down enough of these passageways to know when something felt wrong, and this was all wrong. The ground seemed to absorb my footsteps as I made my way deeper into the shadows.

And then I saw them.

A mass grave. No real attempt to hide the fact that bodies were piled high. Discarded like trash. Suckerpunch went on alert as I inched closer. The smell was overpowering. The urge to bring the sandwich and stale beer back up was nearly impossible to shove back down.

My eyes narrowed at the condition of the bodies. They weren’t justdead—they werewrong.

Suckerpunch’s ears perked up, nose twitching as he sniffed the air. Men. Women. And—fuck—children. Elders. They all bore the same mark in the center of their head. The lion of Covert Province.I could think of only one reason to brand a body. To make sure they couldn’t go anywhere else without anyone knowing who they belonged to. Any settlement these people could have gone to if given the chance of freedom, would not be able to deny knowing who they were helping. Property of Ronan Moore. But it wasn’t their fate alone that stood out. No. It was the way they looked. The way theyalllooked.

I crouched low, inspecting one of the bodies. They were pale, their skin sickly gray, almost …like a Pansie. The texture was different—rougher, more brittle—but the gray was unmistakable. I picked up their forearm, studying the one mark of red that appeared on every single one of them. One bite. Their faces were too human, toonormalotherwise, but the skin, it didn’t match the usual waxy cast of death.

Suckerpunch growled low in his throat, a deep warning. I pushed up from the ground, eyes lingering on the bodies a beat longer before signaling him to stay sharp. There were bigger things at play. This war with Ronan was only the beginning.

The first nightin San Joaquin passed without incident. Surprising given the increased patrols searching for us in the heat of the night. This was far from my first time dodging law and order, and it wouldn’t be my last. People rarely saw past their own blind spots. Everyone had them. For Fresno’s military, it was their own outpost. We lingered along the outside of the cluster of buildings until dawn broke.

By morning, the boredom set in. Panoche Road was nothing but dry air and cracked pavement, stretching endlessly into nowhere. Suckerpunch padded along beside me, silent except for the occasional huff of annoyance. At least one of us was used to the monotony.

The next day we should have been home bound. Instead, it brought a storm. Black skies churned angrier than the North Sea. Rain came down in torrents. Mud sucked at my boots with every step, and Suckerpunch kept glaring at me with eyes that screamedReally? This is the plan?

“Don’t start,” I muttered.

We reached Hollister, drenched, cold, and ready for a break. A less than impressive slab of an abandoned house seemed promising enough—a roof, four walls. No immediate signs of a corpse. Suckerpunch whined at the command to wait outside. Without the others here, I needed eyes on the outside while I cleared the inside.

The floor creaked upstairs. Distant. Behind a closed door and faint, but there.

Knives in hand, I moved silently up the staircase. The first blade was ready, drawn and hidden against my forearm. The second rested in my palm for a quick throw.

I stood in the hallway surrounded by three doors. One in front and two on the side. I kept still, waiting, letting the hairs on the back of my neck do the sensing. Where my body didn’t want to go, laid fear. That fear was there for a reason. Fear of the unknown that laid behind the door to my left. I threw it open. Two young small, frail bodies were huddled in the corner. They froze the moment they saw me.

“What the hell,” I spat, lowering my knives.

The girls from San Jose. My stance was loose but ready. Never underestimate a wounded animal.

The older one met my gaze with defiance. She exhaled slowly and nudged the brunette, “He can help.”

The brunette hesitated, glancing between us, then nodded.

“No,” I said. “Hecan’t. I told you to wait.”

“No, you said if we wanted your help, we had to wait. We didn’t then. We do now,” the brunette replied quietly.

I whistled, and Suckerpunch crashed through the front door, bounding into the room like a wild thing. I holstered my knives, watching as the girls visibly relaxed, softening a bit at the sight of the dog.

“I don’t have the time to help you now,” I muttered, digging through my bag. There wasn’t much left, but I was only a day away from Monterey. I tossed what little food I had left at them. “Here. Stay out of the storm.” I turned to leave.

“Wait,” the oldest reached out, halting me in my steps with the grab of my wrist. “Please. Our magic still hasn’t fully returned and they’re going to take them back soon.”

I noted the way her hand hovered, then met her eyes without a word. She hesitated. I could tell it took everything in her totouch me, to hold this contact, but there was something in her eyes—a quiet desperation.

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