Chapter 24 The Enforcers True Role
The thermal charge didn’t just crack the vault door.
It vaporized it.
The explosion slammed into me like a fist. I flew backward, my spine hitting the pedestal that held the silver pelt. Stars burst behind my eyes, black spots swimming across my vision as my breath tore out of my lungs.
“Caspian!”
He was sprawled on the floor, dragging himself forward with shaking arms. The Filtering Ritual had gutted him. His Alpha fire was barely a flicker, nothing but dying embers beneath his skin.
I lunged for him.
A shadow blocked the light.
Three men stepped through the smoking breach, their boots crunching over shattered stone. They wore tactical Thorne gear, faces hidden behind ballistic masks. I recognized them instantly.
Purge specialists.
Lord Thorne’s personal executioners.
“The girl lives,” the lead assassin said, his voice metallic through a vocoder. “The traitor dies. Execute the Prince.”
Silver-tipped carbines rose in perfect unison.
I threw myself in front of Caspian, silver light bursting from my hands, wild and unstable. “Touch him and I’ll burn this entire sub-level to ash!”
The lead assassin laughed. “You’re a battery, little girl. And we brought grounding cables.”
He lifted a specialized capture hook.
The wall beside him didn’t crack.
It disintegrated.
A roar tore through the vault, deep and violent, like the earth splitting open. Rune hit the lead assassin in a blur of fur and fury. He wasn’t fully shifted, but his claws were out, his eyes blazing molten gold.
One movement. One snap.
The lead assassin’s neck broke. Rune hurled the body into the second man, crushing him against the far wall.
“Rune!” I screamed.
“Get behind me, Lyra!” he barked.
A bullet slammed into his thigh. He didn’t flinch. He backhanded the second attacker, claws ripping through armor and flesh in one brutal sweep.
More boots thundered in.
Three more specialists poured through the corridor, firing blindly. Rune stepped into the barrage, his massive body a living wall.
Then I saw it.
A black-steel blade flashing in the dim light.
It was aimed at my throat.
“Rune—!”
He didn’t strike.
He pivoted.
His shoulder took the hit.
The blade sank deep into his collarbone, the tip bursting out his back. Rune let out a sharp grunt, grabbed the assassin by the throat, and crushed his windpipe before dropping to one knee.
“Rune, no!” I grabbed his arm and dragged him backward into the inner sanctum.
“Close… the inner seal,” he rasped, blood bubbling at his mouth.
I slammed my palm against the emergency crescent. Stone ground against stone as the inner slab sealed shut, locking us inside with the wounded and the dying.
I knelt in front of him, shaking. “Let me see it.”
“Don’t waste the energy,” Rune groaned, slumping against the wall. “Caspian needs you. I’m built for this.”
“Shut up,” I snapped. “You’re not expendable. You’re mine.”
I didn’t wait for permission.
Silver light poured from me, blinding and fierce, flooding his wound. The blade burned as it was forced free, flesh knitting, bone sealing. Rune gasped, claws gouging the stone floor as the Luna fire cauterized the damage.
When the light faded, he looked at me.
The pain was gone.
What remained was devastating clarity.
“You felt it,” Rune said quietly.
I froze. “Felt what?”
“The resonance,” he replied. His gaze flicked to Caspian, who was pushing himself upright against the wall. “I felt the silence. I know I’m not the one.”
“Rune—”
“The bond is a shield,” he interrupted. “But your heart is his. I’ve known since the hallway. Since the gym.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
“Don’t be.”
He moved—slowly, deliberately—and dropped to both knees in front of me. His forehead touched the stone at my feet.
“I am not your husband,” Rune said. “I am not your King. I am your Shield. I am the wall the world breaks against before it reaches you.”
My chest tightened painfully.
“I vow my life, my wolf, and my last breath to your service,” he continued. “Not because of a curse. Not because of blood. But because you are my Alpha.”
He looked up, eyes fierce and steady. “Use me. Break me. But let me stand between you and the dark.”
I rested my hand on his head, voice shaking. “I accept. But you stay alive. That’s an order.”
“Yes, my Luna.”
The comms crackled.
“Lyra?” Kael’s voice cut through the vault. “Report.”
“We’re sealed in,” I said. “Rune is stable. Caspian’s conscious. The assassins are down.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Kael said, fear raw in his voice. “They were a delivery system.”
My blood ran cold. “For what?”
“A Shadow Plague,” Kael said. “Fae-engineered. Necrotic. It’s already in the lower barracks. Wolves are rotting alive. It’s spreading through the vents.”
“How do we stop it?”
“We can’t,” Kael said. “It’s keyed to your scent. It’s moving toward you. If it reaches the vault, your power will amplify it. Fifty miles will die.”
“There’s a cure,” Caspian rasped.
“There is,” Kael said. “The Heart of the Woods. Neutral Zone. Old Temple.”
“Then I’ll go,” I said, standing.
“No!” all three roared.
“If I stay, you die,” I said. “If I leave, I draw it away. Give me the coordinates.”
“This is suicide,” Kael whispered.
“No,” I said. “This is a Queen protecting her people.”
Rune straightened. “She’s right.”
Caspian slammed his fist into the wall. “I hate this.”
“Drainage tunnels,” Kael said. “Northern woods. Secondary gate unlocked.”
I looked back once.
The bond hummed—love, duty, grief.
Then I ran.
Into the dark.
Alone.
The plague followed.