Chapter One Hundred and Five

Chapter One Hundred and Five
Sky's Pov

“I swear on my name,” I breathed out calmly, eyes fixed on the lifeless bodies on the ground before me. “I will rid the world of your kind.”

In an instant, the treeline broke and soldiers came running towards me, pouring from the forest the way we’d planned. I turned away from the bodies because I didn’t want to look at them, didn’t want to meet my own face in their eyes. My hands shook, but only for a second.

Training is funny like that; it steadies what hope cannot.

“Sky!” Kael’s voice cut through the chaos. He was already moving, but he didn’t look at me with that ownership I’d learned to flinch from. He looked at me with something like concern folded inside command. “Are you—”

“I’m fine,” I said before he could finish. My voice was level, though my throat felt sandpapery. “Let them come.”

Men surged toward the gate, a wave of armor, rope and steel. They breached the yard like a storm. Spears met shields, the house doors were battered down in two rattling hits. I moved with them because there was no room to be anything else.

Screams blurred into the same noise as the crash of furniture and the thud of boots on logs.

Inside, the stink of damp linen and sweat hit me, a smell that makes you suddenly feel very, very young and very, very old at the same time. Men tried to pull their hands away from ropes, others reached for blades but were cut down by soldiers who moved like a single, practiced thought.

I saw chains, rusted and thick, and for a moment the world narrowed to the small faces behind them, hollow, blinking, human. My knees trembled. I clenched my jaw so hard I tasted metal.

One of the girls I’d once known, not by name, not now, folded forward with a sob that was too whole for the silence that had kept them. A soldier knelt and began to cut the ropes at her wrists.

Her hands were raw. She looked at me and for a second the room held: she blinked at me like the sky blinks after a storm, uncertain, disbelieving, alive.

I wanted to fall into that space and weep and laugh and apologize and promise and— I swallowed it down.

There would be time for tears later. There had to be.

“Commander,” one of our men called out, dragging a small chest out of one room. “I think you need to see this.”

The commander moved and Kael followed. When it was opened, a coil of keys and a stack of ledger sheets listing names sat in it. Names. Lines on paper that meant people had been bought and sold.

My hands tightened by my side, my blood boiling with the urge to burn them, to erase that record as if that could unmake what had been done.

“Secure this,” Kael whispered and turned to me. His eyes found mine but I pulled off, wrapping my hand around myself.

When the fighting ended, we gathered the freed into a rough circle and laid out blankets. Mira and her priestesses moved among them with steady hands, murmuring blessings and pulling out bandages.

Rendall barked orders, Rendall always barked.

Kael stood nearby, shoulders squared, watching the horizon like a man listening for a coming thunder. He looked at me once, and his face was unreadable.

I sat with one of the women I recognized, older than the rest, with a scar that ran from temple to jaw like a pale river. She gripped my hand, fingers like branches.

“You came back,” she said simply, tears welling up around the corner of her eyes.

“I did,” I said, my voice came out faint. “I apologize for not coming earlier.”

She smiled, a small, fragile thing. “Don’t blame yourself for it. I’m sure it wasn’t easy getting to where you are today.”

“What about the others?” I asked, looking around.

She only shook her head and closed her eyes. “I’m sorry. After you left, they attempted to run again and they were caught. Half of them were placed in chains and taken away.”

“And the others?” I asked, hopefully but she didn't say anything. She couldn't.

“This is all my fault,” my voice cracked, “I should have been here sooner, convinced whoever I could, asked for help—”

“Don't blame yourself for that,” she pulled me into a hug, caressing my back. “To did your best.”

I wanted to believe her. I wanted to believe it with the kind of hunger that mends broken things. I wanted to believe that every arrow and every plan that led to this moment meant something beyond the immediate.

But I couldn't help but feel the pain of being trapped all over. Like this whole things wasn't over.

“Hey, move!” an order was barked and the Lord of the house came stumbling.

He had his hands tied to his back, his shirt was rough, like he had been in a struggle just recently. Behind him trailed three young men, each one barely over their twenties.

The soldiers made them kneel before Kael, hands behind their back, heads bowed. I recognized the older man, the lord of the house.

He had been there when I was sold, trading me for scraps and silver, pulling my hair hard enough to pull a few strands and shoving me into the cage like an animal.

I felt my blood boil. My feet moved before I could will it, walking straight to him. Rendall was nearby and he tried to stop me but stopped on Kael's signal.

The moment I stood before the man, I felt my hatred take on a new height. And my hand, it found the man's face before I could think.

The slap echoed off into the air, shock rising fast through everyone.

“Where is he?” I asked, my voice choked with sobs. “Where is the swine who laid his hands on innocent women?!”