Chapter 25 Collectors
Dawn broke in muted color—gray bleeding into pale gold, the kind of light that doesn’t chase the dark away so much as convince it to shift its weight.
I woke to the sound of stone settling and the dry whisper of Drake moving nearby. The fire was long dead. The air smelled of smoke, dust, and something faintly metallic—the echo of the hound’s passage.
He was crouched near the ledge, one knee bent, scanning the ravine below. His coat had been torn along one sleeve, and the faint shimmer of scale beneath caught the morning light.
“You didn’t sleep,” I said.
He didn’t turn. “You talk in yours.”
“Do I?”
“About hospitals. And blood.”
“Good bedtime story.”
“You said a name.”
My stomach tightened. “Whose?”
He looked over his shoulder. “Jonah.”
I went still. The bond pulsed, betraying me before I could say a word.
“Who was he?”
I wrapped my arms around my knees. “Someone I saved. Someone they made me regret saving.”
Drake didn’t press. He just nodded once, eyes soft in a way that didn’t belong on his face. “Then he mattered.”
“Yeah,” I said quietly. “He mattered.”
🔥🔥🔥
The airships were gone. The sky was clear except for the faint contrails drifting westward. But the silence that followed didn’t feel safe; it felt expectant.
“We move fast,” Drake said. “The hound found our scent last night. That means the Syndicate knows where to look. They’ll send something worse next.”
“Define worse.”
He slanted me a look. “You wouldn’t believe me.”
“Try me.”
He hesitated, then said, “They have collectors now. Human enough to fool scanners. Fed on shade, tethered to resonance fields. They move like smoke and think like the men who made them.”
“Lovely,” I said. “And they’ll be after us.”
“They’re after the bond,” he corrected. “You’re just… attached.”
“Comforting.”
We started down the Ash Road, keeping to the shadows where the cliffs bent inward. The path grew steeper, narrower—crumbled in places, forcing us to balance along edges slick with dew.
Somewhere below, water rushed faintly.
“That the river?” I asked.
“The Ashflow,” Drake said. “It cuts through the lower canyons. If we reach it, we can follow it east into the ruins near Varrin’s Gate. Seris might regroup there.”
“Might?”
He gave a grim smile. “I’ve learned to hope cautiously.”
🔥🔥🔥
By midmorning, the temperature climbed. The heat baked off the rock, drawing sweat and memory alike. I stripped the outer layer of my coat, knotting it at my waist. The mark on my wrist caught the light, still faintly glowing where the bond rested beneath my skin.
Drake noticed. “It’s stabilizing.”
“Is that good or bad?”
“Both,” he said. “Good because it’s solidifying. Bad because it means the universe’s paperwork is almost done deciding we’re stuck together.”
I groaned. “Great. Marriage by magical bureaucracy.”
He smirked. “At least there’s no paperwork.”
“Yet.”
We walked in silence for a while after that, the quiet stretching comfortable until a sound cut through it—faint, high, and wrong.
A whistle. But not from wind.
Drake froze.
“What is it?” I whispered.
He didn’t answer immediately. His eyes went distant, unfocused, as if listening to something far away. Then he said, “Collectors.”
“How close?”
“Too close.”
I scanned the cliffs, heart pounding. Nothing but stone and sun and shadow. “I don’t see anything.”
“You won’t,” he said. “They move between reflections.”
“Between what?”
He pointed to a sliver of metal jutting from the rock—a broken shard of Syndicate alloy, catching the light. “Mirrors. Water. Glass. Anything that remembers light.”
“Fantastic,” I said. “We’re surrounded by reflective rock.”
His jaw clenched. “Stay behind me.”
“Not a chance.”
“Christine—”
“No.” I drew my weapon—an old Syndicate sidearm I’d modified for energy rounds—and aimed it at the largest reflective patch of stone. “If they come through the light, I’ll make sure they regret it.”
He gave a short, sharp nod. “Then aim low. They like to crawl first.”
Before I could ask what that meant, the light shifted.
A ripple passed through the air, like heat over sand. Then a hand—long, thin, wrong—pressed out of the reflection. Fingers too many, joints bending backward. The air screamed, metal and bone and echo.
“Down!” Drake roared.
I hit the ground as a shape tore free from the rock—humanoid only in suggestion, its body slick with mirrored skin that caught every glint of sunlight and threw it back as silver fire.
It shrieked. The sound burrowed behind my eyes.
Drake moved—one blur of heat and gold—slamming into it before it fully solidified. The impact sent both of them skidding across the path. The cliff shuddered, rock cracking beneath their weight.
I scrambled up, sighted the second shimmer behind them, and fired. The energy blast hit the reflection squarely. The air warped; the creature half-born through it convulsed, then shattered into dust and shards of light.
The bond pulsed—warning, heat, pain. Drake’s shoulder flared with light where the creature raked him. He threw it off, turned, and drove his hand into its chest. Fire erupted outward, consuming it in gold flame that left only glassy residue.
For a moment, the only sound was breathing—mine ragged, his heavy.
Then I said, “So that’s worse.”
“Yes,” he said. “That’s worse.”
He stumbled. I caught him by reflex. His blood—if it was blood—burned faintly gold where it smeared across my arm.
“Hey,” I said, gripping him. “Hey. You with me?”
He nodded once, jaw tight. “They got close. Too close. Their touch drains resonance.”
“Translation?”
“They tried to unmake me,” he said. “Didn’t work.”
“You sure about that?” I asked.
He managed a rough smile. “Mostly.”
I eased him down against the rock. His breath came in uneven pulls. I pressed my hand to his shoulder; the heat under his skin felt wrong, like fever and fire tangled together.
“Let me—” I started.
“Christine, no—”
“Shut up,” I snapped. “You saved my life three times in the past week; you can survive me patching you up once.”
The bond flared when my palm met the wound. Energy rushed between us—fire meeting light, heat meeting heartbeat. I focused on the rhythm, willing the burn to settle, to mend.
His hand shot up, gripping my wrist hard. “Careful,” he hissed.
“I am careful,” I said through clenched teeth.
“You’re bleeding power,” he said. “If you give too much—”
“Then you take it back.”
He blinked. “That’s not how—”
The bond surged, cutting him off. A wave of warmth spilled out from the contact, pushing the wrongness back, knitting the edges of the wound. For a heartbeat, our breaths synced. The fire didn’t burn; it balanced.
Then the world snapped back into focus.
He let go first, eyes unfocused, pupils wide. “You shouldn’t be able to do that.”
“Guess I’m full of surprises.”
He stared at me for a long moment, then said softly, “No. You’re full of life. It’s different.”
I stood, wiping sweat from my temple. “Life, death, resurrection, whatever—let’s move before the rest of their creepy cousins show up.”
He pushed himself to his feet, slower than usual but steady. “They will. The collectors don’t stop until they gather what they’re sent for.”
“Which is?”
He met my gaze. “Us.”