Chapter 201 SAFETY

Chapter 201 SAFETY
Hasmik's hands clamped over mine.
I flinched, not even realizing she had taken hold of me until she was dragging me forward.
I blinked furiously, as if the act might clear the film of horror clouding my vision.
War.
The word pulsed in my skull like a drumbeat, echoing with every scream, clash, and body that fell. War wasn't something I'd trained for in Avaline's teachings, no matter how often she drilled calm into me. It wasn't elegant postures or calculated restraint. It was chaos. It was blood on my face and my hair, sticky against my lips.
I tried to swallow it down, to be steady the way she'd taught me, but the bile kept rising, choking me.
I stopped.
Dug my heels into the floor so abruptly that Hasmik nearly wrenched my arms out of their sockets.
"Where is Sargis?"
Hasmik jerked her head toward me, lips pulled back in something between irritation and urgency, her eyes were glowing sharp with battle fury. "The king is holding the entrances. He is to the north with Lupercus, they're containing the brunt of it."
"No." The word escaped in a shuddering whisper before I realized I'd said it. My heart was hammering so hard I could hear it in my ears. "I need to see him."
Hasmik snarled low, frustration spilling from her in a guttural sound that didn't belong to anything human. She tightened her grip, claws pressing deeper into my wrists. "They can handle themselves. He ordered me to get you to safety."
But the thought of safety was absurd when Sargis was out there, and every step I took away from him felt like treachery. I shook my head violently, the strands of my hair sticking wet against my cheeks. "No. I can't... I can't just leave him. I have to see him."
"Narine," Hasmik snapped. "If you go there, you will die. Do you understand me? That's not defiance or bravery, it's suicide. The king needs you alive."
Alive? What was the worth of life if it was spent cowering in shadows while Sargis bled for us? My chest burned with the urge to rip free of her grasp, run blindly toward the northern entrance, and throw myself into the storm if it meant one fleeting glance at him.
"I don't care," I whispered hoarsely, voice breaking as tears carved pale tracks down my blood-smeared face. "If he falls, I need to-"
Hasmik's snarl ripped through the air. "Enough!"
Her hands seized my shoulders, shaking me so violently my teeth clacked together.
"You think you're the only one who fears losing him?" Her voice cracked like thunder. "You think I don't?"
I blinked at her, stunned, and for the first time, I saw the wet shimmer in her eyes, anger and anguish were braided so tightly they were one.
"My mate is also out there fighting!" she spat, shaking me again as if she could rattle sense into my bones. "Do you know what it costs me to stand here? To stay behind when every instinct in me is tearing to run to him? I want to be beside him so badly my chest feels like it's splitting open..."
Her nails dug into my arms. "But here I am. Because I know he can handle it."
Her face twisted with feral grief, and she shook her head, strands of hair falling wild across her cheeks. "But you..." Her eyes blazed into mine. "If you disobey, if you throw yourself into their claws, then you are not fighting for him, you are handing them everything."
The weight of her words slammed into me.
"You are Aeryna's blood, Narine," Hasmik seethed. "You are what they want the most. Do you understand? " She shook me once more. "And you will not waste that because your heart makes you foolish."
"No!" I yanked my hand free from Hasmik's grip, the sting of her nails leaving crescent marks across my wrist. "I won't sit around and hide while everything is going up in flames."
The words ripped from me louder than I intended, born from the panic swelling in my chest.
Hasmik's eyes widened, then narrowed in a mix of fury and fear. "You think I want this?" she snapped. "You think I don't hear every scream out there and want to tear through those walls myself?" Her throat bobbed as she swallowed back her own rage. "But someone has to think beyond the next heartbeat, Narine."
The ground shuddered, dust sifting from the ceiling beams. Screams rose and cut short with stomach-churning abruptness, and that awful copper stench of blood seeped in thick waves until it clung to my tongue with every breath. My whole body trembled, but I refused to step back.
"I want to fight," I mumbled.
Hasmik's brows pulled together. "Fight with what?" she demanded. "Do you even know how to hold a blade and land a strike that doesn't get you killed? You don't even know how to fight, Narine. And if you fall, it isn't just your blood on the ground. It's the kingdom. It's all of us."
Her words should have silenced me, but instead they stoked something restless inside. My veins hummed with that strange, volatile energy that had no name but always lived deep in my marrow. I lifted my chin, meeting her glare with my own.
"I don't," I admitted, my breath hitching. "I don't know how. And I won't even ask you how you know that I'm Aeryna's descendant." I clenched my fists. "But like you said, I'm her blood."
Her face tightened at the name she had thrown at me only moments ago.
"I know I can help," I pressed on, desperately. "I want to. I want to fight beside him, Hasmik. I want to stand for this kingdom. I'll figure it out somehow, even if it means bleeding for it."
For a moment, Hasmik just stared at me. Her lips pressed into a hard, pale line, her chest rising and falling with sharp, restrained breaths. Around us, the battle raged like a storm, the clash of steel and the guttural cries of beasts slamming against the walls, each vibration rattling the floor beneath our feet. The air felt alive with death, thick with smoke and blood, and yet in that breathless pocket of time, it was only her eyes holding mine.
Then she gave a nod. I braced myself, certain she'd grab me by the arm and drag me toward the safety I hated, the dark corners where I would be tucked away like a coward while others bled for me.
But instead, she pressed something cold and weighty into my palm.
I looked down. A blade. Small, yes, but deadly in its design.
My breath snagged, and when I looked up again, Hasmik's gaze had hardened into steel. "Aim for the heart," she said. "Fast and hard. Don't hesitate. Do you hear me?"
My stomach flipped violently, a wave of nausea clawing its way up my throat. My fingers curled tighter around the weapon. The thought of driving it into someone's chest made my insides churn.
I opened my mouth, some half-formed word of thanks or protest trembling on my lips, but I never got the chance to finish it, movement flashed at the edge of my vision. A figure lunged from the shadows, straight at Hasmik's unguarded side.
I opened my mouth to scream, but she didn't need warning. She moved like water, smoothly and mercilessly. Her claws pierced his chest with brutal precision, and she wrenched his heart free in one fluid, horrifying motion.
Blood sprayed on my body again, dripping down my hands that still clutched the knife.
My eyes widened, locked on the gory heart pulsing weakly in her fist before it stilled, and she tossed it aside like refuse. My knees threatened to buckle beneath the weight of the moment, and my mind was screaming at me to look away, but I couldn't.
That was the reality of the war I had demanded to step into.
And I didn't even know if my own shaking hands could do what she had just done.
"Get your head in the game," Hasmik barked. "I'll shadow you."