Jaylin had expected wolves. Instead, they were met with rifles.

In the time that it'd taken for the vehicles of armed men to arrive, they could have easily fled from the bluff. But Gunner had said it himself; if what they really wanted was to get their hands on Ziya, then they needed a way over the trenches. They needed to stay exactly where they were.

Ziya had upgraded the armor on her men this time. They weren't simple bullet-proof vests anymore, but military-grade suits, padded from head to toe. They looked like they'd stepped straight from the front-lines of war, circling the group slowly, slumping through the trees with their black-gray vests and their silver masks and their sizable rifles—the barrels whipping from one body to the next, seeking out the slightest movements and denying themselves the will to fire.

Jaylin was the first to raise his hands in surrender.

He heard Felix's breath shift. He shot a look to Jaylin from over his shoulder. "The hell're ye' doing, kid?"

The men closed in step for step. The way they moved was not with confidence. Each step advanced only inches, the leaves and twigs cracking beneath their tactical boots. Jaylin felt an elbow bump into his spine, but he wasn't sure who it belonged to. The wolves had all collapsed backward, enclosed in a circle, backs pressed to one another. Bailey was the last to forfeit his distance, hesitating back a step until Izzy reached out and tugged him into the huddle.

Bailey grumbled, the same way he grumbled about everything, "You have a plan, litch?"

"Not really," Jaylin admitted.

"Ye' realize yer giving the bastards exactly what the wanted," said Felix.

"He isn't," Nicon interjected. "What they want is a lichund—but he isn't a lichund. He's a warden and that's not something Ziya will ever be able to recreate."

"Should we go wolf?" asked Izzy.

"Human men," Elizaveta said. "Good odds."

"No." Jaylin pushed out a slow, nervous breath. "For all we know they're stuck here like Gunner." He watched as a suited lackey crept closer, unhooking a metal object from his belt. Moonlight pearled across the short silver chain.

"Turn around," ordered the man, the metal pieces clacking together as he advanced another slow, skittish step.

He couldn't see past the man's mask—not enough to read his eyes, but Jaylin could feel his heartbeat when he really focused.  Even with his suit of protective armor, the man was afraid. 

When Jaylin sought out the pulses of the other guards, their heartbeats came just as fast, just as hard; overlaying one another like rain on a tin roof. Each of them too fearful of the lichund to keep their guns steady.

Slowly, Jaylin turned and folded his arms behind his back. One by one, the others turned as well. He stared into Nicon's eyes now—caught the uncertain twinge in his sharp brows as he lowered his head and offered his arms to his captors. You'll be okay, Jaylin wanted to tell him. We'll all be fine. But the truth was that Nicon's presence here made him a traitor. Jaylin couldn't imagine that Ziya treated renegades very kindly.

Cool metal slid around his wrists, and Jaylin wasn't prepared for the searing pain that came next. It'd been a long time since he felt the burn of silver—but there was something worse about these binds than the ones they'd used on him last. A curse came from Felix, a hard breath from Nicon, a whimper from Izzy and he could only assume they'd been given the same treatment.

He was taken by the arms, a man at each bicep, and led down the forest slope to a dirt path. They could have easily walked the distance to Ziya's headquarters, but instead, they were tossed into the back of an empty cargo van.

Jaylin found himself pressed up against the corner—the only light in the vehicle a dim yellow bulb that hardly lit much more than the ill-defined faces around him, and flickered when the van began to move.

Felix hacked out another derogatory, wrenching his arms in a fight with his binds. "Fuckers made new ones, did they?"

"Yeah," Izzy sighed, sitting on her cuffed wrists and then slipping her legs through the hoop of her arms so she could examine the metal in front of her eyes. "The old ones only cut into you if you moved too much. I'm bleeding. These are made to hurt."

If the fire of the cuffs wasn't enough to make him ill, the scent of her blood tipped Jaylin's stomach.

"Everything Ziya does is made to hurt," muttered Nicon.

It was strange, but not a face around him held a glint of fear. Jaylin wasn't so certain about his own. He'd had so many nightmares of waking up in Ziya's cell—discovering that his rescue and everything that had come after had only been a sick, twisted figment. He'd woken up too many nights with sweat on his back and thunder in his heart.

Quentin, he reminded himself. This would all be worth it if they could just save Quentin.

"How was he doing?" Jaylin asked. The van barreled over a dimple in the earth and he cringed as his head smacked against the door.

"No better than when you left," Nicon answered. A thread of his hair had fallen over his eyes. Jaylin wondered what it looked like it when it wasn't bound back or braided over his shoulder. "Imani's moving him out of the Watch. He belongs in a ward with medicks. They're the only ones who can help him right now."

A grin cut deep creases into Felix's cheeks. "Know what he'd say?" he asked. "He'd stand there with a stick up his arse, jerking around in cupcake batter and moaning on about responsibility. How he can't believe I'd allow this to happen, though he and I both know it's a load of shite. Every bit a grandmother in a young lad's body." He laid his head back against the glass of the window and Jaylin noticed how he stopped struggling with the cuffs on his wrist. "We were supposed to bring ye' back. I knew I was lying to Imani when I said I would. I don't want him to die, lad."

"But aren't you all afraid?" Jaylin asked. "Ziya could kill us. She probably will."

"I'm more afraid of leaving here empty-handed," said Izzy.

"If it is not us today," added Elizaveta, "it is us tomorrow."

Nicon seemed the most reserved of them all. He took in a deep breath and shook the hair from his face. "She's right. It isn't just about Quentin. If Ziya isn't stopped now, we'll all be exactly where he is."

The only one who hadn't said a word was Bailey, slouched at the back of the van, the ankles of his jeans caked in dirt from the ride over. The knees ripped and gaping. His blood smelled different than the others—like strong, wet dirt.

"And you?" Jaylin asked. "Why did you come?"

Bailey's dark eyes lifted from him and settled somewhere else in the van.

Felix answered the rejected question, "Because he knows what he is without Quen. Another one of Ricco's slaves."

"Fuck off," gnarled Bailey.

"I'm not wrong, aye? Without Quen, yer unclaimed again. Ye' belong to them."

"I don't belong to anyone."

"Ye'd think so, the way no one wants you."

Bailey's deep-set glare set on Felix when he said it. A sharp pin pressed in just the right stop of him.

"Felix—" Izzy started.

"No," Felix said. "If ye' want your freedom so fuckin' badly, why were you right back at the den? Missed your master?"

Bailey snarled, "It's none of your goddamn business."

"Isn't it?" asked Felix, tongue rolling over his teeth. "Quen would've sensed those men coming from miles away. He would've had the place evacuated—he wouldn't be wired up to a fuckin' breathing machine. He's dying because of you, ye' stupid fud."

Bailey shoved himself up to his feet, looking every bit like he was one word away from tearing Felix apart. But the van came to a halt and he was slung back into the loading doors. They opened and two men reached in, heaving him out by the arms.

"Leave the lich to me," one of the masks declared. "She's ordered an examination."

Izzy was pulled out next, stepping down from the van with quiet grace. Elizaveta managed to sink her teeth into the arm of a guard. She was held by the back of the neck like a wild cobra and heaved out by two men. Nicon went next without a fight, and when it was only Felix and Jaylin left, the lanky redhead gave him a look. Something that said see you if we get out of this alive. Then he shoved himself to his feet and hopped from the back of the van, into the padded gloves of a guard.

Then the door was shut again and Jaylin was alone in the dark.

The van moved on, a second short drive on bumpy, uneven road. It was a relief when the wheels met a flat surface, less so when the sound of sliding metal chugged just beyond the loading doors.

"Identification?" Jaylin heard a man say. He watched through the metal wire of the cabin window as the driver passed a card off to the guard at the gate. "Clear," the man said. Then the van carried on.

Through the gaps in the wire, Jaylin could see the world ahead of him go dark. Then something metal began to churn again—the sound of a garage door, shivering as it declined shut behind them. The engine died and the driver stepped out. The loading doors cast opened to the light.

"You're lucky I was able to get a suit in time." It had only been a year and yet Gunner looked so different from what Jaylin remembered. His hair had turned thin and silver—even the hairs on his brows going white. He chucked his mask into the back of the van and ripped the armor parts from his forearms. "Come on, get your ass out. This is the only place without cameras."

Jaylin shoved himself out into the open air. Gunner turned him by the elbow and took the silver cuffs into his hands. A click released the lock and the metal slid out from Jaylin's skin. He gritted at the burn.

"They call 'em bear traps," Gunner said. When he stepped in front of Jaylin, it was with the device in his hands—a pair of silver cuffs with several sharp spikes on the insides, some short and fat and some long and wide and glazed with blood. Jaylin brought his wrists out in front of him and the sight of the holes in his flesh made him blanch. 

"I'll have to put them back on you eventually," said Gunner.

Jaylin rubbed his pained wrists and took a gander around him. It felt like a garage they were standing inside of, but one wide and tall enough to assemble a commercial jet in. "Where are we?"

"Thirty-feet underground," said Gunner. "The lab is just above us. You'll be taken in and evaluated. Ziya has a cell ready for you."

Jaylin bristled.  "Ready for me?"

"You think she didn't know you were coming?" asked Gunner. "Why do you think she sent those hunters to the hotel that night? Her goal wasn't to kill Quentin, it was to lure you here."

Something inside of Jaylin snapped. He shoved Gunner, hard in the chest. "And you didn't warn us? You had his number all this time and you didn't call him to tell us they were coming?"

Gunner's hands flew up in the air. "I didn't know," he said slowly. "After you called, I went through the documents. That's how I found out. It doesn't matter now, kid. You're here."

"What's she going to do to me?" Jaylin asked.

"Study you, I suppose. None of her current subjects have been a success. Her goal isn't to eradicate the lich anymore. She wants to recreate you, kid. She's not going to stop until she does."

"And my friends?"

"Ziya's been a fan of executions lately."

Jaylin ran his fingers through his hair, but he couldn't find the breath he needed. He wanted to sob, to scream out until his own voice bellowed from the rafters. That was why none of Ziya's wolves had been following him since they'd arrived in Maine. They were all waiting for him to come here. To walk right into her trap.

He slumped back against the bumper of the van, fingers gripping his hair too tight, eyes burning. They were all going to be killed. Because of him.

Then he felt a hand on his shoulder. Gunner removed the glasses from his face and leaned down to look Jaylin in the eye. "There's a reason I brought you this way," he said. "There's something I need to show you."

The barbed cuffs hurt worse going in the second time. Gunner muttered an apology after snapping them back on and promised a dose of pain relief once they'd made it to the lab. Then he led Jaylin into an elevator, where the floor lifted beneath their feet and the doors opened once more to a hallway too white for human eyes.

The round, recessed lights above didn't flicker eerily or buzz with the hum of a mosquito. They were strong and each light Jaylin passed beneath seemed almost brighter than the last. The doors around him were given only numbers now, the windows covered with privacy curtains. Was this really Ziya's secret lair? It felt more like a sterile hospital hallway. All he could make out in those curtained windows was his own gaunt reflection. Fear. It was written in every crease. 

Jaylin took a deep breath and hardened his face.

They came to a metal door with a passcode lock on the left. Gunner swept his card through and the door hissed open. Jaylin felt his heart lag a beat. Cell upon cell existed within this room—stacked atop one another like a display case at a pet store. Each was a small, cubic space, with one tiny face peering out from beyond the glass. Children. They were keeping children locked away in glass cages—just like the one Ziya had kept him prisoner in. Jaylin felt his stomach tilt. His heart skipped a second time.

"I don't understand," he whispered. They looked like simple children at first glance—but then he saw the black stain, growing up the arm of a boy no older than four. The pale, white eyes of a tiny girl with bows in her hair. The claws on a kid who'd been using his sharp talons to scoop out the padding of his bed.

Jaylin took in every soft, plump face. Some of the children were too young to count to ten, some old enough to know basic math. One waved to him and the voice of another pulsed and echoed within the glass of her cell.

When he finally took his eyes off of the children, he found that Gunner had left his side. He'd wandered further down the hall, toward a containment cube marked six. "Come here," he said. "Look a little closer."

His legs stumbled at first, then they crossed the tile floor to meet Gunner. The child in cell six was tucked away in the corner, drawing on white walls with broken bits of crayon. Her curly brown hair bobbed over her shoulder, the dress she wore as white as the world around her. Gunner gave two raps on the glass and she turned away from her scribbled drawings.

Her eyes glistened, blue as the sky in the pale lights of her cell. She wandered to the glass, nervously rubbing the plump skins of her wrist with one big, black monstrous hand. The hand of a lichund—the one he'd been stuck with for days on end before the Bad Moon.

The child blinked at him, eyes wide with curiosity. She couldn't have been older than two. 

And as she neared the glass, Jaylin's heart took on a new pace. A sudden, unexplained rhythm that echoed down his spine. The closer the little girl wandered, the harder his heart beat.

She pressed her hands to the glass wall between them and he raised his own to match. Her tiny, flushed palm looked so small in comparison—but the hand of the lich stretched to nearly the same size. She gaped up to him with those round, blue eyes, and Jaylin knew. It was not the fast, unexplained tick of his heart and it wasn't the sweet, powdery scent of her. He just knew. He just knew. She was one of his.

And then little girl smiled.

A dimple on one cheek and none on the other.

An; wow you guys missed the mark on this one 😂😂 it's not jaylin's kid. Who had the dimple on one cheek?

an; ahhhhh i've been waiting to write this chapter for so long!! I can't believe Perigee is already reaching its end :'( we've got a few more chapters, but it's definitely coming up.

What do you guys think of Jaylin's discovery? ♥