Page 245 of Scarlet Wars
The High Chief inclined his head once—almost courteous—and the man beside Saoirse lifted the Corona a fraction higher. Its red edge glowed brighter, casting a sickly halo across the filthy floor and the splattered wall behind her.
Saoirse forced her head up. Even through the swelling, through the bruises, through the blood matting her hair to her skull, she tried—tried—to form words. Her lips trembled around shapes I couldn’t hear. The Nexus didn’t transmit her sound. Only mine. Only my breath, my pulse, my panic echoing back at me while she mouthed silent pleas.
“Stop it,” I snapped, too loud, too cracked. “Stop it! You want to play politics, fine—fine—but she’s not—she’s not part of this—don’t fucking touch her?—”
“She is now.”
The weapon moved, making my stomach drop so fast I nearly doubled over.
“Okay. Okay, wait!” I blurted, stumbling over the words, tripping on them, reaching for anything they’d take. “Fine, I’ll do it, I’ll agree, just stop, just stop, I’m agreeing, all right? Don’t hurt her, I’ll call?—”
But before I could finish…
One strike.
Brutal.
Precise.
Final.
The Corona sliced across her neck in a single clean arc, and the feed didn’t turn away. Didn’t blur. Didn’t spare me a pixel.
It caught everything.
The violent jolt of her body as the weapon flashed.
The eruption of blood—dark, thick, too much—spraying across the wall like someone had flung a bucket.
The way it soaked instantly through the thin fabric of her shirt, turning the pale material a soaked, sticky red.
The wet, choking spasm of her limbs as her nerves fired on instinct alone.
And then…her head dropping forward.
A sound followed—dull, heavy, meaty—as chin hit chest, as blood gushed in a horrible, continuous stream down her torso, dripping onto the concrete in fat, rhythmic splatters.
There was no cutaway.
No fade.
Only Saoirse—dying in real time—while the High Chief watched me through the frame.
And then I screamed.
FIFTY-THREE
CADEN
That night, I almost told her.
I almost said those three little words that had been true almost from the first moment she crashed into my life.
She deserved to know.
But I wanted it to be right. Wanted to tell her without the Chiefs’ threat hanging over our heads. Without the world waiting to tear us apart the second we chose each other.
When I left her room after James’s urgent nex, I found him pacing the hallway, tension bleeding into his every move.
