Page 251 of Scarlet Wars
Except for mine.
Which the United Chiefs didn’t know, because they had no idea I was also a Healer.
The numbness inside me cracked, letting in a sliver of possibility, a sliver of hope.
I gave him a small nod, indicating I understood. “James is right. We shouldn’t risk anyone interfering.”
The High Chief hesitated—a single, calculating beat—before inclining his head.
“All right,” he said, voice clipped. “You may portal out with Walker’s Nexus…but keep this connection open at all times.”
The portal snapped open with a harsh crack of green energy, the edges jagged and unstable—like even the magic itself sensed how wrong this was—then the world yanked sideways.
Cold hit me first.
A brutal, slicing cold that stabbed needles straight through my skin. Snow whipped hard across an empty stretch of abandoned farmland, the wind howling like it wanted to tear us apart molecule by molecule. My boots sank into frost-crusted drifts up to my calves.
James stepped out right beside me, shoulders squared against the storm.
I kept my Nexus raised, its glow trembling in my palm, not from the cold, but from the images flooding through it.
Saoirse.
Broken. Headless. Slumped in that chair, her body robbed of everything that made her alive.
Nino.
Beaten to hell, blood drying on her collar, eyes swollen but still blazing with fury through the screen.
And between them: the High Chief.
Smirking like he’d already won. Like we were his puppets standing exactly where he wanted us.
Wind whipped my hair across my face as I tightened my grip on the Nexus, forcing my shaking hand to hold steady. The blizzard raged around us, snow swirling and snarling, stinging my cheeks until they burned.
James stepped closer, not touching me, but close enough the heat from his body was a small, stubborn shield against the cold. His breath fogged in the air, his jaw was locked tight, and every line of his posture was braced.
“We’re in the clear,” he murmured, barely audible over the wind. “No Healers will translate here and undo the bond.”
The reminder of our plan sent a tremor down my spine.
It would all come down to me undoing what we were about to do.No room for failure.
The High Chief’s image was distorted by the storm, but it was still dripping with authority.
“Now,” he said. “Begin to form the bond.”
Snow hammered against my back. My fingers numbed around the Nexus. My heart slammed harder, like it was trying to tear its way out.
James shifted again, attention fully on me. There was something fierce and broken and determined in him.
“You ready?” he asked quietly. Not gently. Not kindly. But firmly, like every part of him was saying: We do this together or not at all.
I took a breath. It felt like inhaling glass.
“Yeah,” I whispered, the word almost lost in the wind. “Let’s do this.”
In the middle of the freezing human world, with death looming through the screens before me, James reached for me, and the world held its breath.
