Chapter 13 · Execution Tonight

"Get off him!"

I drove my shoulder into the guard's chest before his blade could touch Kael's throat. We slammed sideways, his helmet cracking against the tower wall with a sickening thud. I didn't give him a second to breathe. I grabbed his wrist, twisted until the metal clattered across the floor, and buried my knee into his ribs.

"Mara! Left!" Noah screamed.

A second guard charged through the broken doorway.

Kael moved faster. He caught the man by the collar and launched him into the rail. The metal bent under the impact, but the guard still managed to raise his rifle.

Kael’s hand flashed. A black spike erupted from the air, punching through the rifle and pinning it to the wall like a specimen in a jar.

Then Kael staggered.

Blood was soaking through his coat, dark and heavy. Too much. The shared bond had given me his strength, but it had also tied our nervous systems together. As his breath hitched, a jagged rip of pain tore through my own side.

"You feel that?" he gasped.

"I feel you being stupid," I snapped, slamming the first guard's head into the floor again. "Stay down!"

"That wasn't an answer."