“What’s happening out there? Did I just hear—” Chloe didn’t finish as Peter let out a series of curses.
She stared at her husband, surprise etched on her face, while Peter was busy shaking Daniel. He shook him twice and slapped him awake when that didn’t work. Daniel roused with a pained groan. His hair was partially burned, and his clothes were torn—marred by cuts that seemed too clean to have been inflicted by a beast’s claws. Whatever it was that tore through his clothes had also cut into his abdomen.
Chloe was the first to react, but Beaster Bert was faster. He retrieved a small vial and hurled it toward Peter, who caught it mid-air. Peter removed the cap in one motion and fed the serum to Daniel.
“That was closer than I’d like, but we escaped,” I heard Peter mutter to his wife and the Beaster.
Escape from what? The Zerogs were the strongest Blessed I knew. There was no way in the Rulers’ names they had to flee from anything—yet beads of sweat trickled down Peter’s temples.
“What is happening?” Chloe repeated, a nuance of irritation in her voice.
Peter shook his head, which silenced Chloe for the time being, even if she didn’t seem particularly pleased.
He turned to the Beaster. “Get your research drive and bring Daniel and Adam to the estate.”
That was not a request, and Bert didn’t take it as one.
“I’ll get Evalynn,” the Beaster nodded and moved along. He pulled Daniel from the ground and motioned for me to follow him to the first floor.
Bert moved faster than I expected as he rushed to the Central Network—a small pillar that connected all ether machines within the Beaster’s shop. He retrieved a small cube that glowed faintly and slipped it into his pocket. A moment later, he was in the doorframe to the staircase, pushing Daniel to move his “lazy butt,” as he put it.
I reached the first floor by the time Evalynn reunited with her husband. She was a kind soul and had treated me like family for the last few weeks, and seeing her scared witless was infectious. My eyes drifted to the large panoramic windows at the shop entrance, and my heart froze as a massive shadow covered the street. It was only there for a moment, burying the Beaster’s shop in darkness, and it could have only been a massive cruiser passing overhead—but I had yet to see a beast-shaped cruiser.
There were more movements—tiny shadows sprinkled all over the street—and more frenzied roars reverberated. The ground trembled again, and screams filled the air. The windows of the buildings across the street shattered, and it became quickly, painfully obvious that the Beaster’s shop was not the only one affected by… whatever was happening. The entire street shook from the tremors.
“Who was that idiot?” I heard Bert ask from behind.
My ears perked up, but I couldn’t hear much. My body and mind went blank as the distant shadows grew more defined. The Zerogs pushed us outside the building, ignoring my futile efforts to resist. I wanted to stay inside the Beaster’s shop—preferably in the basement, where I could hide and wait until the nightmare ended—but nobody seemed to care about my issues.
A scream nearly escaped my lips as a humongous avian flew across the Bastion. It smashed into the dome, clawing at the massive structure, trying to tear it apart, while hundreds of smaller beasts followed, clawing and biting at the barrier. The dome resisted, but I wasn’t sure it could protect the Bastion from something like this.
The avian beast was massive even from a distance—and I didn’t want to know how much larger it was up close.
“Is that a stampede?” I gasped, failing to understand the meaning of the beasts’ frantic attacks. Why was there a stampede? I knew the ether density levels had been shifting for the last two years, but the Blessed—especially the armies and Camps—had been working tirelessly to regulate the beast populations. There shouldn’t have been—
“That moth-brained idiot really did it, didn’t he?” Bert’s curse rang through my mind, and I spun toward the Beaster and the Zerogs.
What?
“Berthold Merka is an insane bastard. Who in the Rulers’ names steals a Mistral egg for a Journeyman?” Chloe hissed, her voice sharp with fury. “So what if his son was on the verge of advancing, or if he has a highly restricted World? Screw those damn restrictions—he put everyone in danger!”
I had never heard Chloe curse, but I wholeheartedly supported her outburst. Sure, I didn’t understand everything they said, but I’d learned a lot about the Zones and their rulers. My knowledge was still far from perfect, but even I had read about Mistrals—and it scared the living shit out of me.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
“Is… that a Mistral?” My hair stood on end as I looked back at the massive beast, which rivaled the legends I’d read about Rocs when I was still a child.
“Well, it looks like that fool found what he was looking for,” Bert grunted, staring at the Mistral.
“He either got an egg or one of their young ones, and—he thought it was a smart move to bring it back to the Bastion when Wale isn’t here to take care of the mess? Great! That’s fucking great!” Chloe’s heel crashed into the ground, cracking it open like a nut.
The dome flickered as more beasts attacked, but it wasn’t until one of the Mistral’s claws tore through the barrier that hell broke loose. Worse even, my gaze followed Evalynn’s as she turned to the horizon, where the outlines of a second massive beast, followed by speckles of much smaller creatures, appeared.
Unable to suppress a shudder, I stared at the stampede. There had to be thousands of beasts, and there were probably more coming from the ground, if the frightened screams all around them could be believed. Chaos ensued, and time seemed to crawl as my mind drifted to one thing while everyone rushed to the bunkers in the inner sectors: my parents!
“We need to get you to the estate!” I heard the muffled voice of Peter… or was it Bert? I couldn’t quite tell, not that it mattered at this moment.
“I am not going anywhere!” I snapped, turning around to face the others. “I need to get to my parents!”
Everyone turned to me and started talking at once, some trying to convince me calmly, while Chloe was shouting over them, but I wasn’t hearing anything.
“Do whatever you have to do. I am not your responsibility, nor am I obliged to listen to you,” I said sternly, and I was surprised at how calm I sounded. “I don’t care where you will go, but I will find my parents.”
“Then bring them to the estate as well!” Chloe relented when she realized I wouldn’t budge. “The Mistrals won’t back down until they have their young back… and until Berthold is dead, or they are. They will bring company with them. The beasts of several Zones must have been stirred by the Mistrals’ ire, and they will move this way, some guided by despair, others by greed once the dome is no more.”
More people emerged from the buildings around us. Some carried suitcases, others their children. There were also Soulkin carrying people as they rushed closer to the center of the Bastion, but there were also Blessed with Soulkin companions charging toward the edges of the dome. The Blessed rushing to danger wielded weapons and clutched them tightly. Even I could sense their tension and see their pale, fearful faces.
Although anxious and uncertain about what awaited them, they rushed to protect the Bastion from danger.
Chloe grimaced as the Blessed rushed past us, and she approached Daniel to kiss him on the forehead.
“I don’t know what will happen, but you should know that I love you.” She looked at Peter and added with a forced smile, “We love you, don’t forget that.”
Peter nodded in Daniel’s direction and turned away. Chloe was hesitant but followed Peter. A dark storm cloud crackling with violet arcs materialized beside her a moment later. The cloud shifted into a roaring beast only to transform back into mist a second later. Daniel’s parents stepped onto the cloud, which shot into the sky. A flash of violet leading to the edge of the dome was all I saw before Bert pulled us away.
“Where are they going?” I asked, even though the answer was obvious.
“They’ll fight,” Daniel said calmly. His eyes lingered where his parents stood a moment ago. “My parents will be fine.”
He turned to me. “As long as they don’t fight the Mistrals, they will be fine.”
Even though Daniel said that to me, it felt more like he was trying to convince himself that everything was going to be okay.
The dome flickered once more, but the barrier didn’t reform this time. It dissipated, giving the Mistrals and thousands of beasts free rein of the treasures they desired the most: humans and their Worlds.
***
“Incoming!” Evalynn warned us for the sixth time.
This time, nobody had to drag me into the alley as I moved fast enough to escape the squadron of beasts rushing through the main street. I hadn’t seen beasts like that before, nor was I given enough time to analyze them, but they were powerful as they rushed deeper into the Bastion. They were fast and ferocious, probably even stronger than Daniel, and they ignored us.
Granted, they ignored most people since we reached the ninth sector and moved toward the Blessed with larger, more refined Worlds. However, it was hard to remain hopeful in such a chaotic situation.
Wilds and the occasional Awakened beast stopped and charged into the buildings left and right as they sensed the Worlds of unBlessed hiding from the danger that seemed to loom everywhere. Or perhaps they smelled their fear. I had no idea if the beasts’ sense of smell was better than their perception of human Worlds. It probably varied by beast, but... was that really important right now?
My breathing was ragged, my chest heavier than ever, and my mind was drifting to my parents. Beasts were feasting on the corpses of the unfortunate, and it took everything I had to stay strong. Bile filled my mouth, and I would have loved to commit myself to vomiting, but I was not granted such a luxury.
“They left,” Bert whispered as he emerged from the small alley. He cursed and turned back as his eyes locked onto something to the left, but it was already too late. “We were discovered.”
The first thing I saw was a massive four-legged beast. A lion towering at two meters, with white fur, a crystallized mane, and… two heads. More lions followed the two-headed beast, but they had only one head. Not that the additional head made much of a difference to me. They were powerful, incredibly so.
Facing the Shadowing head-on had been one thing, but the lions? They were strong. Stronger than Aureus, the Shadowing, and even Daniel’s Thunderhorn Bull.
The beasts had noticed us, and they rushed at us, their eyes lingering on Daniel, the Beaster, and his wife. They ignored my very existence, yet I could still sense their bloodlust. It engulfed me and threatened to swallow me in despair.