Page 6 of Awakened Ash and Alchemy

Finally, her instincts, the ones that had screamed at her to run, were getting their way.

She pushed off the wall with unsteady legs, nearly tripping over her handbag. It took a few tries before her fingers latched onto the handle to start backing away.

Zarek watched her the entire time with those bright eyes, as if memorizing her.

Angela reached the edge of the alley where streetlights were too bright as the noise of the city rushed back, filled with cars, laughter, and a distant siren.

She turned back to find Zarek, standing deeper in the alley’s shadows, the injured man over his shoulder, while ash drifted around his boots. His gaze locked onto hers again, and somehow the air tightened, like an invisible thread pulled taut between them.

Angela’s throat burned that she could only whisper, “Thank you, Zarek.”

Zarek’s jaw clenched so hard she saw the muscle jump. As if gratitude were a language he didn’t know how to speak.

It was enough to send Angela stumbling out into the street, pushing through the crowd as if normal people could shield her just by existing.

Her car felt like a fortress when she finally reached it. Her hands shook so badly she fumbled with her keys, slamming the door and locking herself inside.

For a long moment, she just sat there, breathing hard, gripping the steering wheel to stop the trembling while clenching her teary eyes shut. Only for her mind to replay the three Black Cloaks turn to stone, then ash, all from the flash of those silver blades wielded by a man made of heat, with eyes like pale sea-glass teal blue, with that deliciously deep voice telling her to forget.

She wished she could forget.

What’s more, she should have been sobbing hysterically or calling the police about a mugging she couldn’t properly describe. Instead, she sat there… Her gaze flicked up to the rear-view mirror, reflecting the alley. For a second, she thought she saw a black shadow with impossible eyes fixed on her car.

But when a bus drove past, he was gone.

Angela’s pulse didn’t slow as she started the engine. With shaking hands, teary eyes, and a straight spine, she drove into the night, while the world she knew quietly cracked down the middle.

TWO

Zarek did not follow her. He never did. But what bothered him was that every instinct inside demanded that he follow that female. Instead, he turned back to the alley to finish the job.

The mortal lay slack over his shoulder, breathing shallow but stable. It was rare for them to survive an attack of the Black Cloaks. Two survivors, including one who walked away, was even rarer.

So how did she see him? And how did she see the other two Black Cloaks before he did?

And with three confirmed kills in one night, it was three too many.

Zarek adjusted his grip and stepped into the shadows as the alley folded around him and the light thinned into nothing. The city dropped away where brick was replaced by stone as the black walls of the Vanguards Keep rose out of the darkness.

He crossed the threshold, and the veyll sealed behind him.

Greeted by healers, the mortal was transferred without ceremony. The healers moved fast and would deliver him back to the mortal realm unharmed.

Zarek didn’t need to stay; his part was done. The memory wipe would hold indefinitely, like it always did.

Except tonight it was different.

He stripped off his coat as he walked down the wide corridor, his inner fire dampened to embers under his skin. He didn’t remove his gloves but flexed his fingers, feeling the heat curl and settle, obedient again.

Yet he could still smell her.

Not her fear, but apples, pears, and a human honeyed warmth beneath the shocked expression and teary eyes.

Surprisingly, her mind had not fractured after what it had seen. But it would. Most mortals could not cope with the abrupt cruelty of his world. To see the Black Cloaks turned to stone and ash made mortals go mad. That was why he wiped their memories. It wasn’t a kindness, but a necessity from a man who knew only cruelty and command.

Zarek stopped in the corridor of high stone walls and steady torchlight. He went over the moment the way he’d been trained to after each battle—the sequence, reaction, contain, wipe, and forget.

This was the only time he’d failed to finish his mission. Because of her.