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Half the truck is charred down to the metal, the two back tires flat and rolling on the rims. I don’t recognize most of the blood-soaked faces. Soldiers rush to the vehicle, already pulling out corpses. If Matthias were here, he’d insist I put down the wounded to cease the racket. Instead, I reach out with my mastery, brushing over each hysterical person until they calm. I eat their pain, their panic and fear, until a hush falls over us. People avert their eyes, but the soldiers are having an easier time gathering information.

My skin buzzes from the high, a tingle catching my fingertips. I know my eyes are glowing. I know what they all see after such a blatant consumption. Approaching slowly, clinically, I examine the nearest corpse. These people didn’t die by bullet or a wild animal. The fatal blow was a strike to the throat, precise, clean, and severed at the C2 vertebra.

My breath hitches, fingers hovering over the singed, flayed skin.

“Saren!” Avis booms, his face a deep burgundy. “Leave.”

His alpha stench overpowers the smell of cooked flesh and engine oil. I meet his eyes, daring him to try that again.

“What is this?” I demand, pointing at the woman’s neck.

“A slit throat.” His voice gives nothing away, but I can sense the lie.

I move to the next laid-out body and the next…ten bodies total. Only two were part of the original convoy. The only survivors are the armed guards and a scared teenager. His black hair covers his face, thin arms wrapped around his middle, but when he peeks up at me, dark brown eyes and olive cheeks revealed, I hate myself for hoping. This couldn’t have been Ryx. Ryx isn’t a teenager anymore. It is just the only version of him I remember.

I doubt he is even alive.

“What happened?” I ask the boy.

“Maven,” Avis growls, approaching us. “We are not interrogating the survivor.”

I ignore him. “Answer me,” I bark.

The boy glances between us and pisses himself. The crotch of his dirty pants darkens. He crumbles under my stare, shivering. “N-Nightp-pulse.”

I freeze. My heart stutters in my chest. “What?”

He doesn’t get a chance to answer me. Avis digs his meaty fingers into my arm, jerks me away, and pushes his telekinesis onto me. My limbs are strung up like a puppet. I fight it instantly, breaking his hold with ease. “How dare you!”

Another presence brushes my mind, darker, stronger. I glance up just as Matthias approaches. His eyes are lit up like two violet stars. Their glow penetrates my resolve, making my steps waver. Pain instantly flares behind my skull. I call out, swaying right into Avis’s hold. “Take him home,” Matthias rasps.

“Consider it done, sir.”

14

Saren

I dig my heels into the wooden floorboards.

“Please!” I beg Matthias, but even though I'm strong, he’s stronger. Always stronger. Always has this hold on me that I can’t ever break free of.

“You need to be reminded of your place, boy.”

His voice is still as horribly rough as it was when I was a child—his mastery is like ten-ton shackles around my throat. Tears burn behind my eyes as he pushes me again, closer to my cage. The cold bars reach for me like sharp talons. Each time I try to fight back, to strike with my abilities, the pain in my stomach worsens to the point that I shriek. His alpha stench singes my nose, forcing my brain to accept its dominance.

“Please, sir!”

“In.”

“I only meant to help them! To find out what—Ah!” I cry out, my limbs stiff and moving.

The cage door swings open before I’m shoved into it. My back crashes into the bars, jolts of energy forcing my spine to arch and spasm. I collapse in a pile of aching limbs, tears splashing on my cheeks. Like I usually do, I curl into a protective ball, not touching a single inch of the perimeter. The pose is unnatural, and after too long, my muscles hurt so bad it takes days to walk properly again.

Clicking the button on his controller, he eases the current down so he can slip a hand through the bars to pet me. Those cool fingers stroke my cheeks, lips, and ears all while he coos that I’m his.

“Please,” I whisper.

“Three days for disobeying Avis’s order. Another three for unsanctioned feeds.”