Chapter 42

LEAH

My freedom began with a click and I still stuck on that click even if it felt good, it felt like a relief, but I couldn't keep myself in this position, I had just few hours before they come back, and I needed to get out of here quietly

It was so soft I almost thought I imagined it. Just a quiet snick of metal giving way, but it roared through me like thunder. The first shackle was off. Three more to go, I took a deep breath not blinking an eye as I pushed further knowing my life depended on the outcome of my predicament.

I didn’t sleep, I couldn't bring myself to do that when freedom was just few hours away, I looked through the window and relief coursed through my veins knowing I still had time, but I needed to hurry

I took a breath before I continued to move knowing I could not afford to stay another day not with that monster of a machine humming beside me like it owned my soul, not with Victor’s voice echoing in my mind, claiming me like some lab rat he'd broken.

My body was still, but inside, I was fire. I didn’t blink. Didn’t breathe more than necessary. My heart pounded like it was trying to claw out of my chest, each beat a rebellion. Around me, machines clicked and hissed, unaware, uncaring, of what was about to happen.

That damn stupid device sat there, smug in its silence. Victor had treated it like it was his fucking child, a masterpiece of cruelty designed to drain me. But it would never work again. Not if I had anything to say about it and you damn well I did.

I twisted my wrist, just enough to slip it from the loose cuff. Skin tore where wolfsbane had eaten into me, but I didn’t flinch. Pain had long become irrelevant. It was just another noise in the background, white noise I refused to acknowledge.

I reached across, fingers trembling as I dug my nails under the rusted latch on the opposite cuff. My breath caught. Every second felt like borrowed time, like someone might walk in and drag me back to hell, but I kept going.

A cry slipped passed my lips as well as a click from the chain then a snap, and it finally dropped to the ground with a thud

The last shackle hit the floor with a metallic clang that echoed too loud. Too damn loud. I froze. My breath locked in my throat. Had they heard that?

I remained silent as my heart raced in my ear, one second, two seconds and then nothing

Silence answered me. Blessed, infuriating silence. No guards storming in. No Victor monologue. Maybe they still thought I was unconscious. Maybe they were stupid enough to believe I’d given up.

They didn’t know me at all

I stood but immediately fell as my legs felt like jelly, knees screaming from days strapped down. Standing up again I held on to the wall while I staggered but didn’t fall. My body trembled under its weight, but I forced it upright. I would not collapse. Not now. Not when freedom was finally within reach.

I looked down at myself. A torn, blood-crusted hospital gown clung to my skin. My hair was a filthy, tangled mess in my face. I looked like something the hospital found abandoned in the woods but my eyes they were alive, and they burned like the fury of a queen.

A faint silver shimmer rippled under my skin, soft like moonlight behind clouds. Then it flared, brighter, bolder. My powers were returning. Finally. Slowly. Like the tide creeping back into a broken shore.

The Moon Goddess hadn’t abandoned me. She was with me the entire time then as if suddenly remembering what I've been through, fury took the best of me.

I turned to the machine. That parasite. That abomination. Tubes still stained with me. With everything it tried to steal.

My jaw tightened.

I lifted my hand, and a gust of air exploded from the window causing a sense of shock to go through me, flinging papers and metal trays across the lab. Something surged inside me, clawing for release. I wanted vengeance that badly.

“Let’s see how you like being drained,” I muttered.

Both palms lifted. The energy swirled at my fingertips, silver and electric blue, alive with rage and purity. I didn’t hold back. Not this time and I was completely taken aback, and I remembered how the moon goddess had told me I had powers I just needed to use it.

I held on to the that power as a sense of happiness coursed through my body knowing that all his effort will just go to waste, I twisted my fingers and glass shattered, wires snapped and flailed like dying snakes as lightning stroke the room almost causing me to go blind.

The explosion wasn’t deafening, but it definitely blinded me with light. Smoke billowed. Flames licked shelves. Something burst above, releasing a torrent of steam that hissed like a warning.

But honestly, I really didn't care, but I know I needed to get out of here. I ran as fast as I could and pushed the door down as it was already broken from the damage I made. I coughed from the smoke as I continue to run.

My feet were bare, bloodied, aching as they slapped against the concrete while alarms finally screamed to life. Too late, assholes.

“She’s out! The girl is loose!” my heart hammered Andi continued to run as fast as possible.

“CAPTURE HER…NOW!” I heard the booming voice.

The hallway exploded into chaos, rogues poured in like locusts, snarling and ready. But I wasn’t the same broken girl they’d strapped to that table. I slammed my hands against each other and lightening clapped through the hall and lowered myself before twisting and reaching for my daggers that I found in the room before rising.

I met them head-on.

I leapt, twisted midair, slammed into the first rogue like a battering ram. He dropped. Another swung a blade, I caught his wrist, snapped his arm, drove my elbow into his throat. He gagged and crumpled. A third grabbed for my hair.

Bad move, I do not joke with my hair

I spun, ducked under his arm, and slammed him so hard into the wall the plaster cracked before driving my dagger into his chest

I moved like a storm. Slow yet fast, calm yet dangerous, I didn’t stop.

Blood sprayed across the corridor. Mine. Theirs. Didn’t matter. My fists bled, my ribs burned, I tasted iron in my mouth. But each punch, each blast of power, was another mile between me and that lab.

Another step closer to Dante.

I crashed through a rusted metal door and stumbled into the night. For a second, I couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe and panic surged through me before I blinked and everything rushing me and my legs moved.

The forest stretched out before me, dark, alive, real and I have never been happier to feel the dirt in-between my toes

The scent of pine. The sting of wind. The damp earth beneath my feet. I stood there, gasping, soaking in the sheer freedom of it all.

Then I ran.

Branches whipped at my face. Thorns tore at my legs. I didn’t stop. Couldn’t stop, I dragged the power and stroke the lightening to the back. Behind me, the facility burned, screaming, collapsing, dying the way it deserved along with the rogues.

A smile spread on my face and I looked ahead of me, there was silence and stars and then…

Crack.

The sound of a branch snapping behind me made my heart cease for a split second and I reached the power within me, I turned too slow, but it was too slow

A force slammed into my side, and I hit the ground hard, skidding across dirt and leaves. Pain exploded through my shoulder. A growl rumbled above me.

I twisted, ready to fight, my dagger ready to stab, but something pinned me down. Heavy. Familiar.

I blinked. Blood in my eyes. My vision swam.

“Leah?”

The voice hit me like a shot to the heart. I blinked again. The blur sharpened. A face I hadn’t seen in days. A voice that tore through every wall I’d built around myself.

“Dante?” I whispered, my voice barely a breath, without thinking I reached for his neck in a hug as a cry escaped me and then it hit me.

Darkness, total and complete.

I collapsed into it, his name on my lips.

“Dan…"