You grit your teeth and whisper a verse of forgiveness for everything wrong you’ve ever done. Every innocent life you’ve ever taken. It is not unlike what your father said when the guards came for you. It is the same phrase you’ve used under your breath many times in battle, whenever you were forced to lift your gun or blade or arrows to cut down a civilian. Their eyes haunt you now.

The first Skyhunter comes soaring down at me, wings spread, his eyes ready to murder.

My wings are broken. My back is a mass of wounds. But I feel no fear. Right now, there is only one person who needs every bit of protection I can offer her. Talin.

This is your redemption.

39

TALIN

The two Skyhunters from back at the lab complex, when Raina showed me around. How could I have forgotten about them?

I look back and, in horror, see Red barrel forward to face the first of them. He’s buying me time.

Red! I scream through our link, but I know it’s no use. No time to waste now—and certainly not when Red is risking his life to give me that time.

I tear my eyes away as Red clashes with the first Skyhunter. I rush into the door. A gush of cool air greets me as I hurtle into the palace.

The instant I set foot in here, I feel the weight of Constantine’s presence. It’s so strong I’m not even sure if it’s just through our bond. Perhaps it has always haunted every hall of this palace, the whisper of his legacy in every tile and stone and wall of this forsaken place. But the beat of his heart turns into a drum in my chest as I hurry down the corridor that widens into the main atrium of the palace, until I almost mistake it as my own.

Come out, Constantine, I tell him through our link as I head down the path. My anger is a fire in my mind now. You’ve lost.

He doesn’t answer, but I can feel the shift of his emotions, the hate in his heart. It is strong here, echoing off the walls. At least he’s still trapped.

Somewhere behind me comes Red—but almost as soon as I feel his energy follow me in, something attacks him, sending him crashing against a wall. I wince as I feel agony lance through his body and tremble through our link, and turn around long enough to see him struggle with a Skyhunter.

He shoots me a grim look before he bares his teeth at the Skyhunter and attacks him.

Go, he tells me, his voice a hammer through our link. Go!

Constantine. I have to find him. I tear my eyes away from Red and force myself to continue down the hall. The space opens into the soaring ceiling of the atrium. I’m so used to seeing this space speckled with sunlight that at first it looks completely unfamiliar—the sky through the glass ceiling is dark and churning, fires burning around the city casting the sky in shades of crimson. It gives the entire space a scarlet glow.