Page 31 of God of War

He shoves me. Hard. I stumble into the hallway, pausing only once to see Ares return to his position at the window. He looks back at me and something passes between us. I nod once, turn, and race for the bedroom.

Ares will find me, I tell myself as I hoist my backpack over my shoulder.

Ares will find me, I tell myself as I wrench open the window and drop down to the spindly weeds on the other side.

Ares will find me, I tell myself as I stay low and dart for the dark tree line.

And that’s when I hear the gunshots.

12

Ares

I am fury.

I am rage.

I am war.

There’s a powerful creature in my body that’s roaring for blood. I want to shoot Sheriff Jackson dead. Send his brains splattering all over his fucking windshield.

It’s what Delaney wants and, now that I know the truth about what he’s done to her — probably for years, probably ever since she sat herself down at my kitchen table — I want it too.

But I can’t. I can’t betray Griff or the brothers. If I kill the Sheriff, there will be no end to the repercussions for the Wastelanders. The logical, rational part of me fights for control as I send Delaney away. I manage to hold myself back until I hear the bedroom window squeak, until I hear the soft thump of Delaney landing on the other side of the trailer.

Then I count to three.

I kick open the trailer door and start shooting. It’s dumb, it’s fucking reckless. It’s so dark out I can’t see anything beyond the glaring headlights of the Sheriff’s patrol car. Still, I fire, my finger squeezing the trigger again and again.

Luckily I catch the Sheriff off guard. He shouts something and scrambles for his door, flinging it open and ducking down behind it as bullets whizz through the air.

Any second now and he’ll return fire. I’m out in the open, bathed in light. I’m dead for sure.

I stop running. Steady my hand. Aim.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

One front tire on the patrol car explodes. One headlight, then the next.

“You’re fucking dead, Warner!” Sheriff Jackson screams into the darkness. “You and the slut!”

Hopefully his ears are ringing just like mine. Hopefully he can’t hear what direction I take off in, can’t hear my feet sliding on the gravel.

I run to the other side of the trailer and sprint to the woods, running blind, my feet stumbling over branches and thick undergrowth. I just shot at Sheriff Jackson, and even without killing him, I know I just threw the Wastelanders headfirst into the shit.

Still, with that bouncing around in my head, the only thing I care about is Delaney.

I make it several yards beyond the treeline before I stop to see if he’s following. He’s not.

Breathing hard, I look around. It’s impossible to see much of anything this deep in the woods.

“Delaney? He’s gone, kid.”

“Ares?” Her voice is muffled, but close.

“Yeah.”

There’s movement to my left and I spot a fallen tree, the sides rotting and coming apart. After a moment, Delaney rises from the inside, a ghost of the forest prying her way out of the dead tree. There’s a crown of twigs and leaves caught in her hair and even though her face is shadowed, I can already tell she’s glaring at me.

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