Page 116 of Valkyrie Unknown

“We’re not alone.” I kept my voice low and direct at Davyn.

Davyn shook his head. “No, we’re not.” The man I was holding captive spoke.

“Tell whomever you’re with to drop the weapon, I want to meet them,” I said to the man.

He was the most calm of all of us, and that made me nervous. “The young lady would like you to put down the gun and join us on the street.” He spoke to the empty air.

Or the earpiece hidden under pale curls.

He frowned, and turned his attention to a space behind me. I wouldn’t look, but I was willing to bet it was the same open window I’d seen.

“Don’t do that,” he said.

I was about to argue, but he kept talking. “I hate cleaning brains out of clothes.” He looked at me. “My companion would like you to know they have the tactical advantage, and she’ll give me with a shirt covered with your brains if you don’t back the fuck up.” His voice was tight now.

The threat should terrify me. I wasn’t in the mood for this being hunted shit. Besides, if the person behind me was going to shoot, they wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble to stop me. They wouldn’t be letting me do what I was doing now.

Please let me be right. Even if I was wrong, I’d die in defiance instead of cowering.

I don’t die here.

Right. The prophecy.

I flipped off the sniper—or where I assumed they were.

“Watch yourself,” Davyn growled and spun. A blur charged him, and forced my attention between him and the man in front of me.

A spike of pain lanced my hand, and then my head. The agony spilled through my whole body. My dagger clattered to the ground as a scream tore from my throat. I was sicker than I’d ever been, and my arm had been cut off, and I was on fire, and I was being crushed. A spear lanced my chest.

None of those things were real, as I forced myself to look—I was still intact—but the pain and the impressions of death were so vivid, it was as if I lived them.

The pain surged stronger, and all my thoughts vanished.

I needed it to stop.Please make it stop.I didn’t want to die again. And again. And over and over. Lifetimes. An eternity of pain. So much agony.

“Davyn.”

“Holy shit. Finn?”

Those voices were part of the pain, but in front of me. I couldn’t?—

“She can make it stop.”

No. Nothing could stop this. It would happen again and again.

There was a shape in front of me. A person. Blond. Female. I tried to keep her in my sight, because it was better than what I felt.

“Can you hear me?” she asked.

I nodded. I thought I did.

Another scream ripped from me.

“Promise me you’ll hear us out when I take the pain away?”

I couldn’t?—

My head was being ripped clean again.

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