Page 309 of Shadowblood Souls
But I want to be something like that for her and all the other shadowbloods. If the guys and I are blood, then we’re connected to the rest of them too, if not quite as closely.
There’s no one else in the whole world who could really understand what we’ve been through.
I offer her the best smile I can. “I know. I’ve been there. We’ll get a real life eventually, where everything’s… a little easier.”
God, I hope I can fulfill that promise. Especially after the way she smiles back at me after my encouragement.
Another swell of cold wraps around my stomach. What if I end up leading them to their deaths instead?
Before I can shake off the thought and head over to the course like I intended, a couple of guardians jog down the mountainside steps. Their slacks shift with their brisk movements, and for the first time I notice a glimpse of a monitoring band around the man’s ankle, just like the ones Clancy had us all wear on the mission.
The ones he made a point of taking off us when we returned. But the guardians wear them?
Understanding hits me like a slap to the face.
Clancy’s monitoring the guardians—so that he knows immediately if any of us tries to hurt them. If I went on a rampage out here and slaughtered these two, no doubt an alarm would go off somewhere and the whole place would be locked down before I could get any farther.
Knowing the guardians are okay is more useful to him than tracking our exact movements when we’re confined to the valley anyway.
They let us shadowbloods go without those anklets to give us the illusion of freedom. The guardians don’t need the illusion, because theyknowthey’re actually free.
All more of his manipulative lies.
As the two guardians stride toward me, I force my hands to unclench. It’s clear from their gazes that I’m their intended target.
I move forward instinctively to meet them before they get closer to Nadia, even though I’m not really sure what I’d be shielding her from.
She and the other younger ones haven’t had to see half of what the rest of us have. Haven’t had todowhat we’ve been forced to in order to survive.
And I’d rather keep it that way if I possibly can.
“We’ve got a different task for you, inside,” one of the guardians says with a jerk of her thumb toward the facility.
I frown. “Right now? I thought I had the whole morning out here.”
The other guardian rests his hands on his hips—by his electrified baton. “Change of plans. Clancy’s orders.”
A prickle of apprehension runs down my back, but I nod and go with them. Let’s find out what the man in charge wants from me today.
The guardians lead me to a different part of the facility than the areas I’ve become familiar with. In a small room with a vaguely medical vibe, they have me take off my running shoes.
Then they wrap a band around each of my arms, just below the sleeve of my T-shirt. The outer material feels like fleece, but something more solid presses against my skin from within.
As they click into place, tiny bumps jut out against my skin with a faint prick that fades away almost instantly.
I study the gray fabric warily. “What are these for?”
“Monitoring equipment,” the woman says. “They give a closer look at your internal state, but you’ll forget they’re even there.”
I find that hard to believe. And something about her phrasing sets off a sharper alarm bell in my head.
The man opens a door at the other side of the room and ushers me into a slightly larger space. The door thumps shut the second I’ve stepped over the threshold.
Zian turns at the sound where he’s standing at the far end of the room, his expression uncertain. Other than him, the room holds only a shag rug, a polka dot loveseat, and a double bed with two pillows and a duvet, all lit by a soft glow from the panel set in the ceiling.
My entire body is jittering with discomfort now. Something about this whole scenario feels way too wrong.
I glance at Zian, noting the matching bands against the peachy-brown skin of his bulging biceps. “Do you have any idea what this is about?”
