Page 117 of A Warrior's Fate

He wouldn’t have her here for spats of trade and resources. Back in Callisto, he’d wanted to keep her as far away from Deimos and its higher-ups as possible because he feared their lives at risk.

But instead of going right at him to cut out the act, part of her wanted to wrench it out of him, to catch him off-guard.

“Why do you want to look at the Wall?” she asked.

Kai leaned on the railing beside her. For a split second, a grimace crossed his face. “Because it borders my territory—more than any other on this continent—and if wards are failing, if the bak are acting strange, I need to make sure my pack is safe.”

At the reminder of the bak and the great structure that caged them, Isla found her gaze drawing outward. She’d forgotten which direction Surles—the region of Deimos that harbored its border with Phobos—lay, but she narrowed her eyes at the distance as if she could see the behemoth rising from where she stood.

There was so much that she wanted to tell him. That she needed to get off her chest from her time in Callisto. About the word she’d heard, about the Ares Pass, about the marker and the book, about—

“Someone tried to have me killed,” Isla blurted before she could stop herself.

Kai whipped around to face her, eyes wide and face twisted in a mix of confusion and budding rage. “Someone what?”

Isla took a breath, trailing her tongue over her bottom lip as she quickly ran through the best way to divulge the information. “Back in Callisto after you left, Lukas, he—”

“Lukas?” Kai stood; his fists clenched at his sides. “The hunter from Tethys?”

“Yes,” she said softly in a futile attempt to ease him. “I went to see him—after the few hours you’d asked for—and he had a dagger with him. Someone had given it to him and told…told him to kill me. That they’d let him out if he did. It’s fine now. I’m okay. I got away.”

Kai paced away from her, and Isla could practically feel him on the edge of a shift. She wasn’t sure if it was a consequence of what had occurred in the hall getting in the way—the bond tighter, stronger—but she felt her own body start to react.

“I felt something that day,” he growled. “But I thought it was just from the bond and being away from you. I should have never left.”

“You needed to be here with your pack,” she said, still trying to abate him.

“I needed to be with you.” He raked a hand over his hair. “Where is he now?”

Fury still tinged his voice.

“You’re not going to try—”

“Isla, where is he now?”

She swore the faintest hint of red fought over the gray of his eyes.

“In a prison in Io,” she told him, stepping towards him and finding her hand reaching out, just like in Callisto as they stood before the message. A phantom touch. A reminder. She was here. She was safe. Everything was fine.

But Kai had stepped back, his face contorting as if that had bothered him more than anything else. “Why would he be taken to Io? An attempt on another’s life warrants trial within one’s home pack—or the one it occurred in.”

“Because he still doesn’t remember anything,” Isla said, trying to keep her own aggravation out of her voice so as not to feed his as she explained, “And the Imperial Alpha doesn’t want anyone else knowing what happened during the Hunt. I thought you knew that.”

“I do, believe me,” Kai said through gritted teeth. Then he went quiet, pensive. “Who was still in Callisto when he attacked you?”

Isla swallowed and forced her shoulders to rise and fall. “My family, Adrien, some other members of my pack, other packs, nurses…I don’t know. People. Why?”

“Which members of your pack?”

Isla blinked, something in her gut twisting. Which members of her pack…why did that matter?

She angled her head, asking slowly, “Why do you want to know?”

Kai didn’t answer right away which was enough time for Isla’s mind to contemplate the possibility that had been lingering just out of reach and out of sight since it had happened, not acknowledged. “You…do you think it was someone of my pack that tried to have me killed?” More silence. Isla scoffed and moved back. “Are you insane? That—that’s my pack, that’s my family. Why would they want me dead?”

But Kai didn’t need to answer.

The pieces began to come together, despite how much she fought against them. Despite how she mentally clawed at the figments to destroy them before they came to be. Her chest felt tight like it was about to cave in.

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