Page 78 of Renegade Queen

But Damon was lost to us.

He’d chosen his side, and for the first time in our lives, it wasn’t ours.

Maddox’s feet stumbled as he moved, wading through the water quickly filling the room.

“Alyssa.” I shook her as I tried to bring her attention back to me. Her eyelids fluttered as she tried to tear her gaze away from the fire she hadn’t conjured herself. “Alyssa, can you break through the outer wall? Make it look like we escaped that way?”

Her gaze moved to the wall as she furrowed her brow.

It felt like it took an age, but it could only have been a fraction of a moment as the cracks started to form in the wall, vines pushing their way through the spaces. Drawing her arm back, I watched in awe as a wave of water formed behind us, and with one swing, it followed her call, smashing through the crumbling wall in front of us.

I was pulling her away before she’d even finished following through with her swing. Because a second later, the sound of cracking stone from the ceiling rang through the air again. This cell wasn’t going to last much longer. And if it collapsed before they could figure out we hadn’t gone through the outer wall, it could hopefully cover our retreat for even longer.

Maddox led the way down the corridor, and we were at the hidden door within seconds. The wall of flame started to thin, and it didn’t look like it would last much longer.

“Can you bring down the ceiling?” I asked, hating myself as I did.

Damon was still in that room. He could be crushed in the collapse.

If things hadn’t been as they’d seemed, we’d be killing our brother before he even had a chance. There was a possibility, right? A possibility that he was still on our side, that this was a mistake, maybe a ruse? Something. It had to be.

But even as the lies flowed through my mind, I gritted my teeth in denial.

He’d stabbed me. He’d tried to kill the woman I loved.

Damon was lost, and there was no saving him.

“Do it now,” I told Alyssa.

We wordlessly fled through the door. The only sound that accompanied us was the crash of falling stone as we sealed it closed behind us.

It was done.

It was over.

And judging by the tears flowing down Maddox’s face and the judgment in his eyes, I’d lost more than one brother here today.

Chapter 33

Maddox

Squeezing out through the crevice in the cliff face, no one followed our retreat. We didn’t even know if anyone was left alive to do so.

Damon.

Dean had made Alyssa crush him beneath a tonne of rock without a second thought.

It couldn’t have been what it seemed like. There had to be a reason why he made it sound like he was on Arik’s side. He would never have stood against us unless something important was on the line.

But Dean didn’t see it. He didn’t give him the benefit of the doubt.

And now he was dead.

If Damon had wanted him dead, he would be. There’s no way he would have missed a knife strike at that close range. Even if it had seemed like he was aiming for Alyssa.

He would never.

Wouldn’t he?