We ascended even as another boom hinted the fire had devoured everything below, destroying labs and prison cells, erasing all the horrors that’d gone on for far too long.
My heart kicked with hate for this place.
Their day of reckoning was finally here and my mouth watered to avenge myself, my family, and all those unfortunate enough to be injected with my blood.
The floor of the lift grew hot as the fire chased us up the elevator shaft.
It wouldn’t burn out. Not until every inch of this building was char—leaving it to collapse, one floor on top of the other.
Rook stood in a rune of frost, the icy fractals crawling up the walls and ceiling. “Where are we going? Is ground the exit?” She went to push the G button, but...I reached over her and pressed O1.
She scowled. “O one? What’s that? What’s there?”
“Operations. It’s where the reactors convert the energy gathered from elsewhere before being fed into the London electrical grid. It’s a bomb waiting to go off. I plan to set it on fire, so it destroys this building.”
“But...it’syourbuilding.”
“Don’t care. I want nothing to do with it.”
The doors pinged, then opened.
A vast, cathedral-like chamber welcomed us. Huge reactors that worked off Ashfall blood waited in the low humming quiet. The three-storey-high ceilings gave plenty of room for the reactors to work without overheating. They looked as if they were wrappedin metal cobwebs thanks to the steel walkways criss-crossing three levels.
The cylindrical reactors dominated the space, each one the size of a large shed, but not one of them operated—probably thanks to no longer having access to my blood.
I doubted these reactors had been turned on since I’d escaped Cinderkeep. The amount of money my company would be bleeding in lost market share and revenue would probably drive even the calmest board member to murder, but...fuck them.
My father had left me more than enough money in the account protected by Sovereign Retrieval and...I had no affection or loyalty to this company whatsoever.
Why should I?
All it had ever brought me was death, pain, and imprisonment.
Stepping into the impressive space with its network of pipes, stairways, and operation stations, I focused on the part of my power that sensed life.
I waited to hear any heartbeats.
I might have a grudge to settle with the board, but the workers were innocent.
Nothing.
Either the workers had been laid off, or it was still too early for them to clock in.
Rook tensed beside me as I summoned the fire.
Angry, golden flames erupted from my chest, blasting around the chamber like a fiery storm. I didn’t direct it—didn’t care what it attacked first—but it picked up on my desires and bulldozed through each reactor as if they were blocks of butter to be melted.
Explosions rocked the building as the reactors caught fire andburned. Flames chewed their way along every wire, conduit, and walkway—melting everything in its wake.
I smiled as it kept growing. Its roar rang in my ears as it howled around the room like a dragon made of pure fire. The scent of hot metal and burning plastic caught in the back of my throat.
Rook coughed and tightened the scrap of fabric around her mouth and nose.
Glancing at her, I drank in the exhaustion in her eyes and the frost twinkling in her hair. Urgency to get her to safety sent another blast of energy into the fire, commanding it to hurry and ensure nothing was salvageable.
The fire listened.
It snarled—feeding off me like I was firewood.
