Chapter 5The Fail-Safe

The lantern flame shuddered as another howl rolled through the walls. Rissa's fingers traced the Moonstone chip's rough edge, feeling the faint pulse beneath its surface—like a heartbeat, but wrong. Hungry.

"It's not a bomb," Dorian said, reading her intent. "We don't know what that frequency does at full power."

"We know what it did to the tunnel." She kept her voice low, though Vance's ultimatum still rang in her ears. *The girl's life, or your freedom.* "We aim it at the back wall. Controlled. Just enough to break through."

"And if it brings the roof down on us?"

Rissa met his eyes. "Then we're buried before he gets to use her."

Dorian's jaw tightened. He didn't argue. That scared her more than the howls.

She smeared his blood across the chip's surface—three fingers, dragging through the cut he'd made on the axe blade. The stone drank it. The pulse quickened, becoming a thrum she felt in her teeth.

"Now," she said, and threw it.

The explosion wasn't loud. It was *absence*—a vacuum that sucked the air from her lungs, then released it as a shockwave that tore through her eardrums. Sound collapsed into a low, keening drone. Dust filled everything. The back wall wasn't there anymore, just a ragged hole opening onto blighted trees and moonlight.

An enforcer stumbled through the breach, coughing, half-shifted with claws extended and muzzle elongating. He saw them too late.

Dorian hit him low, driving a shoulder into his ribs. The enforcer's shift faltered as he crashed onto his back. Rissa was already moving, dropping her knee onto his chest, pressing the axe blade flat against his throat—not cutting, but promising.

"Don't," she breathed.

The enforcer froze. Young. Maybe early twenties. His eyes were wide, human, terrified.

"Dorian. Help me."

Together, they dragged him through the gap, into the clearing where Vance stood with a dozen enforcers forming a crescent around the station. The alpha's arms were folded. His smile was slow, cold, and utterly satisfied.

"Well done, daughter."

The word hit her like a slap. She wasn't his daughter. She was his *mistake*, his failed experiment, the woman he'd turned in a rage and expected to break.

"I want your blood," she said. "For the girl. For the stone. Give it to me, and he walks."

Vance's smile didn't waver. He looked at the enforcer—really looked, for the first time—and something flickered in his eyes. Recognition. Disappointment.

"You want me to bargain for *him*?"

"He's your son."

"He's a weakness." Vance's voice carried no heat. "I have three sons. Two daughters. Eight grandchildren. You think I remember all their names?" He stepped closer, and the enforcer's breathing quickened under Rissa's blade. "You want to trade for his life? Go ahead. Kill him. It saves me the trouble of culling the litter myself."

The enforcer made a sound—small, broken, a whimper he couldn't suppress. Rissa felt his pulse hammering against the axe's handle.

"He's lying," Dorian muttered.

"He's not." The words came out flat. She'd seen that look before, in pack elders who spoke of their own children as *resources*. "He means it."

Vance spread his arms. "You have nothing I want, Rissa. Your sister is already in the chamber. The girl is waiting. And you—" He tilted his head. "You're just delaying the inevitable."

The enforcer's lips moved. At first she thought he was praying. Then she caught the whisper.

"Please. I didn't want this."

She pressed the blade closer. "Quiet."

"No, listen—" His voice cracked. "I know something. The chamber. There's a fail-safe."

Dorian moved closer, blocking them from Vance's view. "Keep talking."

"My father built it. A drainage mechanism. If the Moonstone starts to destabilize, you can bleed the power out through the ritual lines." The enforcer's eyes darted toward Vance, then back. "It's hidden beneath the altar. A lever disguised as a crack in the stone."

"Why would he tell you?"

"Because I was supposed to maintain it." The enforcer's laugh was hollow. "I'm his *weak* son. The one who can't shift properly. So he gave me a job that kept me out of sight."

Rissa studied his face. Sweat. Fear. But something else too—a bitter resentment that ran deeper than the moment.

"If you're lying—"

"I'm not." He swallowed. "I've seen what the stone does to people. I've seen what it's done to *him*. I'll help you destroy it. Just don't leave me here."

Vance was growing impatient. He gestured, and two enforcers began circling to the left. Rissa made her choice.

"Get up." She hauled the enforcer to his feet, keeping the axe at his back. "You're coming with us. If you try anything, I'll open your throat before you finish your first shift."

He nodded, trembling.

"Run," she said.

They ran.

The blighted forest swallowed them—twisted trees with bark that wept black sap, ground that crunched with dead leaves that never decomposed. Behind them, Vance's howl split the night, high and furious, a sound that promised pain.

*The hunt continues.*

Branches clawed at Rissa's face. The enforcer stumbled ahead of her, guided by Dorian's grip on his collar. His breathing was ragged, but he kept moving.

"What's your name?" she demanded.

"Kellan."

"Kellan. If you're taking us into a trap—"

"You'll kill me. I know." He glanced back, and in the moonlight, his expression was raw. "But I saw the way my father looked at me. I've been dead to him for years. At least with you, I get to choose how I die."

Rissa had no answer for that.

They crashed through the treeline into a dry creek bed, the eroded banks offering temporary cover. Dorian pulled them down, pressing a finger to his lips. Above them, enforcers crashed past, their howls fading east.

For a moment, silence.

Then Kellan spoke, his voice barely audible: "There's something else. Something my father doesn't know I found."

Dorian's eyes narrowed. "What?"

"A journal. Hidden in the fail-safe compartment. It belonged to the pack's founder." Kellan's hands were shaking. "He wrote about the stone's origin. Where it came from. What it *wants*."

Rissa's blood went cold. "Show us."

Kellan looked at her, and for the first time, his fear gave way to something harder. Purpose.

"I will. But when we get there, you have to promise me one thing."

"I'm not promising anything."

"When you destroy the stone—" He met her gaze. "Make sure my father is inside the chamber when it happens."

A howl tore through the night, closer now.

Dorian grabbed Kellan's arm. "Move."

They moved.