The air turned violent.
The helicopter plunged lower, rotors ripping the night apart, the searchlight carving white across the field so brutally that darkness fled in pieces. Dust lifted in choking waves, stinging skin and eyes, filling mouths and lungs.
The guards lost all sense of formation, shouting to one another, colliding, stumbling as the storm swallowed their control whole.
Eliana ducked instinctively, shoulders curling inward, breath trapped high in her chest.
Her heart betrayed her.
It leapt with a hope so sharp it hurt, a wild, reckless instinct that flared before fear could smother it. She raised her head despite the burning in her eyes, squinting into the merciless glare, searching the open side of the helicopter.
Please.
She did not know who she was pleading with. God. Fate. The night itself.
