Free Everlost (The Night Watchmen Series Book 3) by Candace Knoebel Page A

curtain, just waiting for you to snatch it back.
    I wanted them to finally see the corruption in the Priesthood. The innocent blood spilled on their behalf that fills every hollow promise in their words. And maybe I wished they would finally fight back. Maybe I wished the beauty of this place had been unmasked the moment Clara and the rest of the Priesthood showed who they really were, and I’d return to something darker. Emptier.
    But there isn’t a single thing out of place.
    They continue to walk in their fancy clothes with their eyes pointed in whatever direction their heading, oblivious to the slow, internal destruction of our government. They continue to ignore the news that’s so blatantly telling them that we’re in the midst of the biggest civil war our kind has ever seen. Those words are plumes of smoke they pass through. Those statues of the Divine they walk by, the leaders who carry the meaning of this Coven, could be garbage cans for all they care.
    And yet, I’m not surprised.
    The mind, most of the time, only sees what it wants us to see. Only recognizes inconveniences, when it’s convenient. How can they really pay attention when the crimson tears of our people have not yet touched the city limits? When the devastation of losing everything hasn’t clawed its way through the boundaries of what Clara now calls her city.
    She’s keeping the peace by isolating the destruction within the lower ranks. By ensuring the lives lost are only with those who don’t matter in her eyes. But those beneath, those who pour sweat and endure grievances day in and day out to keep this city running, those are the ones who matter most.
    And no one cares.
    At this point, a Defect has more sympathy than the Night Watchmen. They have become slaves of a war. A war in which they can’t even pick the side they want to fight on. These men and woman are sent to slaughter, night after night, so that the rest of our kind can live in oblivious peace.
    I’d rather die. I’d rather bleed out, right here for all to see.
    The woman’s monotonous voice, who broadcasts ninety-nine percent of the news to our kind, spreads like an airborne pathogen over the vast wave of people crowding the vendors in City Square. She’s dishing out a list of members within the Coven who are being summoned to the city, which transmits throughout our nation on a special channel only Primevals receive. The bottom of the screen reports the names of the growing number of Watchmen who have either perished or been taken by the hands of the Darkyn Coven.
    Things are rapidly growing worse.
    And still, life carries on as if it weren’t.
    Weldon looks back at me from just inside the shadow we’re standing in. “This is as close as I could get us.” We’re standing next to a tree that’s about two hundred meters away from the Military Compound. “Once we step out of the shadow, we’ll be on Clara’s territory. We have to get in and get out.”
    “I know,” I whisper back, watching the countless men and women walking past.
    “No matter what, we head straight for the general’s room. Sprint for the compound. If anything happens and we’re split up, meet on the rooftop? Okay?”
    I nod, ignoring the fact that my heart’s bouncing all around my ribcage, and shut off my emotions. It’s time for business, and this is the only way I can guarantee I won’t make a mistake due to my heart thinking for my brain. I reach behind me, pull out a flux for each of us, and hand him one.
    He takes it, inhales and exhales, and then says, “Here goes nothing.”
    The moment his foot crosses into Ethryeal City, a high-pitched alarm sounds from somewhere above the Courthouse. Dread slams into me.
    They warded the entire city against us.
    Elites storm out from every corner of the city with rifles pressed against their chests. Weldon grabs my hand and pulls me in a full-on sprint, leaving no chance of turning back. I feel the cloaking spell flickering in and out as Elite