"They don't want us dead," I managed to press out. "Not yet anyway."
Thalia lifted her head. “What do you mean?”
I stared into the dark ahead, my voice slow but certain. “They had many chances. In the hallway. In the temple. That giant one—the one with the… whatever that was, the Zuten weapon—it didn’t care who it hit. It mowed through their own kind. Took out Eulachs and dragoons like it didn’t matter to them.”
“I saw it too,” Oksana said, her voice low. “That one wasn’t just killing. It was controlling.”
“It didn’t fire until we were out of the way,” Thalia added, her eyes narrowing. “I thought maybe it was a coincidence, but now...”
“It waited,” I whispered. “It waited until we were clear.”
A heavy silence followed. The kind that thickens when too many truths press into it.
“So what are you saying?” Thalia asked. “That those things aren’t just Eulachs?”
Oksana shook her head. “They look like them. But they're bigger and smarter. This wasn't just a random attack. It was coordinated. That’s not Eulach behavior.”
“Ney,” I agreed, staring down at my trembling hands. “That’s… something worse. Something made.”
“Made?” Thalia echoed.
I met her gaze and shrugged, “Like a weapon.”
For a moment, no one said anything. Then Oksana’s eyes darkened. “Because we’re bait.”
Thalia turned sharply. “What?”
“That’s what this is,” Oksana continued grimly. “We’re not being hunted. We’re being pushed. Herded. They’re watching, waiting. And they’re not going to kill us… because they’re using us.”
My stomach turned. “Using us… to get to Mallack. To Myccael. To Darryck.”
Oksana nodded slowly. “We’re not the endgame. They are.”
A chill rippled down my spine. The idea that those monstrous, dead-eyed beasts had a goal. A strategy. That it involved us only as pawns in something bigger… darker.
“We have to find a way to warn them,” Thalia said. “They’re coming into this blind.”
“If they’re not already down here,” I muttered.
Oksana pressed a hand to the wall. “If I’m right about our direction, we’re heading toward the other drill hole, where the males went this morning.”
I shook my head, "They'll never let us out of here."
I didn't need to say whotheywere. We all knew I was talking about the massive Eulachs.
Thalia’s jaw clenched. “Then we don’t ask permission.”
“We don’t need to win,” Oksana added, her voice cool and sharp. “We just need to get ahead of the monsters. Or at least out of their control.”
I lifted my head. “They’re guiding us. So maybe… maybe we let them.”
“What?” Thalia blinked.
I looked between them, the pieces clicking together in my mind like an old machine grinding to life. “They want us to go deeper. So let’s go deeper. But not blindly. We look for any kind of equipment. Abandoned Zuten tech. So far, they've just been letting us go wherever we want, but we need to get back to where the most Zuten artifacts are.”
“If we can’t warn the males,” Oksana said grimly, “then we arm ourselves instead. We stop being bait and start being a threat.”
A pulse of strength moved through me. I wasn’t a soldier. I wasn’t even whole. But I was a mother. And I was done being used.
