Kieran gives me a lopsided grin and holds his arms out. “This is home now, Fallows. The raid got us here quicker than was planned, but the Sanctuary is home now.”
I glance up at Gabe and he slings his arm around my shoulders to direct me over to the large set of doors, opening them and directing me out to look out over… the Sanctuary.
It’s a whole-ass city.
Okay, it’s more of a town or a village really, but there’s dozens of houses and buildings here and people everywhere. The sun is barely setting, so I’m guessing we’re back in the States, but there’s mountains on every side of the clearing and a slight disturbance in the air around us that says we have Shields working overtime to keep this place off of the maps.
I stare around it all in wonder.
“What the hell is this place?”
Gabe kisses the side of my head and murmurs, “William and Nolan Draven started building it forty years ago. When North was old enough to take the seat on the Council, he started helping with it too. It’s been the Draven family's mission for a lifetime. It wasn’t due to be ready for another decade or so, but when North found out about you, he moved the deadlines up. He’s poured literally hundreds of millions of dollars into it since he took over the build. He’s been recruiting to get the best and strongest Gifted here, all of them vetted by Gryphon so we know that you’ll be safe here. Except North refused to leave behind the Gifted communities who couldn’t get out by themselves so that’s why it’s this… big. He brought everyone who would come and could pass the testing. The Resistance will never find us here. North has made sure of it.”
I stare around at the people, the children, around us in wonder. They're all looking a little shell-shocked but moving their personal items into the houses and smiling at each other happily enough.
“How do you move that many people at once without leaving a trace?”
I feel a Bond walk up behind us and then Atlas says, “Transporters. A lot of fucking Transporters. This is the most impressive thing I’ve ever seen.”
I spin around to face him. “I thought you were going back to your very comfortable and humane prison cell?”
He smiles at me but it’s not his usual warm and open grin, the day has clearly worn him down. “I went with North to see about the actual cells here and make sure they’d be able to contain my sister. I’m back to being free. North believes that I want you more than I’ve ever given a shit about the family business.”
He spits out the last few words like they’re poison on his tongue, and I pull fully away from Gabe to go to him. It’s hard to see him like this, hard to think about everything he’s going through while he faces that his family aren’t just the enemy, but they’re his enemies as well.
They’d all kill us in a heartbeat to further their campaign, everyone except his mom.
And Lord knows what she’s going to do now that Atlas has disappeared on her entirely.
Atlas tucks his face into my neck and breathes me in a little shakily, and I try to be strong for him. I try to be everything that he was for me when I first got here and I didn’t know who I could trust. I know I’m falling short, but I try.
Chapter Twenty
Gryphon
After years of coming to the Sanctuary to test out the security measures, help with building the houses and setting up the facilities, stocking the stores and building an arsenal big enough to take out an attack from literally any of the world’s biggest militaries, it’s something else to finally be here and know that it’s home.
With Oli here, it actually feels like it.
The house that North built for our Bond Group isn’t ready yet, so we’re in one of the smaller houses that was put aside for other council members’ families, though only three have chosen to join us. There’s only four bedrooms, so Gabe and Bassinger volunteer to share. Oli doesn’t get one to herself, which she says she’s fine with, but I know she’s already getting frustrated at not having her own space on the very first day.
She doesn’t breathe a word about it though, and I keep my mouth shut about what’s going on in her head to the others. She already has no privacy, no need to make it worse by airing out what’s going on in her head.
Two peaceful but busy days after we arrive here, I wake up with a very naked Bonded in my arms, still asleep and dreaming of nothing but warmth and comfort. She’d been reluctant to have sex in this house with us all sharing walls, and I’d only managed to persuade her by eating her out until my entire face was dripping with her cum. My shoulders were clawed up and her hand was bleeding from where she’d bitten it to stay quiet.