Eclipse Sector (V-Clan #3)

37. Cillian

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

CILLIAN

Several Minutes Earlier

A chill swept down my spine as I arrived in my birthplace. A land I’d both loved and hated. Loved because it was my home. Hated because of the man who’d raised me here.

My father.

Alpha Abbán.

Fuck, I swore his ghost existed here. I could feel his icy breath on my neck, hear his cruel taunts in my ear. It was sickening. Gut-wrenching. Nearly overwhelming.

And exactly why I never came here.

Exactly why I loathed this place.

It hurt to breathe here. To exist. To think .

Only… that cold breeze of familiarity soon dissipated. Much faster than it ever had before. And behind it all, I felt a foreign warmth. A heat radiating from my heart, burning through my very soul.

Ivana , I realized, palming my chest.

She wasn’t here, but she was with me. Tethered to me. My new purpose. My lifeline. My present and my future .

I shook my head, clearing the haunting past from my thoughts, and focused on the now.

That was what Ashlyn’s note had said, right? Our pasts made us stronger. Realize I wasn’t my father. But think like him to find her.

Lorcan and Kyra shadowed in a few feet away, my old friend clearly knowing exactly where I’d intended to land. Then I heard Cael and Grey both trying to find me from somewhere near the cliffs.

“They’re by the water,” I told Lorcan quietly.

He nodded and left without a word, intending to bring them here—to the place where it all began.

Oh, the landscape had changed over the last millennium, and the scents were different. But I recognized the soul of this place. The history. The stories embedded into the very earth.

I started prowling, a gun at my side.

It was still night, making it a prime time for me to hunt. But the early morning hour was coming, and soon, the sun would creep up over the horizon.

Not that it mattered.

I wasn’t impacted by sunlight. Alas, neither were the Infected. Or zombies, as Lorcan had called them.

I didn’t hear any nearby, though. Just the sounds of gentle waves rolling against the shores, reminding me of another life. An old one.

All right, Ashlyn. Where are you? I wondered, searching for her mind.

When I didn’t find her, I shadowed deeper into the hills and paused once more to listen.

Still no sign of the Infected or Ashlyn’s thoughts.

I cast my power in a wider net but came up with nothing. Ashlyn was either unconscious or not here.

Grinding my teeth, I focused on her note again, trying to figure out how to think like my father.

Assuming that’s who she even means. But who else could it be?

Frowning, I tried a new tactic and shadowed to the place I literally came from—the spot my Omega mother would have given birth.

It wasn’t far from where I’d met Lorcan and Kyra, just higher up on a hill. While I couldn’t recall where I’d actually been born, I knew this was where Omegas from Eclipse Sector used to go to give birth. My mother would have done the same.

I swallowed, thinking about the female who once gifted me life. I didn’t remember anything about her. She’d died when I was young. Maybe a few months old.

I learned in my early childhood years that my father had killed her. Knowing that had made me want to kill him more.

But in the moment, I froze , I thought, my eyes narrowing.

It was a moment I’d long hated. A moment I regretted. A moment I feared made me a lesser Alpha.

However, considering it now, I wondered if that was the past Ashlyn had referenced. The night I’d failed to kill my father.

“You mentioned Eclipse Sector being part of this Omega slave trade before.” Kyra’s voice reached my ears from somewhere to my left. I couldn’t see her, and her words were faint, but my enhanced hearing allowed her soft tones to reach me. “How?”

“As a trading ground or a potential auction site,” Cael replied. “Or that’s what we think. It’s possible they’ve also hosted hunting parties out here.”

“Hunting parties?” she repeated, the term sending another chill down my spine.

Because I absolutely knew what a hunting party was. My father had loved them. Craved them. He’d fucking loved making his females scream.

“Where the Omegas run and the Alphas hunt,” Grey growled, his crude summarization making me grunt. “We’ve never seen it happen; we’ve only heard of them. But we know they’re real.”

“And you think they host them here?” Kyra pressed, asking a question I was dying to know the answer to as well.

“Not regularly.” Cael’s reply was louder, his scent curling around my senses and confirming they were close. “But at least once. Unless it was an auction or a trade.”

“Too many scents for a trade,” Grey muttered. “An auction, perhaps. But most likely a hunt. This land is perfect for it.”

“And the hills have a history associated with it as well,” I added as they appeared to my left.

Grey nodded. “That they do.”

I wasn’t sure what he knew about it other than maybe rumors. But the haunted gleam in his gaze made me wonder if it was something more. Something to do with whatever he was hiding. His talent, perhaps?

I didn’t have it in me to press him, not when it was clear we needed to focus on Ashlyn.

“I don’t hear her anywhere,” I told them, getting right to the point and changing the topic away from the Omega slave trade . We’d… deal with that issue after we handled this one. “Do you smell her?” My question was primarily for Grey. I suspected that of all of us, he would be the one most familiar with her natural perfume.

Unfortunately, he shook his head.

Sighing, I was about to suggest splitting up on different parts of the isle when he rumbled out, “But she’s definitely here.”

“You can sense her?” Cael asked.

“No.”

“Then how do you know she’s here?” Kyra asked, her exasperation rivaling my own.

“I just…” He trailed off and cleared his throat. “Trust me. She’s here.”

Trust you , I thought, grunting internally. Right.

Where are all the Infected? Lorcan thought, his gaze flicking toward me. I don’t smell any of them.

They’re probably in the old cities, I replied telepathically. It’d been a long time since we’d been back here. Maybe four or five decades. There just hadn’t been cause to visit after we’d moved everyone to Blood Sector.

But not to smell a single one? He glanced around, his gaze narrowing. I don’t know, C. I don’t like it.

I didn’t like it either. I didn’t like any of this. The cryptic journal entry. Granger’s unexpected betrayal. Cael’s and Grey’s mysterious powers. The Omega slave trade. Leaving Ivana behind. Being here .

Something wasn’t adding up.

What am I missing?

I’m embracing my past, just like you said. I’m here. I’m not my father. But you want me to think like him…

He left Omegas in holes. Ashlyn sent her blessing from the grave.

But she’s not here.

My brow furrowed, my mind whirling with nonsense. It almost felt like…

My eyes widened.

It feels like a distraction.

One used to derail all of us from the truth.

Not too dissimilar to the night Kieran had killed my father. We’d lured him out into these hills with an Omega in heat. Or so he’d thought. We’d tricked him with the scent, then cornered him.

And Kieran had finished the task.

Now we’d been lured out here to track another Omega. A Z-Clan Omega. All on the basis of Grey knowing she was here.

“How?” I asked Grey, facing him. “ How do you know she’s here? You can’t sense her. None of us can smell her. So tell me how you know. Is it your gift? Is she your mate? Or is it something else entirely?”

His icy gaze seemed to frost over even more. “I don’t need to explain myself to you.”

“Yes, you do,” I told him. “Because I don’t think she’s here. I think we’ve been set up.”

“You think we’ve run away with the fairies?” Cael interjected. “That we’re playing some sort of game?”

“No,” I replied. “I think Grey’s head has been fucked with.” It would explain the strange air of power that Ivana and I had picked up on. We’d assumed it was his gift. But what if it wasn’t his at all? What if someone had clouded his judgment?

And what if Granger was just another distraction? I thought in the next breath. Did he lie about Ashlyn being here? Is that why the memory was so vague about where he left her? Was it even real? My eyes widened. What if he’s the proverbial Omega in heat, the red herring that lured the prey right into a trap?

Kieran.

No. Not Kieran.

Quinnlynn and the Blood Sector heir growing in her belly.

Taking them out would end the MacNamara bloodline, and the enchanted barrier around Night Sector—and the Omega Sanctuary inside—would fall.

If Cael and Grey were right about this secret network of Omega auctions, then the Omegas were the target all along. And all these episodes with the estrus party serum were just distractions.

Ashlyn disappearing was another distraction.

Granger was a distraction.

This was a distraction.

“We need to get back to Blood Sector right now,” I told Cael and Grey before looking at Lorcan and Kyra. “And you two need to go to Night Sector.” Because if someone was trying to end the MacNamara line, then others were waiting for the opportunity to attack the Omegas under Quinnlynn’s protection.

“What about Ashlyn?” Grey demanded.

“She’s not here,” I told him. “There’s nothing fucking here.” Which should have been our initial clue.

The Infected hadn’t ventured out here in a long while, which confirmed there hadn’t been any signs of recent life.

“She was never here,” I added. “Look deep down; you’ll find I’m right.”

Grey’s glacial gaze glittered with fury, immense power pouring off him. But rather than rage at me, he took a deep breath.

Then he tilted his head back and howled .

I took a step back, his explosion of energy unlike anything I’d ever felt. Lorcan grabbed Kyra, his mind telling me he was about to shadow her to safety.

Only nothing followed Grey’s ripple of intensity.

It died almost as immediately as it had appeared.

And all that happened next was Grey saying, “I’m going to fucking kill Tadhg.”

He disappeared in the next instant.

“Fuck,” Cael breathed. “ Fuck !”

I caught his intentions in his mind just as he followed Grey.

“They’re going back to Blood Sector,” I told Lorcan. “I’ll message you as soon as I know something.”

“Likewise,” he said, referring to Night Sector.

I shadowed in a blink, going right to Kieran’s office.

Where I discovered it covered in shattered glass and blood.

Ivana’s terrified scent lingered in the air, causing my wolf to rage inside me.

I snarled her name, my mind instantly locating hers. Where are you? I growled.

Quinn and I are locked in a safe room in her nest.

A part of me relaxed. Not entirely, just marginally. Are you hurt?

I’m okay. But Kieran ? —

Are you hurt? I repeated. Because I could smell her blood in the air.

I’m fine, Cillian. Go help Kieran!

My grin felt feral on my face. If Ivana was issuing demands, then she really was okay.

But someone had made her bleed.

Someone had to pay.

Who hurt you? I demanded.

Oh my Gods, Cillian, go ? —

Who? I echoed, ensuring she felt the impatience underlining that single word.

Granger, she whispered, her submission a gift I cherished in that moment.

Because I’d needed that name.

He will die, I promised as I shadowed to the street outside.

Kieran stood in the middle of the road, his suit in tatters, his dark eyes glowing as he focused on Tadhg.

Fucking traitor , I thought, glaring at the bald Prince of Alpha Sector. Soon to be the former Prince of Alpha Sector. Because Kieran looked ready to rip him apart.

If Tadhg noticed my arrival, he didn’t show it, his entire focus on Kieran.

“You dare attack me, the V-Clan King, in my own fucking home?” he seethed. “And you think to try to touch my Queen? My Omega? My fucking mate ?”

The entire fucking sector shook beneath Kieran’s growl, his power emanating with such ferocity that it made it hard to breathe.

Several wolves fell to their knees nearby, their heads bowed.

But Tadhg simply smirked. “Your bark doesn’t scare me, King .”

A wave of power emanated from the Alpha Prince, the force of it hitting me square in the chest and knocking me a step backward.

However, Kieran maintained his ground, his eyes narrowing even more. “You’ll need to do better than that, Prince .”

Cillian.

The voice didn’t belong to Kieran, but to Cael.

I met his gaze from across the street, somewhat surprised to see him just casually leaning against a wall.

Cael, I returned.

Where’s Queen Quinnlynn? he asked.

I narrowed my gaze. Safe.

Are you sure about that? He glanced around, a tic forming in his jaw. Because this feels like a redirect. These mutts were all too easy for me to put down. And now I can’t find Grey.

It took me a second to see what he meant—to feel him controlling the other Alphas lurking in the street. A lot of them were bloody and breathing heavily, their attires rivaling Kieran’s.

His mind helped me put together the pieces, telling me how he’d fought several of them in his office before taking the party outside.

Where he’d run into Tadhg.

However, Cael was right. This… this was too easy.

Tadhg had lured us all away from Blood Sector for a reason. Perhaps I’d discovered his intentions faster than he’d anticipated, but he still seemed far too calm.

So where is Grey? I wondered, my mind instantly searching for the Alpha in question. Murderous intent rolled through the male’s thoughts, causing me to glance sharply back at the darkened building behind me.

I didn’t think; I just shadowed directly to Kieran’s personal quarters.

And found Grey in the middle of three Alphas, showing them the true meaning of Z-Clan Alpha strength.

Vana! I shouted via our bond, her scent wrapping around me like a warm embrace. Only that hint of iron underlying her natural perfume had me rumbling in fury. I already knew she’d been hurt. But now I wondered?—

I’m okay, she replied before my concerns could grow. But something’s happening to Quinn. That weird fog I sensed around Grey and Granger is… it’s doing something to her.

Granger? I repeated.

Yeah, right before the attack, I sensed it in Granger. But now it’s in Quinn, and I… I don’t know what it means. But she’s acting strange.

Can you figure out how to undo the fog? I asked her.

I’m trying, but every time I unweave part of it, more appears.

Can you trace the source of it? The question left me as I surveyed the rest of the room, searching for any other threats. But all I found were some dead Alphas that Grey had already handled—or I assumed he was their executioner, anyway.

He confirmed that assumption in the next beat as another Alpha lost his head and collapsed to join the macabre scene on the floor.

Nice, I thought before refocusing on Ivana.

She hadn’t replied, but I heard her trying to locate the source of the fog clouding Quinn’s mind.

While she worked, I searched all of Blood Sector, scanning the minds of everyone here for any signs of ill intent.

There were several assholes outside with Tadhg who were waiting for an opportunity to strike. But it seemed Cael had already wrapped his own powers around them, holding them back while Tadhg and Kieran squared off in a show of Alpha energy.

However, there were a few stragglers who had escaped Cael’s notice. I heard them moving through the building, up the stairs, slowly creeping up here to reach their prize.

You were right about it being a distraction outside, I told Cael. Grey’s up here handling three of the rogues. There are six… no, make that seven, more making their way up here.

Do you need me?

I smiled. Nah, I can handle these jackholes.

Because one of them was Granger.

And we had a date planned.

A very bloody, violent fucking date.