The heavy iron door was melting, and Elara had exactly five seconds to choose between her own life and a ghost.
"Elara, what are you doing?" Vesper yelled, her fingers digging into the leather harness on Elara's shoulder. She tried to yank the younger woman toward the dark, gaping mouth of the escape tunnel. "The seal on the main airlock is failing! If those outer bones split even an inch, the entire nectar tide is going to flood this room. We will all dissolve in seconds!"
Elara didn't move.
Her boots felt like they were glued to the cold stone floor.
Inside her mind, the telepathic static was deafening, but beneath the roaring hive mind of the Leviathan, there was a tiny, familiar spark. It was a faint, suffocating cry that made her chest ache.
Lucien.
He wasn't running. He hadn't escaped with the rest of the Guild pack. The stubborn, arrogant prince had thrown himself straight into the black ocean to chase her, and now he was drowning in the dark.
