Angel Fury (Immortal Legacy #2) - Ella Summers Page 0,46

Because only when people notice the rebels, can their message be heard. And only when they are heard, can they rally others against the ‘false deities’.

Yes, he agreed. These weapons are entirely out of place in the rebels’ hands. They don’t want to hurt people they believe to be innocent, and their faces as they pointed their guns at us were etched with guilt. Their desperation has driven them to this. We can use that. We can give them a way out.

Ahead of me, I heard the crunch of scratching gravel. The rebels were on the move. I was pulled along roughly by the arm.

“We need to find a place to hide,” said the rebel with a deep voice.

“This way.”

A Hive patrol squad is coming, Damiel told me.

We were pulled along the trail. Then we came to an abrupt stop. I could hear the soft and steady drip of water against stone. The air was cold and damp.

The rebels have taken refuge in a cave, I said silently to Damiel.

“You used magic!” Deep Voice hissed under his breath. “How could you be so careless? You know the patrols have tools to track magic use.”

“It wasn’t my doing. I didn’t use any magic,” replied a quieter, screechier voice.

That was all that anyone said for several minutes. Eventually, I could no longer hear the footsteps of the Hive soldiers. A few minutes after that, the rebels pulled me and Damiel out of the cave. They pushed us into a hard, metallic container.

The container began to rumble under me. We were moving. This ‘container’ must have been the back of a large van. I could hear the rebels. Their voices were muffled. It sounded like there was a wall between us and them.

“This is your fault,” one of the rebels chided another. “It was your idea to snatch those two from the springs. What stupidity! It’s too risky to abduct tourists when a Magic Collective patrol is nearby.”

“You need to take risks in order to get things done,” the other rebel replied hotly.

I freed my hands from the restraints. Then I pulled off the hood smothering my head.

I looked around. We appeared to be inside a work van, one probably used to carry around large and heavy things. It must have belonged to one of the rebels. I doubted that instigating rebellion was a full-time career. The rebels surely all had regular jobs too.

The back of the van was empty right now, except for the two of us. Damiel was watching me. He wore neither hood nor handcuffs. In fact, he looked like he’d freed himself from them long ago.

“I thought you were chivalrous,” I said.

His brows drew together in confusion.

“You didn’t offer to help me free myself from my restraints.”

“You looked like you had it well in hand.” A smile twisted his lips. “Though it took you quite a bit longer than expected to free yourself.”

Was he teasing me?

“It’s harder to pick a lock than it is to outright break it. The latter I can only do with magic, which I didn’t dare use. I didn’t want to attract any more patrols. Did you hear the rebels talking about the Hive’s tracking tools?” I asked, even though I was pretty sure he wouldn’t miss a thing like that.

“Yes, I did hear them, and that explains how the Hive patrol honed in on us so quickly at the beach. They have developed—or stolen—a tool to track magic. A toy unicorn.” Damiel looked pretty amused by his own joke.

There was that funny name again. ‘Unicorn’ was the word for people who could track magic. It was a passive magic ability, one that up until only a week ago, I hadn’t even known existed. A toy unicorn was an oddly-appropriate name for a magic-tracking device.

“How did you get free of your handcuffs so quickly?” I asked Damiel. “You didn’t use magic, did you?”

He gave me a flat look.

Of course not. He was too clever to use magic so close to people who could track it.

“I have had a lot of practice getting out of restraints,” he told me.

“Oh? I thought you were always on the other side of the restraints. I thought you always did the binding.”

“Usually.” Fire flashed in his eyes.

And all I could think about was the impulsive kiss I’d given him back at the springs.

“I researched and tried out various methods of freeing myself from various kinds of bindings, to better learn how to restrain people,” he told me. “As far as