Ex-Alpha's Regret: Siren's Comeback novel Chapter 79

POV: Damian

The smoke was a living, breathing thing, a suffocating, blinding entity that filled my lungs with fire and my eyes with tears. It reeked of a thousand burning herbs, a chemical assault on my senses that left me disoriented and enraged. My warriors were a mess, stumbling through the fog, their tracking abilities utterly useless. They were chasing echoes, swinging at shadows, their own disciplined formations collapsing into chaos. The tactical superiority of my forces had been rendered completely irrelevant.

By the time the smoke began to clear, they were gone.

The clearing was a scene of carnage. The bodies of my men and Jax's lay strewn across the blood-soaked ground. The air was thick with the smell of blood and the lingering, acrid scent of the smoke bombs. Of Seraphina and her brother, there was no sign. The rope at the edge of the ravine had been cut.

"Track them!" I roared, my voice raw. "Use the blood trails! Find them!"

My best trackers fanned out, their noses to the ground, trying to pick up a scent from the chaos. But it was a fool's errand. Jax's team had been brutally efficient. Their escape route led them directly into a shallow, fast-moving stream that bordered the clearing, a natural scent-killer that washed away any trace of their passing. On the other side of the stream, they had split up, leaving a dozen false trails leading in every direction, each one meticulously scuffed and disguised to mimic a panicked flight.

For hours, my men crashed through the undergrowth, following these phantom paths with a growing sense of frustration. Each trail was a dead end, a perfectly crafted lie. They ended abruptly at sheer cliff faces, or doubled back on themselves in a confusing loop, or simply vanished in rocky terrain where no tracks could be left. It was a masterclass in evasion, designed to waste our time, exhaust our resources, and mock our efforts.

She hadn't been reacting to my moves. She had been maneuvering me into position for her own. From the very beginning, I had not been the player. I had been the pawn.

The realization was a humiliation so profound it was a physical blow, worse than any wound I had sustained in the fight.

I stood there, surrounded by the bodies of the dead, and threw my head back, a silent scream of pure, impotent rage tearing at my throat.