Loss (Skylar POV)

It was a full minute before Skylar was able to move at all again. When she did, the most she could do was raise her head to look at the others. Gemma had fallen to her knees, the shock having gotten to her as well. Tears streaked down her face. She made no move to wipe them away.

Paige was on the ground, curled in the fetal position in the snow. Her earlier panic was now a full on anxiety attack. Her entire body was shaking, her breathing came in ragged, **** gasps for air and calm, her eyes shut tightly. She hugged herself as she shook, desperately trying to calm down. All Skylar could do was hold a hand on her, and absently massage her back.

Olivia had her eyes shut too. She stood, her fists clenched, unmoving. Skylar wondered what their mentor was thinking. Probably much the same as everyone else was. As for Skylar herself? Her brain felt almost fuzzy. She didn’t know what to feel. Mia was dead. Mia was dead, and she didn’t know what she was supposed to do.

They had trained, they had prepared, they had planned for every possible eventuality they could. But all it took was a tiny mistake. Letting their guard down for a second. A stupid decision. And Mia was gone. She’d died the same way her brother had. Ambushed by a stronger gang, tried to fight back and had died because of it. The world wasn’t fair.

Damnit.

Gemma took a deep breath in and screamed to the heavens with all her might. Skylar felt the sound in her soul. The pain and rage, the despair and loss, the helplessness of it all. Gemma let her head drop. Her shoulders sagged. The white snow blowing in the dark midnight air that had once seemed eternally comforting was now bleak. Cold. Lonely.

Emma and Lena came running outside of the castle a few seconds later. “What the hell happened?!” Emma asked. “Where’s Mia?” Lena asked, worried. Nobody answered, and it didn’t take long for them to put the pieces together. Emma went straight to Paige, wrapping her arms around the hysterically quaking girl. “Shhh, it’s okay babygirl, you’re alright. You’re safe now.” Emma cooed gently, holding the smaller girl as tightly as she could.

Paige wrapped her arms around the older woman, squeezing as hard as she could. Emma grunted in pain from the strength of the grip around her, but did nothing to move her away. Lena dropped to her knees beside Gemma and started rubbing her back. The water mage looked like she was absolutely bursting with questions, but even Lena had enough tact to know that this was not the right time to be asking them.

Skylar felt her legs give out from under her as she fell into the snow. She caught herself on her hands, and managed to move herself to a sitting position. She felt the emotions welling up inside her. In her past, she would have shoved them away, blinked back the tears and got on with the job she had to do.

Now she let them in. She opened her heart to her emotions, and the gates opened. The grief came like a terrible tsunami. She had no strength left in her muscles anymore. She couldn’t move. She’d already lost someone she was close with before. She’d taken years to move past it, and even then, the grief was never gone. It only got easier to live with.

She felt the tears streak down her face as her vision blurred. Her head dropped and her shoulders sagged. Her insides felt like stones. She wished she was able to do something when they were standing there, in front of Mathias. She’d frozen up. She’d known the situation they were in all too well. She’d known it the minute they found themselves trapped in the barrier.

And Mia had rushed in, like always. A part of Skylar almost wanted to smile. It was just so like her, especially these days. Mia had been getting impatient and restless. And Skylar understood. It was hard sometimes, to hole up in their untouchable barrier while everybody else around them suffered.

She knew their privilege, and Mia had known it too. They didn’t generally have to face the hardships of the abyss outside anymore. They could sleep in peace, enjoy themselves in peace, train in peace, love in peace and anything else they could really want to do. Nobody else in Sydney had that privilege. And they had the power to give it to them, or so Skylar had started to think.

What an awful way to find out she was wrong. To lose one of the people that meant the most in the world to her. She didn’t know how powerful Mathias was, but she knew Gemma did. And she could feel it anyway. They were nowhere near strong enough yet to be able to take him on, let alone the hulking man he called Max, or the rest of his guild.

Gemma and Olivia had been right to be cautious and to not try to take Mathias head on. Mia had been right to be frustrated at their lack of action. Nothing was ever easy in this world. She thought back to the argument in the car. She hadn’t said anything then. Hadn’t interjected when she could have to calm the situation down.

She didn’t feel like she needed to until the end. She’d felt like Mia had a valid point. It was only after Mia said she didn’t care about being better that she knew she had to intervene. They needed to be better than the scumbags around here. They couldn’t afford not to be.

And what was it that Olivia had started to say just before they’d been pulled over? That Belle went down a similar path or something? Skylar had a hard time remembering. Her brain was fuzzy, clouded by her grief for her girlfriend. She tried to swallow but found that she couldn’t. Her mouth was too dry.

She hadn’t wanted Mia to become like Belle. Belle didn’t seem to care about the lives she took or who she hurt. Only that the job was done. It was the same attitude she got from Mathias, from what she’d managed to process in the time they were there. That’s why they had to be better than the people they were fighting. Because everybody around them thought they were right, everybody thought they knew best, and they didn’t care who got caught in the crossfire.

But Belle and Mia weren’t wrong either. Taking the high road led to more ****. Destruction. Suffering and pain. And now, trying to do what was right had gotten Mia killed. A light in all their lives, one of the main people that had brought everyone together in the same guild, to the same goal. Now extinguished.

A terrible thought seized Skylar and she clutched at her heart as the idea racked through her body. Had they been betrayed by one of their own? By Belle maybe? Skylar shook her head and sobbed. She hugged herself. No no no, not again. She couldn’t go through that, not again.

She felt a hand touch her leg. She slowly looked up and saw Emma looking back at her, tears in her eyes. She had her arm around Paige, who seemed to be slowly calming down, her panic attack rescinding. “You’re not alone.” Emma reassured simply, her voice soft and full of empathy. Skylar couldn’t take it anymore and threw her arms around both of them, closing her eyes and letting her tears fall free.

No. They hadn’t been betrayed. She trusted her girlfriends and guildmates with her life. And Belle didn’t seem the type for betrayal, especially not betraying them to Mathias. He was just that damn good. None of the people who were now grieving for Mia would have betrayed them.

Emma, Paige and Skylar hugged together, finding solace in one another. Slowly, she felt her sobs begin to subside. They calmed down together, bit by bit. It occurred to her that Emma and Lena still didn’t know exactly what had happened. They’d find out soon enough, and they’d clearly managed to piece together enough.

Skylar had no idea what they were going to do for the future. How could they ever move forward from this? One of their own had been killed. One of their family, one of the people they’d all loved. How were they supposed to go on living and fighting with that terrible grief? What were they supposed to do now? How were they even supposed to make it through the night?

Skylar didn’t know. She slowly opened her eyes to look at the others. Olivia had taken her seat in the snow too. She was staring at the ground, her eyes red. Lena was rubbing Gemma’s back, comforting her. Gemma was fiddling with her phone, tears still visible on her face, her body shaking ever so slightly.

She held the phone up to her ear, and when the person on the other end answered, Gemma began to speak. “Elsa? It’s Gemma. We need help. Are you free at the moment?” She said, her voice cracking, betraying her grief. Skylar wasn’t sure what good that would do them, but she trusted Gemma was making the right choice.