How does it feel to be used? He spit those words at me in the prison beneath the Bowl of Bones and it made me want to die. Now it barely stings.
She doesn’t say anything, and that is enough for Cal.
“They’ll have Snapdragons,” he says grimly.
Kilorn laughs aloud. “Flowers?”
“Airjets,” Cal says, his eyes sparking with distaste. “Orange wings, silver bodies, single pilot, easy to maneuver, perfect for an urban assault. They carry four missiles each. Times one squadron, that’s forty-eight missiles you’re going to have to outrun, plus light ammunition. Can you handle that?”
He’s met only with silence. No, we can’t.
“And the Dragons are the least of our worries. They’ll just circle, defend a perimeter, keep us in place until ground troops arrive.”
He lowers his eyes, thinking quickly. He’s wondering what he would do, if he were on the other side of this. If he were king instead of Maven. “They’ll surround us and present terms. Mare and I for your escape.”
Another sacrifice. Slowly, I suck in a breath. This morning, yesterday, before all this madness, I would have been glad to give myself over to save just Kilorn and my brother. But now . . . now I know I am special. Now I have others to protect. Now I cannot be lost.
“We can’t agree to that,” I say. A bitter truth. Kilorn’s gaze weighs heavy, but I don’t look up. I can’t stomach his judgment.
Cal is not so harsh. He nods, agreeing with me. “The king doesn’t expect us to give in,” he replies. “The jets will bring the ruins down on us, and the rest will mop up the survivors. It will be little more than a massacre.”
Farley is a creature of pride, even now when she’s terribly cornered. “What do you suggest?” she asks, bending over him. Her words drip disdain. “Total surrender?”
Something like disgust crosses Cal’s face. “Maven will still kill you. In a cell or on the battlefield, he won’t let any of us live.”
“Then better we die fighting.” Kilorn’s voice sounds stronger than it should, but there’s a tremble in his fingers. He looks like the rest of the rebels, willing to do anything for the cause, but my friend is still afraid. Still a boy, no more than eighteen, with too much to live for, and too little reason to die.
Cal scoffs at Kilorn’s forced but brazen declaration, yet he doesn’t say anything else. He knows a more graphic description of our impending death won’t help anyone.
Farley doesn’t share his sentiment and waves a hand, dismissing both of them outright. Behind me, my brother mirrors her determination.
They know something we don’t, something they won’t say yet. Maven has taught us all the price of trust misplaced.
“We are not the ones who die today,” is all she says, before marching toward the front of the train. Her boots sound like hammer falls on the metal flooring, each one smacking of stubborn resolve.
I sense the train slow before I feel it. The electricity wanes, weakening, as we glide into the underground station. What we might find in the skies above, white fog or orange-winged airjets, I do not know. The others don’t seem to mind, exiting the Undertrain with great purpose. In their silence, the armed and masked Guard looks like true soldiers, but I know better. They’re no match for what is coming.
“Prepare yourself.” Cal’s voice hisses in my ear, making me shiver. It reminds me of days long past, of dancing in moonlight. “Remember how strong you are.”
Kilorn shoulders his way to my side, separating us before I can tell Cal my strength and my ability are all I’m sure of now. The electricity in my veins might be the only thing I trust in this world.
I want to believe in the Scarlet Guard, and certainly in Shade and Kilorn, but I won’t let myself, not after the mess my trust, my blindness toward Maven got us into. And Cal is out of the question altogether. He is a prisoner, a Silver, the enemy who would betray us if he could—if he had anywhere else to run.
But still, somehow, I feel a pull to him. I remember the burdened boy who gave me a silver coin when I was nothing. With that one gesture he changed my future, and destroyed his own.
And we share an alliance—an uneasy one forged in blood and betrayal. We are connected, we are united—against Maven, against all who deceived us, against the world about to tear itself apart.
Silence waits for us. Gray, damp mist hangs over the ruins of Naercey, bringing the sky down so close I might touch it. It’s cold, with the chill of autumn, the season of change and death. Nothing haunts the sky yet, no jets to rain destruction down upon an already destroyed city. Farley sets a brisk pace, leading up from the tracks to the wide, abandoned avenue. The wreckage yawns like a canyon, more gray and broken than I remember.
We march east down the street, toward the shrouded waterfront. The high, half-collapsed structures lean over us, their windows like eyes watching us pass. Silvers could be waiting in the broken hollows and shadowed arches, ready to kill the Scarlet Guard. Maven could make me watch as he struck rebels down one by one. He would not give me the luxury of a clean, quick death. Or worse, I think. He would not let me die at all.
The thought chills my blood like a Silver shiver’s touch. As much as Maven lied to me, I still know a small piece of his heart. I remember him grabbing me through the bars of a cell, holding on with shaking fingers. And I remember the name he carries, the name that reminds me a heart still beats inside him. His name was Thomas and I watched him die. He could not save that boy. But he can save me, in his own twisted way.