A jet overhead sweeps by, its wings almost scraping the tip of a nearby ruin. It’s so close. Too close. I can feel its electric heart, its whirring engines somehow keeping it aloft. I reach for it as best I can, like I have so many times before. Like the lights, like the cameras, like every wire and circuit since I became the lightning girl, I take hold of it—and shut it off.
The airjet dips, nose down, gliding for a moment on heavy wings. Its original trajectory meant to take it above the avenue, high over the legion to protect the king. Now it dives headfirst into them, sailing over the Red line to collide with hundreds of Silvers. The Samos magnetrons and Provos telkies aren’t quick enough to stop the jet as it plows into the street, sending asphalt and bodies flying. The resounding boom as it explodes nearly knocks me off my feet, pushing me farther away. The blast is deafening, disorienting, and painful. No time for pain repeats in my head. I don’t bother to watch the chaos of Maven’s army. I am already running, and my lightning is with me.
Purple-and-white sparks shield my back, keeping me safe from the swifts trying to run me down. A few collide with my lightning, trying to break through. They fall back in piles of smoked flesh and twitching bone. I’m grateful I can’t see their faces, or else I might dream of them later. Bullets come next, but my zigzagging sprint makes me a difficult target. The few shots that get close shriek apart in my shield, like my body was supposed to when I fell into the electric net at Queenstrial. That moment seems so long ago. Overhead, the jets scream again, this time careful to keep their distance. Their missiles are not so polite.
The ruins of Naercey stood for thousands of years, but will not survive this day. Buildings and streets crumble, destroyed by Silver powers and missiles alike. Everything and everyone has been unleashed. The magnetrons twist and snap steel support beams, while telkies and strong-arms hurl rubble through the ashen sky. Water bleeds up from the sewers as nymphs attempt to flood the city, flushing out the last of the Guardsmen hiding in the tunnels below us. The wind howls, strong as a hurricane, from the windweavers in the army. Water and rubble sting my eyes, the gusts so sharp they are nearly blinding. Oblivions’ explosions rock the ground beneath me and I stumble, confused. I never used to fall. But now my face scrapes against the asphalt, leaving blood in my wake. When I get back up, a banshee’s glass-shattering scream knocks me down again, forcing me to cover my ears. More blood there, dripping fast and thick between my fingers. But the banshee who flattened me has accidentally saved me. As I fall, another missile blasts over my head, so near I feel it ripple the air.
It explodes too close, the heat pulsing through my hasty lightning shield. Dimly, I wonder if I’ll die without eyebrows. But instead of burning through me, the heat stands constant, uncomfortable but not unbearable. Strong, bruising hands wrench me to my feet, and blond hair glints in the firelight. I can just make out her face through the biting windstorm. Farley. Her gun is gone, her clothes torn, and her muscles quiver, but she keeps holding me up.
Behind her, a tall, familiar figure cuts a black silhouette against the explosion. He holds it back with a single, outstretched hand. His shackles are gone, melted or cast away. When he turns, the flames grow, licking at the sky and the destroyed street, but never us. Cal knows exactly what he’s doing, directing the firestorm around us like water around rock. As in the arena, he forms a burning wall across the avenue, protecting us from his brother and the legion beyond. But now, his flames are strong, fed by oxygen and rage. They leap up into the air, so hot the base burns ghostly blue.
More missiles drop, but again, Cal contains their power, using it to feed his own. It’s almost beautiful, watching his long arms arc and turn, transforming destruction into protection with steady rhythm.
Farley tries to pull me away, overpowering me. With the flames defending us, I turn to see the river a hundred yards away. I can even see the hulking shadows of Kilorn and my brother, limping toward supposed safety.
“Come on, Mare,” she growls, half dragging my bruised and weakened body.
For a second, I let her pull me along. It hurts too much to think clearly. But one glance back and I understand what she’s doing, what she’s trying to make me do.
“I’m not leaving without him!” I shout for the second time today.
“I think he’s doing fine on his own,” she says, her blue eyes reflecting the fire.
Once, I thought like her. That Silvers were invincible, gods upon the earth, too powerful to destroy. But I killed three just this morning; Arven, the Rhambos strongarm, and the nymph lord Osanos. Probably more with the lightning storm. And they almost killed me, and Cal, for that matter. We had to save each other in the arena. And we must do so again.
Farley is bigger than me, taller and stronger, but I’m more agile. Even banged up and half-deaf. One flick of my ankle, one well-timed shove, and she stumbles backward, letting go. I turn in the same motion, palms outstretched, feeling for what I need. Naercey has far less electricity than Archeon or even the Stilts, but I don’t need to leach power from anything now. I make my own.
The first blast of nymph water pounds against the flames with the strength of a tidal wave. Most of it flash boils into vapor, but the rest falls on the wall, extinguishing the great tongues of fire. I answer the water with my own electricity, aiming for the waves curling and crashing in midair. Behind the wave, the Silver legion marches forward, lunging for us. At least the chained Reds have been pulled away, relegated to the back of the line. Maven’s doing. He won’t let them slow him down.
His soldiers meet my lightning instead of open air, and behind it, Cal’s fire jumps back up from the embers.
“Move back slowly,” Cal says, gesturing with an open hand. I mirror his measured steps, careful not to look away from the oncoming doom. Together we alternate back and forth, protecting our own retreat. When his flame falls, my lightning rises, and so on. Together, we have a chance.
He mutters little commands: when to step, when to raise a wall, when to let it drop. He looks more exhausted than I’ve ever seen him, his veins blue-black beneath pale skin, with gray circles rimming his eyes. I know I must look worse. But his pacing keeps us from giving out entirely, allowing little bits of our strengths to return just when we need.
“Just a little farther,” Farley calls, her voice echoing from behind. But she’s not running off. She’s staying with us, even though she’s just human. She’s braver than I gave her credit for.
“Farther to what?” I growl through gritted teeth, tossing up another net of electricity. Despite Cal’s commands, I’m getting slower, and a bit of rubble flies through. It breaks a few yards away, crumbling into dust. We are running out of time.
But so is Maven.
I can smell the river, and the ocean beyond. Sharp and salty, it beckons, but to what end, I have no idea. I only know that Farley and Shade believe it will save us from Maven’s jaws. When I glance behind me, I see nothing but the avenue, dead-ending at the river’s edge. Farley stands, waiting, her short hair stirring in the hot wind. Jump, she mouths, before plunging off the edge of the crumbled street.
What is it with her and leaping into an abyss?
“She wants us to jump,” I tell Cal, turning back just in time to supplant his wall.
He grunts in agreement, too focused to speak. Like my lightning, his fires grow weak and thin. We can almost see through them now, to the soldiers on the other side. Flickering flame distorts their features, turning eyes into burning coals, mouths into smiling fangs, and men into demons.
One of them steps up to the wall of fire, close enough to burn. But he doesn’t. Instead, he draws the flames apart like a curtain.
Only one person can do that.
Maven shakes embers from his silly cape, letting the silk burn away while his armor holds firm. He has the gall to smile.
And somehow, Cal has the strength to turn away. Instead of tearing Maven apart with his bare hands, he takes my wrist in his searing-hot grip. We sprint together, not bot
hering to defend our backs. Maven is no match for either of us, and he knows it. Instead, he screams. Despite the crown and the blood on his hands, he is still so young.
“Run, murderer! Run, lightning girl! Run fast and far!” His laughter echoes off the crumbling ruins, haunting me. “There is nowhere I won’t find you!”
I’m dimly aware of my lightning failing, giving out as I get farther away. Cal’s own flame crumbles with it, exposing us to the rest of the legion. But we’re already jumping through midair, to the river ten feet below.
We land, not with a splash but the resounding clang of metal. I have to roll to keep from shattering my ankles, but still feel a hollow, aching pain run up my bones. What? Farley waits, knee-deep in the cold river, next to a cylindrical metal tube with an open top. Without speaking she clambers into it, disappearing into whatever lies beneath us. We have no time to argue or ask questions, and follow blindly.
At least Cal has the good sense to close the tube behind us, shutting out the river and the war above. It hisses pneumatically, forming an airtight seal. But that won’t protect us for long, not against the legion.
“More tunnels?” I ask breathlessly, whirling to Farley. My vision spots with the motion and I have to slump against the wall, my legs shaking.
Like she did on the street, Farley puts one arm under my shoulder, supporting my weight. “No, this isn’t a tunnel,” she says with a puzzling smirk.
And then I feel it. Like a battery humming somewhere, but bigger. Stronger. It pulses all around us, down the strange hallway swimming with blinking buttons and low, yellow lights. I glimpse red scarves moving down the passage, hiding the faces of the Guardsmen. They look hazy, like crimson shadows. With a groan, the whole hall shudders and drops, angling downward. Into the water.
“A boat. An underwater boat,” Cal says. His voice is faraway, shaky, and weak. Just like I feel.
Neither of us makes it more than a few feet before we collapse against the sloping walls.
THREE
In the past few days, I’ve woken up in a jail cell and then on a train. Now it’s an underwater boat. Where will I wake up tomorrow?
I’m beginning to think this has all been a dream, or a hallucination, or worse. But can you feel tired in dreams? Because I certainly do. My exhaustion is bone-deep, in every muscle and nerve. My heart is another wound entirely, still bleeding from betrayal and failure. When I open my eyes, finding cramped, gray walls, everything I want to forget comes rushing back. It’s like Queen Elara is in my head again, forcing me to relive my worst memories. As much as I try, I can’t stop them.
My quiet maids were executed, guilty of nothing but painting my skin. Tristan, speared like a pig. Walsh. She was my brother’s age, a servant from the Stilts, my friend—one of us. And she died cruelly, by her own hand, to protect the Guard, our purpose, and me. Even more died in the tunnels of Caesar’s Square, Guardsmen killed by Cal’s soldiers, killed by our foolish plan. The memory of red blood burns, but so does the thought of silver. Lucas, a friend, a protector, a Silver with a kind heart, executed for what Julian and I made him do. Lady Blonos, decapitated because she taught me how to sit properly. Colonel Macanthos, Reynald Iral, Belicos Lerolan. Sacrificed for the cause. I almost retch when I remember Lerolan’s twin boys, four years old, killed in the explosion that followed the shooting. Maven told me it was an accident—a punctured gas line, but now I know better. His evil runs too deep for such coincidence. I doubt he minded throwing a few more bodies on the blaze, if only to convince the world the Guard was made of monsters. He’ll kill Julian too, and Sara. They’re probably dead already. I can’t think of them at all. It’s too painful. Now my thoughts turn back to Maven himself, to cold blue eyes and the moment I realized his charming smile hid a beast.
The bunk beneath me is hard, the blankets thin, with no pillow to speak of, but part of me wants to lie back down. Already my headache returns, throbbing with the electric pulse of this miracle boat. It is a firm reminder—there is no peace for me here. Not yet, not while so much more must be done. The list. The names. I must find them. I must keep them safe from Maven and his mother. Heat spreads across my face, my skin flushing with the memory of Julian’s little book of hard-won secrets. A record of those like me, with the strange mutation that gives us Red blood and Silver abilities. The list is Julian’s legacy. And mine.
I swing my legs over the side of the cot, almost thwacking my head on the bunk above me, and find a neatly folded set of clothing on the floor. Black pants that are too long, a dark red shirt with threadbare elbows, and boots missing laces. Nothing like the fine clothes I found in a Silver cell, but they feel right against my skin.
I barely have the shirt over my head when my compartment door bangs open on great iron hinges. Kilorn waits expectantly on the other side, his smile forced and grim. He shouldn’t blush, having seen me in various stages of undress for many summers, but his cheeks redden anyway.
“It’s not like you to sleep so long,” he says, and I hear worry in his voice.
I shrug it off and stand on weak legs. “I guess I needed it.” An odd ringing in my ears takes hold, piercing but not painful. I shake my head back and forth, trying to get rid of it, looking like a wet dog in the process.
“That’ll be the banshee scream.” He crosses to me and takes my head in gentle but callused hands. I submit to his examination, sighing in annoyance. He turns me sideways, glancing at ears that ran red with blood however long ago. “You’re lucky it didn’t hit you head-on.”
“I’m a lot of things, but I don’t think lucky is one of them.”
“You’re alive, Mare,” he says sharply, pulling away. “That’s more than many can say.” His glare brings me back to Naercey, when I told my brother I didn’t trust his word. Deep in my heart, I know I still don’t.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter quickly. Of course I know others have died, for the cause and for me. But I’ve died too. Mare of the Stilts died the day she fell onto a lightning shield. Mareena, the lost Silver princess, died in the Bowl of Bones. And I don’t know what new person opened her eyes on the Undertrain. I only know what she has been and what she has lost, and the weight of it is almost crushing.
“Are you going to tell me where we’re going, or is that another secret?” I try to keep the bitterness from my voice but fail miserably.
Kilorn is polite enough to ignore it and leans back against the door. “We left Naercey five hours ago, and we’re headed northeast. That’s honestly all I know.”
“And that doesn’t bother you at all?”
He only shrugs. “What makes you think the higher-ups trust me, or you, for that matter? You know better than anyone how foolish we’ve been, and the high cost we’ve paid.” Again, I feel the sting of memory. “You said yourself, you can’t even trust Shade. I doubt anyone’s going to be sharing secrets anytime soon.”
The jab doesn’t hurt as much as I expected it to. “How is he?”
Kilorn tosses his head, gesturing out to the hallway. “Farley carved out a nice little medical station for the wounded. He’s doing better than the others. Cursing a lot, but definitely better.” His green eyes darken a bit, and he turns his gaze away. “His leg—”
I draw in a startled breath. “Infected?” At home in the Stilts, infection was as bad as a severed arm. We didn’t have much medicine, and once the blood went bad, all you could do was keep chopping, hoping to outrun fever and blackened veins.
To my relief, Kilorn shakes his head. “No, Farley dosed him good, and the Silvers fight with clean bullets. So that’s big of them.” He laughs darkly, expecting me to join him. Instead, I shiver. The air is so cold down here. “But he’ll definitely be limping for a while.”
“Will you take me to him or do I have to figure out the way myself?”
Another dark laugh and he extends his arm. To my surprise, I find that I need his support to help me walk. Naercey and the Bowl of Bones have certainly taken their toll.
Mersive. That
’s what Kilorn calls the strange underwater boat. How it manages to sail beneath the ocean is beyond both of us, though I’m sure Cal will figure it out. He’s next on my list. I’ll find him after I make sure my brother is still breathing. I remember Cal being barely conscious when we escaped, just like me. But I don’t suppose Farley will set him up in the medical station, not with injured Guardsmen all around. There’s too much bad blood and no one wants an inferno in a sealed metal tube.
The banshee’s scream still rings in my head, a dull whine that I try to ignore. And with every step, I learn about new aches and bruises. Kilorn notes my every wince and slows his pace, allowing me to lean on his arm. He ignores his own wounds, deep cuts hidden beneath yet another set of fresh bandages. He always had battered hands, bruised and cut from fishing hooks and rope, but they were familiar wounds. They meant he was safe, employed, free from conscription. If not for one dead fish master, little scars would be his only burden.
Once that thought would have made me sad. Now I feel only rage.
The main passage of the mersive is long but narrow, divided by several metal doors with thick hinges and pressurized seals. To close off portions if need be, to stop the entire vessel from flooding and sinking. But the doors give me no comfort whatsoever. I can’t stop thinking about dying at the bottom of the ocean, locked in a watery coffin. Even Kilorn, a boy raised on water, seems uncomfortable. The dim lights set into the ceiling filter strangely, cutting shadows across his face to make him appear old and drawn.
The other Guardsmen aren’t so affected, coming and going with great purpose. Their red scarves and shawls have been lowered, revealing faces set in grim determination. They carry charts, trays of medical supplies, bandages, food, or even the occasional rifle down the passage, always hurrying and chattering to each other. But they stop at the sight of me, pressing back against the walls to give me as much room as possible in the narrow space. The more daring ones look me in the eye, watching me limp past, but most stare at their feet.