Thorne pulled his shirt on again, a little more dry and wrinkled now, and Cress was able to breathe again.
“That might work,” said Thorne, nodding at Cinder. “Think you can make it?”
“No,” said Cinder. “I can’t walk.”
“It’s not far,” said Jacin. “I thought you were supposed to be tough.”
Cinder scowled up at him. “I can’t walk. The water did something to my interface.” She paused. Wheezed. “My leg and hand aren’t functioning. Lost net access too.”
Four pairs of eyes shifted to the glistening metal foot. Cress was not in the habit of thinking of Cinder as cyborg—as something other. As someone who could just … stop functioning.
“Fine,” said Jacin, turning to Thorne. “You want to carry her first, or shall I?”
Thorne raised an eyebrow. “Do you know how heavy she is?”
Cinder kicked him.
He huffed. “Fine. You first.”
* * *
“Are we sure about this?” Cress whispered. She was crouched behind a trellis covered in ivy, along with Cinder, Thorne, and Jacin, watching as Iko lifted the shining gold door knocker for the third time.
“I told you, they aren’t home,” said Jacin, annoyed at the precaution of having Iko scout out the pillared mansion before they went in. “This family is popular at court. They’ll be staying at the palace all week.”
After a fourth knock bore no result, Iko turned to them and shrugged.
Cress wrapped an arm around Cinder’s waist—she was a good height to act as a crutch for her as they hobbled through the garden. Cinder’s dead metal foot dragged a groove into the pathway of tumbled blue glass.
“What if it’s locked?” asked Cress, glancing down the street, although they hadn’t seen a single person. Perhaps this entire neighborhood was made up of popular members of the court. Perhaps this whole city was off having a raucous celebration at the palace.
“Then I’ll pick it,” said Thorne.
The door wasn’t locked. They found themselves in a grandiose entryway with a curved staircase and a sea of gold and white tiles.
Thorne let out a low whistle. “This place is ripe for plundering.”
Iko responded, “Can I go plunder the master closet?”
Jacin found an enormous vase full of flowers and set it on the floor inside the front door, so anyone who opened it would knock it over and shatter the vase into a hundred tiny pieces. Fair warning that it was time for them to leave.
It didn’t take them long to find a kitchen that was bigger than Cress’s satellite. Cress and Iko maneuvered Cinder onto a stool and helped her prop up her leg while Jacin rummaged through the pantry, emerging with an assortment of nuts and fruits.
“What do you think is wrong with you?” Iko asked.
Cinder smacked her palm against the side of her head, like she hoped to jog something back into place. “It’s not a power issue,” she said. “My eyes are working, at least. It’s something in the connection between the brain-machine interface and my prostheses. It affected both my hand and leg at the same time, so it must be a primary connection. My control panel could have gotten waterlogged or something. Could be a few dead wires.” She sighed. “I guess I should feel lucky. If my power cell had died, I’d be dead with it.”
They mulled over this for a moment, picking at the food.
Thorne glanced back at the pantry. “Did you see any rice in there? Maybe we could fill Cinder’s head with it.”
Everyone stared at him.
“You know, to … absorb the moisture, or something. Isn’t that a thing?”
“We’re not pouring rice in my head.”
“But I’m pretty sure I remember someone putting a portscreen in a bag of rice once after they’d put it through a clothes washer and—”
“Thorne.”
“Just trying to be helpful.”
“What do you need to fix it?” asked Cress, then hunched down between her shoulders as all eyes turned toward her.
Cinder frowned, and Cress could see her working through different possibilities. Then she started to laugh, dragging her good hand through her tangled, still-damp hair. “A mechanic,” she said. “A really good one.”
Iko beamed. “That, we have. Plus, we’re in a mansion. They have tons of technology here. We just need to find you the parts and tools and you can talk me through fixing you. Right?”
Cinder pursed her lips. There were dark circles beneath her eyes and an unhealthy pallor to her skin. Cress had never seen her so worn down.
Iko cocked her head. She must have noticed it too, because she spent a moment studying Cinder, then everyone in their group. “You all look awful. Maybe you should rest for a while. I can keep watch.”
They mulled over the idea for a minute, before Thorne said, “That’s actually not a bad idea.”
Iko shrugged. “Someone has to stay clearheaded in an emergency situation.” Frowning, she added, “Although I never thought it would have to be me.”
Thorne turned to Cinder. “You’ll think more clearly after a nap.”
She ignored him, staring at the counter. There was a dejected slump to her shoulders, a hollowness in her gaze.
“I don’t think a nap is going to fix this,” she said, lifting her cyborg hand. It hung limply from her wrist, a hole where one finger had been removed. “I can’t believe this is happening. I can’t fight like this, or start a revolution, or be a queen. I can’t do anything like this. I’m broken. I’m literally broken.”
Iko settled a hand on Cinder’s shoulder. “Yeah, but broken isn’t the same as unfixable.”
Fifty-Five
“This was a bad decision,” said Scarlet.
Winter peered over at her. There was discomfort in Scarlet’s face, a deep-etched line between her eyebrows.
Reaching over, Winter tugged at one of Scarlet’s curls. “You have not turned back yet.”
Scarlet batted her away. “Yeah, because I no longer have any idea where we are.” Scarlet glanced over her shoulder. “We’ve been wandering around these caves for hours.”
Winter followed her look, but the cave was so dim they couldn’t see very far before it disappeared into shadows lit only by the occasional glowing orb on the ceiling. Winter couldn’t tell how far she and Scarlet had come through the underground lava tubes in search of the wolf soldiers—in search of an army—and she still didn’t know how much farther they would have to go. Whenever she thought of turning back, though, she would imagine she heard a faint howl in the distance, compelling her to go on. Her dream of Ryu and Levana clung to her thoughts like sticky pollen, inciting her resolve again and again.
Levana believed she could control everyone on this moon. The people, the soldiers, Winter herself.
But she was wrong. Winter was sick of being manipulated, and she knew she couldn’t be the only one. She would find soldiers to fight for her and together they would rid themselves of her stepmother and her cruelty.
They rounded another bend. The dark, gritty walls never changed. The ceiling was jagged, but the ground was worn smooth from years of foot traffic. And marching. Did the soldiers march? Winter wasn’t sure. She had not paid much attention to her stepmother’s army. She wished she’d taken more of an interest in what Levana was doing with these boys-made-soldiers. What she had been planning all along.
Otherwise, the cave looked like it had since it had first been carved out by molten lava billions of years ago. Back then, Luna had been a place of heat and transformation. It was difficult to fathom now in these cold, barren caverns, left to exist in quiet darkness.
When Earthens had first built their colony, they had made temporary homes of the vast interconnected lava tubes while the domes were under construction, and afterward converted them into storage and shuttle rails.
Only recently had they been used for something violent and grotesque.
“Secret barracks for a secret army,” she whispered to herself.
&nbs
p; “All right, time out.” Scarlet stopped and settled her hands on her hips. “Do you even know where we’re going?”
Winter tugged on a lock of her own hair this time, like a spring curled against her cheek. There was still a bump on her scalp where she’d hit her head, though the headache was mostly gone. “Many of the lava tubes that were not used for the shuttles were converted into underground training facilities. That is where the soldiers will be. At least, those who have not been sent to Earth.”
Scarlet blinked, slowly. “And how many lava tubes are there under Luna’s surface?”
Winter blinked, slowly, back. “I do not know. But did you know Luna started its life as a giant ball of magma, liquid and burning?”
Scarlet knotted her lips to one side. “How many wolf regiments are left on Luna?”
This time, Winter did not answer at all.
Exhaling, Scarlet rubbed at her brow. “I knew better. I knew better than to listen to you. Winter. We could be wandering down here for days and not see a single person. And even if we do find one of these regiments, or packs, or whatever they call themselves, they are most likely going to eat us. This is suicide!” She pointed back the direction they’d come. “We should be looking for allies, not enemies.”
“You go back then.” Winter continued down the endless tunnel.
Scarlet let out a bedraggled groan and stomped after her. “Thirty minutes,” she said. “We are going to walk for thirty more minutes and if we haven’t seen any evidence that we’re getting closer, then we are turning around and going back, and I am not taking no for an answer. I’ll club you over the head and drag you back if I have to.”
Winter fluttered her lashes, amused by the thought. “We will find them, Scarlet-friend. They will join us. Your Wolf is proof that they are men, not monsters.”
“I really wish you would stop comparing them with Wolf. Wolf is different. The rest of them … they are monsters. I met Wolf’s pack in Paris, and they were brutal and terrible. And that was her special ops, and they’re still mostly human! You can’t reason with these monsters any more than you could a … a…”
“A pack of wolves?”
Scarlet glared. “Exactly.”
“Ryu was my friend.”
Scarlet threw her hands into the air. “What are you going to do, play fetch with them? You are thinking about this all wrong. They are under Levana’s control, or whoever their thaumaturge is. They will do what they’re told, and that will be to eat us.”
“They were young boys forced into a difficult situation. They did not ask for this life, just as your Wolf didn’t ask for it, but they have done what they needed to do to survive. If they are given the opportunity to break their binds of enslavement, I believe they will take it. I believe they will side with us.”
Winter heard a distant, low howl, and shivered. Scarlet didn’t seem to hear it, though, so she said nothing.
“You have no idea whose side they’ll take. They’ve been so messed with, they’ll side with whoever is offering them a bigger piece of steak.” Scarlet hesitated. “What’s wrong? Are you hallucinating right now?”
Winter forced a smile. “Not unless you are a figment of my imagination, but how could I ever be sure one way or the other? So I will go on believing you are real.”
Scarlet looked unimpressed with her logic. “You know what these men become, don’t you? You know they can never be normal again.”
“I would think that you, of all people, would believe in their ability to change. Wolf changed because of his love for you. Why can they not change also?” She started walking again.
“Wolf is—it’s not the same. Winter, I know you’re used to batting your eyelashes at everyone who walks by and expecting them to fall in love with you, but that’s not going to happen here. They are going to laugh at you and mock you and then they are going to—”
“Eat me. Yes. I understand.”
“You don’t seem to be grasping the meaning behind the words. This isn’t a metaphor. I’m talking about huge teeth and digestive systems.”
“Fat and bones and marrow and meat,” Winter sang. “We only wanted a snack to eat.”
Scarlet grunted. “You can be so disturbing.”
Winter hooked her elbow with Scarlet’s. “Don’t be afraid. They will help us.”
Before Scarlet could mount another argument, a peculiar smell assaulted their senses, sharp and pungent. An animal smell, like in the menagerie, but different. Sweat and salt and body odor mingling in the cave’s stale air, along with something rank, like old meat.
“Well,” said Scarlet, “I think we found them.”
A chill crawled down Winter’s neck. Neither of them moved for a long while.
“If we can smell them,” said Scarlet, “they can smell us.”
Winter raised her chin. “I’ll understand if you leave. I can go on without you.”
Scarlet seemed to consider it, but then she shrugged. Her expression was reckless. “I’m beginning to think we’re all going to end up wolf food anyway by the time this is over.”
Facing her, Winter cupped Scarlet’s face in both hands. “It is not like you to talk like that.”
Scarlet clenched her jaw. “They took Wolf and they took Cinder, and as much as I want to see Levana ripped into tiny pieces and fed to her own mutants, I just don’t think we have a whole lot of hope without them.” She gulped, her resentment clouding over. “And I … I don’t want to see this place. He was trained here too, you know. I’m afraid to see what he came from, what he … who he was.”
“He is your Wolf now, and you are his alpha.”
Scarlet laughed. “According to Jacin, you need a pack to be an alpha.”
Jacin. The name brought sunshine and blood and kisses and growls rising to Winter’s skin. She gave it a moment to sink back toward her bones, before she tilted Scarlet’s head down and placed a kiss on the top of her flame-and-fury hair. “I will get you your pack.”
Fifty-Six
They hadn’t gone much farther before they detected noise rumbling through the caverns. Low and thunderous, like a distant train. They came to another fork in the tunnel, and while one path led into further darkness and rock and nothingness, the other ran into a set of iron doors. Hinged into the regolith walls, the doors looked ancient. Their sole ornamentation was a faded label painted on the lower corner of each door—STOREROOM 16, SECTOR LW-12.
A tiny screen had been embedded into the wall beside the doors. It was old and outdated and the text kept flickering. LUNAR REGIMENT 117, PACKS 1009–1020.
The ground and walls thrummed with activity beyond those doors—laughter and shouting and thumping footsteps. For the first time since she’d embarked on this quest, Winter felt a flutter of nervousness in her stomach.
Scarlet glanced at her. “It isn’t too late to go back.”
“I disagree.”
Sighing, Scarlet studied the screen. “Eleven packs, so around a hundred soldiers, give or take.”
Winter hummed, a sound without commitment. A hundred soldiers.
Animals, killers, predators, or so everyone claimed. Had she truly gone mad to think she could change them?
Her eyes began to mist, surprising her. She had not realized that thinking of her own imbalance would sadden her, but the feel of her ribs crushing against her heart was unmistakable.
“Why did you follow me?” she asked, staring at the solid doors. “Knowing what’s wrong with me. Knowing that I’m broken.”
Scarlet scoffed. “That is an excellent question.”
A loud thud was followed by hollers. The walls reverberated around them.
They had not been noticed. Scarlet was right. They could turn around and leave. Winter could admit she was delusional and no one should ever listen to her. She was adept only at making the wrong decisions.
“I couldn’t let you go on your own,” said Scarlet, most of the venom gone from her tone.
“Why?”
“I don’t
know. Call me crazy.”
Winter shut her eyes. “I won’t. You are not damaged like I am. You are not a hundred scattered pieces, blowing farther and farther away from each other.”
“How would you know?”
Listing her head, Winter dared to look up again.
Scarlet leaned against the regolith wall. “My father was a liar and a drunk. My mother left when I was a kid and never looked back. I witnessed a man kill my grandmother and then rip out her throat with his teeth. I was kept in a cage for six weeks. I was forced to cut off my own finger. I’m pretty sure I’m falling in love with a guy who has been genetically modified and mentally programmed to be a predator. So all things considered, I’d say I have a fair amount of scattered pieces myself.”
Winter felt her resolve crumbling. “You came with me because it was the quickest path to death, then.”
A crease formed between Scarlet’s eyebrows. “I’m not suicidal,” she said, the sharpness returning to her tongue. “I came with you because—” She crossed her arms over her chest. “Because ever since my grandma took me in, I’ve heard people tell me she was crazy. A kooky, belligerent old woman, always good for a joke around town. They had no idea how brilliant she was. That crazy old woman risked everything she had to protect Cinder when she was a baby, and in the end, she sacrificed her own life rather than give up Cinder’s secret. She was brave and strong, and everyone else was too closeminded to see it.” She rolled her eyes, annoyed with her own frustration. “I guess I’m just hoping that despite all the absurd things you say, you might also be a little bit brilliant. That this time, you might be right.” She held up her finger. “That said, if you’re going to tell me how stupid this idea was to begin with and we should run like hell, then I’m right behind you.”
Beyond the doors, something crashed, and there was a round of boisterous laughter. Then, a howl. A chorus of a dozen other voices rose up to meet it, sounding victorious.
A muscle twitched in Winter’s jaw, but her lip had stopped trembling. She hadn’t cried. She’d been too focused on Scarlet’s words to remember to be upset. “I believe they were boys once and they can be boys again. I believe I can help them, and they will help me in return.”