“You chose something over me too,” he sighs. “Many things.”
The Scarlet Guard. The Red dawn. The hope of a better future for the people I love. I bite my lip, chewing my own flesh. I have nothing to deny. Tiberias isn’t wrong.
“If you two are done,” Tyton says loudly, leaning down from his vantage point on the transport, “I think you’d both be interested to know there are people in the trees.”
I suck in a breath, tensing up. Tiberias puts out a hand quickly, touching my arm in light warning. “Don’t startle,” he says. “I’m guessing they have us targeted.”
Metal groans, and I jump beneath Tiberias’s fingers. His grip tightens. But it’s just the transports being moved.
“How many?” I ask through gritted teeth, trying my best to mask my fear.
Tyton looks down at me, eyes bright. His white hair gleams in the artificial light illuminating the Hawkway. “Four, two on each side. At a good distance, but I can just feel their brains.” Next to me, Tiberias frowns, the corners of his lips curving downward in distaste. “Fifty yards, maybe.”
I look past Tiberias, and he looks past me, both of us searching the shadowed pines as furtively as we can. I can’t see anything beyond our circle of light. Not the gleam of eyes or the flash of steel down a gun barrel. Nothing.
I can’t feel them either. My ability is nowhere near as strong or as focused as Tyton’s.
Farley catches my eye and approaches with a hand on her hip, the other still clutching her pistol. “You three look like you’ve seen a ghost,” she says, sweeping her gaze back and forth. “Snipers in the trees?” she offers, as if she’s asking about the weather.
“Did you see them?” Tyton breathes.
“No.” She shakes her head. “But it’s what I’d do.”
“You can drop them, right?” I ask, nudging Tyton’s boot. I remember the electricons taught me about his ability. Brain lightning. Tyton can affect the electricity in a person’s body, the tiny sparks inside our brains. He can kill without anyone knowing. Without any trace.
He frowns and furrows his dark brows, a sharp contrast to his dyed hair. “I might be able to, from this distance. But only one at a time,” he says. “And only if they are raiders.”
Tiberias scowls. “Who else would they be up here?”
“I don’t enjoy killing people without cause, Calore,” Tyton replies. “And I’ve lived on these mountains my entire life.”
“So you’ll wait for them to shoot us?” The prince shifts slightly, squaring his shoulders so that I’m sheltered on one side.
Tyton doesn’t budge. As he speaks, a breeze plays up, carrying with it the strong, sharply sweet scent of pine. “I’ll wait for your magnetron princess to tell me if they’re holding sniper rifles or not.”
On the one hand, I agree with Tiberias. We’re exposed up here, and who else would be waiting in the trees, watching us scramble? But I understand Tyton too. I know what it is to pour lightning into a person, to sense their nerves sparking off and dying. It feels like a small death of your own, an ending you can never forget.
“Get Evangeline,” I mutter. “And tell Davidson. We need to be sure.”
Next to me, Tiberias huffs. But he doesn’t argue. He pushes off the transport, intending to stalk after Evangeline.
The breeze strengthens, playing across my face. Pine needles brush my skin, soft as trailing fingers. I try to catch one, but it dances off on the growing wind.
And it sprouts before my eyes, a sapling growing in midair. It spears a soldier before any of us can react.
The attack is not the storm of bullets we expected, but the spray of pine needles blasting in a strong, sudden gale. It catches Tyton head-on, tossing him off the wrecked transport. He rolls onto the road, head smacking against the pavement. He stumbles to a knee, then falls, oddly off balance. I throw up an arm to protect my eyes and drop to a knee as needles scratch across my exposed skin. Where they land, roots and trunks burst forth in curling, living explosions. The Hawkway cracks and transports heave, tossed by the forest growing before our eyes. My balance shifts with the road, and I fight to keep upright, bracing against the wrecked transport at my back.
Tiberias reacts without thinking. He tosses a fireball, charring the pines sprouting up around us as fast as they can grow. The ash swirls in the growing wind, obscuring the road lights, making my eyes water.
The air shudders with the sound of crushing metal and shattering glass. Evangeline and her crew are done wasting time. They flatten the wrecks that remain in the way, reducing them to solid puddles of iron and steel. The transports that still work roar, revving their engines as they lurch forward, fighting over pulsing roots and ripping branches. Evangeline leaps through the smoky air, climbing up onto a transport frame. Gunshots ring out, but the bullets fall to the wayside, tossed off by her ability.
Blue shields spring to life on either end of the Hawkway, tall and ethereal against the smoke and ash. Davidson controls each one with an outthrust fist. More shots sound, rippling over the shield. They can’t penetrate. The guns can’t reach us.
“Tyton!” I scream, looking for the electricon. “Tyton, kill them!”
He hoists himself to his feet, teetering as he wags his head back and forth. Trying to shake away the daze. Using the nearest transport, he props himself up, leaning heavily.
“Give me a second!” he yells back, shaking his head again.
We still can’t see the raiders, safe from their nests in the trees. There have to be greenwardens, at least. Tiberias’s flames spread across the surge of pines on the road, twisting like a snake, attempting to devour each new tree as it sprouts. His Lerolan guards run between the trunks, laying hands on each. They explode at their touch, splintering in clouds of bark and blooming fire.
“Get on the transports!” Davidson roars over the chaos. He still holds the shields, defending us from a hail of bullets. “We have to get off the mountain!”
I suck in a deep breath, steeling myself. Focus. In the dark, I can’t see the clouds gathering overhead, but I can feel them. Storm clouds, thunderheads. Growing at my command, ready to strike.
Someone pulls Tyton onto the approaching transport, buckling him in. On the road, Tiberias directs his inferno through the lethal forest trying to trap us on the cliff or push us off it. The rest of our detachment does their best to dodge the trees or destroy them, clearing the way for the transports and our escape.
My heart thunders against my rib cage, adrenaline charging in my blood. It rises until I feel like I might burst. I take one more breath, deeper than before, and raise my hands, palms flat. My storm breaks overhead, twin bolts of lightning shattering down into the trees on either side of the Hawkway. The pines crack. Embers flare. Trunks slide and lean before crashing into the underbrush. Fire springs up among the boughs, small at first. Then gigantic. Fueled by the strength of a Calore prince.
The bullets on our left stop long enough for Davidson to drop one shield and clamber onto the transport behind Evangeline’s. The six vehicles bristle with soldiers, familiar and unfamiliar. In their black suits they look like bugs, crowding for space on a stone in the middle of a churning river.
Tyton hangs off the side of Evangeline’s transport, one arm looped through a set of straps. As they drive past Tiberias, still fighting, Tyton extends a hand. The prince takes it without question, swinging up onto the transport with ease. I’m next.
I land hard, tucked between Tiberias and Tyton, with Evangeline upright above us. She fuses her metal boots to the body of the transport, which allows her to stand with confidence despite our growing speed. She clenches a fist, clearing the last wreck out of our way, slamming it against the cliff side. Glass sprays the air like jagged rain.
Davidson’s final shield drops, shifting from the trees ahead to the lead transport. But in that brief second, another storm of bullets peppers our convoy. A few hit dangerously close, pinging off the metal by my head. Adrenaline eats my fear. I focus on
keeping my grip on the transport, fingers tight on makeshift handholds, my body pressed against the cold steel. Flame chases alongside us, flanking the cliff edge of the transport. Tiberias keeps hold of it, dragging the swirl of fire with us, charring anything in our path. We scream over the road, taking the switchbacks with blinding speed.
“More in the trees,” Tyton growls, his teeth gritted against the wind. He squints into the darkness, his eyes narrowing to slits. I know what he’s doing, even if I can’t do it myself. Tyton reaches out to the brains, feeling them as I feel the storm. He blinks once, twice. Killing anyone within his reach, leveling them with a fury of electricity in their skulls. I imagine raiders dropping to the forest floor, their bodies twitching through a deadly seizure before finally lying still.
I rain lightning into the pines, more bolts striking through trunks and branches. The blinding flashes illuminate the forest for a moment, enough to see the silhouettes of falling trees and fleeing figures. A dozen at least.
The Hawkway levels for the last mile as we leave the sharp corners and cliffs behind. The transports roar beneath us, eating up the straightaway in a mad race to the foot of the mountain. Fire and storm run with us, two guardians on deadly wings.
More engines flare on the edge of my awareness. Not as strong as the transports, but just as fast, and moving toward us with furious speed.
The first cycle snarls out of the tree line, its single headlight blinding. The raider on it is small, with spindly limbs, armor, and goggles. He is also boldly stupid, driving the cycle up and off a boulder, sending himself arcing over the road.
Above me, Evangeline slices her hands through the air. The cycle shreds at her command, spokes and pipes peeling apart.
But she isn’t the only magnetron here.
The raider keeps his seat, and the cycle knits back together beneath his body, continuing its leap over the hood of the transport. As he goes, he tosses something. The steel glints in the dim light, fast as any bullet.
Knives sail through the air, their razor edges cutting the wind. We duck together, Tiberias, Tyton, and I. One grazes my shoulder. The suit saves me from the worst of it, but I still feel the sting. I bite my lip hard, forcing back a yelp of pain.
The cycling raider hits the other side of the road hard, wheels skidding through dirt as he circles to make another pass. Instead he crunches into a thin blue wall, the cycle crumpling beneath him as he falls backward, gushing blood.
Davidson moves the shields with us, trying to block the other cycles spitting out of the trees. Some of the riders drop, their bodies spasming, as Tyton takes hold of them. The rest of our focus is on getting onto the plain, out into the open. To the outpost, our reinforcements, and safety. The Montfort newbloods defend the convoy, pushing back the raider attacks with everything they have. Tiberias’s fire spreads through the trees, the ash falling around us like snow, coating us in white and gray. I let my lightning crack across the sky, the sound and force of it enough to send the raiders scurrying back into the trees.
In the darkness, it’s hard to discern their shadows. They don’t look like the Silvers I’m used to, in fine robes, polished armor, and gleaming jewels. They don’t even have the neat severity of Training suits and uniforms. These Silvers are different, their clothes a patchwork, their weapons and gear mismatched. I’m reminded, more than anything, of the Scarlet Guard in their scraps of red, united only by a color and a cause.
The cycles disappear into the smoky underbrush, their headlights bobbing and weaving out of sight. I reach for the engines, trying to grab hold before they pass beyond my grasp. But another rumble makes me pause, a pounding thrum lurching close.
I can feel it in my teeth.
Monsters burst from the ash, their shaggy heads massive, horns lowered, hooves stamping. Dozens of them, snorting and braying in hulking ranks. The stampede pummels into the convoy, knocking over each transport even as they meet bullets and fire and lightning and knives. The monsters are too strong, too strange. Their hides thick, muscles thicker, with bone like living armor. I watch one catch a bullet in the forehead and keep on ramming, horns tearing through metal like paper. I barely have the wherewithal to scream.
Our transport tips beneath us, knocked off the road by the monstrous charge. We topple with it. I hit the dirt hard and taste blood. Someone holds me down, their hand on my neck. Through my hair, I glimpse the transport as it sails over us. Evangeline is silhouetted against the sight, arms outstretched, fists clenched. She swings, using the transport like a battering ram, and tosses it into the stampeding herd of fearsome creatures. They circle and charge again, their eyes wide and furious, clearly under the control of a Silver animos.
I scramble up, using Tiberias’s arm to leverage my weight and get back on my feet. Some yards away, Farley fires her gun from a knee. Her bullets have no effect on the beasts as they run, closing the distance quickly.
Gritting my teeth, I toss and spread, weaving purple-white lighting across their path. The beasts rear in terror, still animals despite whoever is controlling them. A few attempt to run through. They scream in pain, collapsing in heaps of twitching hide and tossing horns.
I try to ignore the terrible sound and narrow my eyes, squinting through the semidarkness as fear gives way to instinct. My movements come without thought, every step and sweep of my arms immediate. In my focus, I almost don’t notice the creeping sensation, the heavy weight falling around my shoulders. The press is gentle at first, easy to mistake for exhaustion.
But my lightning wanes, not as bright as before. Not as easy to control. It flickers, sparking weakly as I brush aside another raider. He falls but gets back up quickly, a fist clenched in my direction.
The force of his ability sends me to my knees, and I lose all sensation of electricity. Like a candle snuffed out, unable to spark and burn.
I can’t breathe. I can’t think.
I can’t fight.
Silence, a voice in me screams. A familiar pain and familiar fear level me again, bending me over.
My useless hands hit the dirt, brushing against cold earth. I gasp weakly, barely able to move, let alone defend myself. Fear sends me spiraling, my vision going black for a second. I feel manacles again, Silent Stone around my wrists and ankles, keeping me prisoner behind a locked door. Chaining me to a false king, dooming me to a life of slow, wasting death.
The Silver stalks toward me, his footsteps thunderous in my ears. I hear the sing of rasping metal as he draws a knife, intending to make quick work of my throat. It flashes in the night, reflecting the flames with a red sheen. He grins at me, his face bloodless and white as he grabs my hair, forcing my head back. I want to fight him. I should reach for the gun at my hip, still holstered. But my limbs won’t move. Even my heartbeat feels sluggish. I can’t even scream.
The combination of crushing silence and fear keeps me still. All I can do is watch. The blade edges my skin, almost burning me with its cold.
He leers down at me, his hair greasy beneath the scarf wrapped around his forehead. I can’t tell what color the fabric is, if it means anything. A useless thing to wonder right now.
Then his face explodes; shards of bone and torn flesh arc forward. His body follows the momentum, slumping over me, and the thunderous touch of electricity returns as quickly as he falls. I scramble, unthinking, sliding out from under the Silence’s corpse even as his warm blood and splintered teeth catch in my hair.
Someone grabs me beneath the arm, dragging me through the dirt. I let them, still in shock, still paralyzed by fear, unable to do much more than kick weakly at the ground. In the distance, Farley watches me with a murderous expression, her pistol still raised and aimed at a man already dead.
“It’s me,” a deep voice says, laying me down some yards away. Or, rather, letting me drop. Tiberias stands back, eyes wide and almost glowing in the dim light. His breath comes in quick puffs as he looks me over.
Stand up, I tell myself. Get back on your feet.
If
only I could. If only the memory of Silent Stone were so easy to brush off. Slowly, I brush my hands together, calling sparks to my skin. I have to see them. I have to know they aren’t gone again.
Then I touch my throat, my fingers coming away slick with my own blood.
Tiberias watches in silence, unblinking.
I stare back until he turns away, putting reluctant distance between us. When I get my bearings, I realize I’m somewhat defended. He dumped me next to the transports, using the wrecks for cover. All around me, soldiers of Montfort re-form along the line. Davidson stalks among them, a streak of blood across his face. He looks disgusted with himself, and with the raiders.
Shaky, I climb to my feet, using the hulking vehicle above me for support. The battle still rages before us, and the monstrous beasts snort and stamp, at odds with their own nature and their Silver masters.
A net of white lightning forms ahead of them, like a fence to hold them back. They toss their heads at the display, frightened beyond sense. I know the feeling.
“Poor things,” I hear Tyton mutter as he stops next to me. He stares at the beasts, strangely forlorn. When one tries to charge, he blinks, and it drops, its massive body crumpling.
The raiders return for another pass, their cycles snarling and leaping through the thinning trees. Evangeline and her cousins do battle with the other magnetrons, wrestling for dominance over the cycles.
One hand on my chest, nails clutching at my suit, I try to grab hold of a cycle as it leaps over the road. Glaring, I trace the lines of electricity into its engine. With a great push of resolve, I feel them die in quick succession, a sudden burst and then nothing.
The rider twists, startled, as his machine fails. Breathing hard, I do the same to the next. They fall one by one, either coasting to a stop or toppling in midair.
Our own soldiers descend on the raiders. They must have orders to capture, not kill. Davidson himself imprisons one in a cage of shields, letting the raider pound uselessly at his blue prison.
Evangeline pursues one of the small raider magnetrons, running him down over the dirt. He tries to duel her, swirling twin blades that bleed between sword and whip. She is faster and more deadly. His swords are no match for her knives as they pepper his skin, her ability too strong for him to overcome. Evangeline Samos owes no allegiance to Davidson, and she doesn’t have his mercy. She cuts the raider apart, letting him bleed silver beneath the starlight.