Glass Sword (6 page)

“We’re surfacing,” he says, reaching my side.

I tighten my grip on a nearby grate, using it to steady myself. “You don’t say?”

Kilorn grins, leaning against the wall in front of me. He plants his feet on either side of mine, a challenge if there ever was one. I feel Cal’s heat behind me, but the prince seems to be taking the indifferent path as well, and says nothing.

I won’t be a piece in whatever game they’re playing. I’ve done that enough for a lifetime. “How’s what’s-her-name? Lena?”

The name hits Kilorn like a slap. His grin slackens, one side of his mouth drooping. “She’s fine, I guess.”

“That’s good, Kilorn.” I give him a friendly, if condescending, pat on the shoulder. The deflection works perfectly. “We should be making friends.”

The mersive levels out beneath us, but no one stumbles. Not even Cal, who has nowhere near my balance or Kilorn’s sea legs, hard earned
on a fishing boat. He’s taut as a wire, waiting for me to take the lead. It should make me laugh, the thought of a prince deferring to me, but I’m too cold and worn to do much of anything but carry on.

So I do. Down the corridor, with Cal and Kilorn in tow, to the throng of Guardsmen waiting by the ladder that brought us down here in the first place. The wounded go first, tied onto makeshift stretchers and hoisted up into the open night. Farley supervises, her shift even bloodier than before. She makes for a grim sight, tightening bandages, with a syringe between her teeth. A few of the worse off get shots as they pass, medication to help with the pain of being moved up the narrow tube. Shade is the last of the injured, leaning heavily on the two Guardsmen who teased Kilorn about the nurse. I would push through to him, but the crowd is too tight, and I don’t want any more attention today. Still too weak to teleport, he has to fumble on one leg and blushes furiously when Farley straps him onto a stretcher. I can’t hear what she says to him, but it calms him somewhat. He even waves off her syringe, instead gritting his teeth against the jarring pain of being hoisted up the ladder. Once Shade is safely carried up, the process goes much faster. One after the other, Guardsmen follow one another up the ladder, slowly clearing the corridor. Many of them are nurses, men and women marked by white shifts with varying degrees of bloodstains.

I don’t waste time waving others ahead, faking politeness like a lady should. We’re all going to the same place. So when the crowd clears a little, the ladder opening to me, I hurry forward. Cal follows, and his presence combined with mine parts the Guardsmen like a knife. They step back quickly, some even stumbling, to give us our space. Only Farley stands firm, one hand around the ladder. To my surprise, she offers Cal and me a nod.
Both
of us.

That should’ve been my first warning.

The steps on the ladder burn in my muscles, still strained from Naercey, the arena, and my capture. I can hear a strange howling up above, but it doesn’t deter me in the slightest. I need to get out of the mersive, as fast as possible.

My last glimpse of the mersive, looking back over my shoulder, is strange, angling over Farley and into the medical station. There are wounded still in there, motionless beneath their blankets.
No, not wounded,
I realize as I pull myself up.
Dead.

Higher up the ladder, the wind sounds, and a bit of water drips down. Nothing to bother with, I assume, until I reach the top and the open circle of darkness. A storm howls so strongly that the rain pelts sideways, missing most of the tube and ladder. It stings against my scraped face, drenching me in seconds.
Autumn storms.
Though I cannot recall a storm so brutal as this. It blows through me, filling my mouth with rain and biting, salty spray. Luckily, the mersive is tightly anchored to a dock I can barely see, and it holds firm against the roiling gray waves below.

“This way!” a familiar voice yells in my ear, guiding me off the ladder and onto the mersive hull slick with rain and seawater. Through the darkness, I can barely see the soldier leading me, but his massive bulk and his voice are easy to place.

“Bree!” I close my hand on his, feeling the calluses of my oldest brother’s grip. He walks like an anchor, heavy and slow, helping me off the mersive and onto the dock. It’s not much better, metal eaten with rust, but it leads to land and that’s all I care about. Land and
warmth
, a welcome respite after the cold depths of the ocean and my memories.

No one helps Cal down from the mersive, but he does fine on his own. Again, he’s careful to keep some distance, walking a few respectable paces behind us. I’m sure he hasn’t forgotten his first meeting with
Bree back in the Stilts, when my brother was anything but polite. In truth, none of the Barrows cared for Cal, except Mom and maybe Gisa. But they didn’t know who he was then. Should be an interesting reunion.

The storm makes Tuck difficult to see, but I can tell the island is small, covered in dunes and tall grass as tumultuous as the waves. A crack of lightning out on the water illuminates the night for a moment, showing the path in front of us. Now out in the open, without the cramped walls of the mersive or the Undertrain, I can see we number less than thirty, including the wounded. They head for two flat, concrete buildings where the dock meets land. A few structures stand out on the gentle hill above us, looking like bunkers or barracks. But what lies beyond them, I can’t say. The next bolt of lightning, closer this time, shivers delightfully in my nerves. Bree mistakes it for cold, and draws me closer, draping one heavy arm across my shoulders. His weight makes it hard to walk, but I endure.

The end of the dock cannot come fast enough. Soon I’ll be inside, dry, on solid ground, and reunited with the Barrows after far too long. The prospect is enough to get me through the bustle of wet activity. Nurses load the wounded onto an old transport, its storage bed covered in waterproof canvas. It was certainly stolen, as was everything else. The two buildings on land are hangars, their doors ajar enough to reveal more transports waiting inside. There’s even a few boats anchored to the dock, bobbing in the gray waves as they ride out the storm. Everything is mismatched—outdated transports in varying sizes, sleek new boats, some painted silver, black, one green. Stolen or hijacked or both. I even recognize the clouded gray and blue, the Nortan navy colors, on one boat. Tuck is like a much larger version of Will Whistle’s old wagon, packed with bits and pieces of trade and thievery.

The medical transport putters off before we reach it, fighting through the rain and up the sandy road. Only Bree’s nonchalance keeps me from quickening my pace. He isn’t worried about Shade, or what lies at the top of the hill, so I try not to be too.

Cal doesn’t share my sentiment and finally speeds up so he can walk next to me. It’s the storm or the darkness, or maybe simply his silver blood making him look so pale and afraid. “This can’t last,” he mutters, low enough so only I can hear.

“What’s that, Prince?” Bree says, his voice a dull roar. I nudge him in the ribs, but it doesn’t do much more than bruise my elbow. “No matter, we’ll know soon enough.”

His tone is worse than his words. Cold, brutal, so unlike the laughing brother I used to know. The Guard has changed him too. “Bree, what are you talking about?”

Cal already knows and stops in his tracks, his eyes on me. The wind musses his hair, pasting it to his forehead. His bronze eyes darken with fear, and my stomach churns at the sight.
Not again,
I plead.
Tell me I haven’t walked into another trap.

One of the hangars looms behind him, its doors opening wide on strangely quiet hinges. Too many soldiers to count step forward in unison, as regimented as any legion, their guns ready and eyes bright in the rain. Their leader might as well be a shiver, with almost white-blond hair and an icy disposition. But he’s red-blooded as I am—one of his eyes is clouded crimson, bleeding beneath the lens.

“Bree, what is this?!” I yell, rounding on my brother with a visceral snarl. Instead, he takes my hands in his, and not gently. He holds me firm, using his superior strength to keep me from pulling away. If he were anyone else, I would shock him good. But this is my brother. I can’t do that to him, I
won’t.

“Bree,
let me go
!”

“We won’t hurt him,” he says, repeating it over and over. “We’re not going to hurt him, I promise you.”

So this isn’t my cage.
But that doesn’t calm me at all. If anything, it makes me more angry and desperate.

When I look back, Cal’s fists are aflame, his arms stretched wide to face the blood-eyed man. “Well?” he growls in challenge, sounding more like an animal than a man.
A cornered animal.

Too many guns, even for Cal. They’ll shoot him if they must. It might even be what they want. An excuse to kill the fallen prince. Part of me, most of me, knows they would be justified in this. Cal was a hunter of the Scarlet Guard, essentially guaranteeing Tristan’s death, Walsh’s suicide, and Farley’s torture. Soldiers killed at his orders, wiping out most of Farley’s rebel force. And who knows how many he’s sent to die on the war front, trading Red soldiers for a few measly miles of the Lakelands. He owes no allegiance to the cause. He is a danger to the Scarlet Guard.

But he is a weapon as well as I am, one we can use in the days to come. For the newbloods, against Maven, a torch to help lift the darkness.

“He can’t fight out of this, Mare.” That’s Kilorn, choosing the worst of moments to sidle back. He whispers in my ear, acting like his closeness can influence me. “He’ll die if he tries.”

His logic is hard to ignore.

“On your knees, Tiberias,” the blood-eyed man says, taking bold steps toward the flaming prince. Steam rises from his fire, as if the storm is trying to stamp him out. “Hands behind your head.”

Cal does neither, and he flinches at the mention of his birth name. He stands firm, strong, proud, though he knows the battle is lost.
Once he might have surrendered, trying to save his own skin. Now he believes that skin worthless. Only I seem to think otherwise.

“Cal, do as he says.”

The wind carries my voice so that the whole hangar hears. I’m afraid they can hear my heart too, hammering like a drum in my chest.

“Cal.”

Slowly, reluctantly, a statue crumbling to dust, Cal sinks to his knees and his fire sputters out. He did the same thing yesterday, kneeling next to his father’s decapitated corpse.

The blood-eyed man grins, his teeth gleaming and straight. He stands over Cal with relish, enjoying the sight of a prince at his feet. Enjoying the
power
it gives him.

But I am the lightning girl, and he knows nothing of true power.

T
hey try to convince
me it’s for the best, but their poor excuses fall on unsympathetic ears. Kilorn and Bree quickly use every argument they’ve been told to say.

He’s dangerous, even to you.
But I know better than any that Cal would never hurt me. Even when he had reason to, I feared nothing from him.

He’s one of them. We can’t trust him.
After what Maven’s done to his legacy and reputation, Cal has nothing and no one but us now, even if he refuses to admit it.

He is valuable.
A general, a prince of Norta, and the most wanted man in the kingdom.
That one gives me pause, and strikes a chord of fear deep down. If the blood-eyed man decides to use Cal as leverage against Maven, to trade him or sacrifice him, it will take all I have to stop him. All my influence, all my
power
—and I don’t know if it will be enough.

So I do nothing but nod along with them, slowly at first, pretending to agree. Pretending to be controlled. Pretending to be
weak
. I was right. Shade was warning me before. Once again, he saw the turn of the tide long before it rolled in. Cal is power, fire made flesh, something to
be feared and defeated. And I am lightning. What will they try to do to me if I don’t play my part?

I have not stepped into another jail, not yet, but I can feel the key in the lock, threatening to turn. Luckily, I have experience in this kind of thing.

The blood-eyed man and his soldiers march Cal into the hangar, not stupid enough to try and bind his hands. But they never lower their guns or their guard, careful to keep their distance lest one of them be burned for their boldness. I can only watch, eyes wide but mouth shut, when the hangar door slides closed again, separating the two of us. They won’t kill him, not until he gives them a reason. I can only hope Cal behaves.

“Go easy on him,” I whisper, leaning into Bree’s warmth. Even in the cold autumn rain, he feels like a furnace. Long years fighting on the northern front have made him immune to wet and cold. I think back to Dad’s old saying.
The war never leaves.
Now I know it firsthand, though my war is very different from his.

Bree pretends not to hear me, hurrying us both from the docks. Kilorn follows close behind, his boots catching my heels once or twice. I resist the urge to kick him, and focus on climbing the wooden steps leading to the barracks on the hill above. The steps are worn down, beaten by too many feet to count.
How many came this way?
I wonder.
How many are here now?

We crest the hill and the island stretches out before us, revealing a military base larger than I expected. The barracks on the ridge was one of at least a dozen I see now, organized in two even rows separated by a long, concrete yard. It’s flat and well-maintained, not like the steps or the dock. There’s a white line painted down the middle of the yard,
perfectly straight, leading away into the stormy night. What it goes to, I have no idea.

The whole island has an air of stillness, momentarily frozen by the storm. Come the morning, when the rain breaks and the darkness lifts, I suppose I’ll see the base in all its glory—and finally understand the people I’m dealing with. I’m developing a bad habit of underestimating others, particularly where the Scarlet Guard is concerned.

And like Naercey, Tuck is far more than it seems.

The cold I felt on the mersive and in the rain persists, even when I’m ushered into the doorway of the barracks marked with a painted black “3.” I’m cold in my bones, in my heart. But I can’t let my parents see that, for their sake. I owe them this much. They must think me whole, unbroken, unaffected by Cal’s imprisonment and my own ordeals in a palace and an arena. And the Guard must think I’m on their side—relieved to be “safe.”

But aren’t I? Didn’t I swear an oath to Farley and the Scarlet Guard?

They believe as I do, in an end to Silver kings and Red slaves. They sacrificed soldiers
for
me,
because
of me. They are my
allies
, my brethren, brothers and sisters in arms—but the blood-eyed man gives me pause. He is not Farley. She might be gruff and single-minded, but she knows what I’ve been through. She can be reasoned with. I doubt reason lives in the heart of the blood-eyed man.

Kilorn is strangely quiet. This silence is not like us at all. We’re used to filling the space with insults, with teasing, or in Kilorn’s case, with utter nonsense. It’s not in our nature to be quiet around each other, but now we have nothing to say. He knew what they planned to do to Cal and agreed with it. Worse, he didn’t even tell me. I would feel angry but for the cold. It eats at my emotions, dulling them into something
like the electrical hum in the air.

Bree doesn’t notice the strangeness between us, not that he would. Besides being pleasantly foolish, my oldest brother left when I was a gangly thirteen-year-old who thieved for fun, not necessity, and wasn’t so cruel as I’ve become. Bree doesn’t know me as I am now, having missed almost five years of my life. But then, my life has changed more in the last two months than ever before. And only two people were with me through it. The first is imprisoned and the second wears a crown of blood.

Any sensible person would call them my enemies. Strange, my enemies know me best, and my family doesn’t know me at all.

Inside the barracks is blissfully dry, humming with lights and wires bundled along the ceiling. The thick concrete walls turn the corridor into a maze, with no markers to guide the way. Every door is shut, steel gray and unremarkable, but a few bear the signs of life within. Some woven beach grass adorning a knob, a broken necklace strung across a doorway, and so on. This place holds not just fearsome soldiers but the refugees of Naercey and who knows where else. After the enactment of the Measures, commanded from my own lips, many Guardsmen and Reds alike fled the mainland. How could they stay, threatened by conscription and execution?
But how did they manage to get away? And how did they make it here?

Another question joins my steadily growing list.

Despite my distraction, I keep careful notice of the twists and turns my brother takes. Right here, one, two, three corners, left by the door with “PRAIRIE” carved into it. Part of me wonders if he’s taking a roundabout route on purpose, but Bree isn’t smart enough for that. I guess I should be thankful. Shade would have no problems playing the trickster, but not Bree. He’s brute strength, a rolling boulder easy to
dodge. He’s a Guardsman too, freed from one army just to join another. And based on how he held me on the docks, he owes his allegiance to the Guard and nothing else. Tramy will probably be the same, always eager to follow, and occasionally guide, our older brother. Only Shade has the good sense to keep his eyes open, to wait and see what fate awaits us
newbloods
.

The door ahead of us stands ajar, as if waiting. Bree doesn’t need to tell me this is our family’s bunk, because there’s a purple scrap of fabric tied around the doorknob. It’s frayed at the edges and clumsily embroidered. Lightning bolts of thread spark across the rag, a symbol that is neither Red nor Silver, but
mine
. A combination of the colors of House Titanos, my mask, and the lightning that surges inside of me, my shield.

As we approach, something wheels behind the door, and a bit of warmth moves through me. I would know the sound of my father’s wheelchair anywhere.

Bree doesn’t knock. He knows everyone’s still awake, waiting for me.

There’s more room than in the mersive, but the bunk is still small and cramped. At least there’s space to move, and plenty of beds for the Barrows, with even a bit of living space around the doorway. A single window, cut high in the far wall, is closed tight against the rain, and the sky seems a bit lighter. Dawn is coming.

Yes it is
, I think, taking in the overwhelming amount of red. Scarves, rags, scraps, flags, banners, red on every surface and hanging from every wall. I should’ve known it would come to this. Gisa sewed dresses for Silvers once; now she painstakingly makes flags for the Scarlet Guard, decorating whatever she can find with the torn sun of resistance. They aren’t pretty, with uneven stitches and simple patterns.
Nothing compared to the art she used to weave. That’s my fault too.

She sits at the little metal table, frozen with a needle in her half-healed claw of a hand. For a moment, she stares, and so do the rest. Mom, Dad, Tramy, staring but not knowing the girl they’re looking at. The last time they saw me, I couldn’t control myself. I was trapped, weak, confused. Now I am injured, nursing bruises and betrayals, but I know what I am, and what I must do.

I have become more, more than we could ever have dreamed. It frightens me.

“Mare.” I can barely hear my mother’s voice. My name trembles on her lips.

Like back in the Stilts, when my sparks threatened to destroy our home, she is the first to embrace me. After a hug that isn’t nearly long enough, she pulls me to an empty chair.

“Sit, baby, sit,” she says, her hands shaking against me.
Baby.
I haven’t been called that in years. Strange that it returns now, when I’m anything but a child.

Her touch ghosts over my new clothes, feeling for the bruises beneath like she can see right through the fabric. “You’re hurt,” she mutters, shaking her head. “I can’t believe they let you walk, after—well, after all that.”

I’m quietly glad she doesn’t mention Naercey, the arena, or before. I don’t think I’m strong enough to relive them, not so soon.

Dad chuckles darkly. “She can do as she pleases. There’s no
let
to it.” He shifts and I notice more gray in his hair than ever. He’s thinner too, looking small in the familiar chair. “Just like Shade.”

Shade is common ground, and easier for me to talk about. “You’ve seen him?” I ask, letting myself relax against the cold metal seat. It feels good to sit.

Tramy gets up from his bunk, his head nearly scraping the ceiling. “I’m going to the infirmary now. Just wanted to make sure you’re—”

Okay
is no longer a word in my vocabulary.

“—still standing.”

I can only nod. If I open my mouth, I might tell them about everything. The hurt, the cold, the prince who betrayed me, the prince who saved me, the people I’ve killed. And while they might already know, I can’t bring myself to admit what I’ve done. To see them disappointed, disgusted,
afraid
of me. That would be more than I can bear tonight.

Bree goes with Tramy, patting me gruffly on the back before following our brother out the door. Kilorn remains, still silent, leaning against the wall as if he wants to fall into it and disappear.

“Are you hungry?” Mom says, busying herself at a tiny excuse for a cabinet. “We saved some dinner rations, if you want.”

Though I haven’t eaten in I don’t even know how long, I shake my head. My exhaustion makes it hard to think of anything but sleep.

Gisa notes my manner, her bright eyes narrowed. She pushes back a piece of rich, red hair the color of our blood. “You should sleep.” She speaks with so much conviction I wonder who the older sister really is. “Let her sleep.”

“Of course, you’re right.” Again, Mom pulls me along, this time out of the chair and toward a bunk with more pillows than the rest. She nannies, fussing with the thin blankets, putting me through the motions. I only have the strength to follow, letting her tuck me in like she never has before. “Here we are, baby, sleep.”

Baby.

I’m safer than I’ve been in days, surrounded by the people I love most, and yet I’ve never wanted to cry more. For them, I hold back. I curl inward and bleed alone, inside, where no one else can see.

It isn’t long before I’m dozing, despite the bright lights overhead and the low murmurs. Kilorn’s deep voice rumbles, speaking again now that I’m out of the equation.

“Watch her” is the last thing I hear before I sink into darkness.

Sometime in the night, somewhere between sleep and waking, Dad takes my hand. Not to wake me up, but just to hold on. For a moment, I think he is a dream, and I’m back in a cell beneath the Bowl of Bones. That the escape, the arena, the executions were all a nightmare I must soon relive. But his hand is warm, gnarled, familiar, and I close my fingers on his. He is real.

“I know what it is to kill someone,” he whispers, his eyes faraway, two pinpricks of light in the blackness of our bunk. His voice is different, just as he is different in this moment. A reflection of a soldier, one who survived too long in the bowels of war. “I know what it does to you.”

I try to speak. I certainly try.

Instead, I let him go, and I drift away.

The tang of salt air wakes me the next morning. Someone opened the window, letting in a cool autumn breeze and bright sunlight. The storm has passed. Before I open my eyes, I try to pretend. This is my cot, the breeze is coming from the river, and my only choice is whether to go to school. But that is not a comfort. That life, though easier, is not one I would return to if I could.

I have things to do. I must see to Julian’s list, to begin preparations for that massive undertaking. And if I request Cal for it, who are they to refuse me? Who could say no in the face of saving so many from Maven’s noose?

Something tells me the blood-eyed man might, but I push it away.

Gisa sprawls in the bunk across from me, using her good hand to pick loose a few threads from a piece of black cloth. She doesn’t bother to watch as I stretch, popping a few bones when I move.

“Good morning,
baby
,” she says, barely hiding a smirk.

She gets a pillow to the face for her trouble. “Don’t start,” I grumble, secretly glad for the teasing. If only Kilorn would do that, and be a little bit of the fisher boy I remember.

“Everyone’s in the mess hall. Breakfast is still on.”

“Where’s the infirmary?” I ask, thinking of Shade and Farley. For the moment, she’s one of the best allies I have here.

“You need to eat, Mare,” Gisa says sharply, finally sitting up. “Really.”

The concern in her eyes stops me short. I must look worse than I thought, for Gisa to treat me so gently. “Then where’s the mess?”