The Last Princess (13 page)

I SAT UP WITH A START, GASPING FOR BREATH. THE NIGHTMARE
was already gone, but fragments lingered, swirling in the dark corners of my mind. Mary and Jamie trapped in a steel cell as men in white coats came to torture them. Me, running madly through a maze, hearing their voices but unable to find them.

It was the middle of the night, and Wesley was still asleep beside me. His head lay on
the pillow we shared, his wavy hair falling across his forehead, glowing like fine silver in the moonlight. I leaned forward to kiss his cheek. “Good-bye,” I whispered. I felt the sting of sudden tears as I moved away from the bed, desperately hoping he
wouldn’t wake up, that I would be free to remember him like this.

A few embers still glowed in the fire. I fumbled around in the dark for the
candle and lit it on a dying cinder. By the light of the candle, I hurriedly laced up my boots and buttoned the coat of my uniform. The gun was on the round table where I had left it. I tucked it into my pocket.

I looked back through the bedroom door one last time. I was putting Wesley in danger, leaving him here without a horse. But he had his gun to protect him, and he knew these woods well.
By the time he woke it would be sunrise and safe enough to walk back to camp. I forced myself to look away and open the front door.

The morning air felt damp and cool. Before I left, I kissed the wall by the door. It was a superstition I had inherited from my grandmother: She always said that if you kissed a door before you left it would ensure a safe return. I hoped, despite all odds, that I
could come back here someday with Wesley.

I looked out into the dark, cold night, hoping for at least one star to get my bearings, but there was nothing. Caligula slept standing, a dark shadow against the darker sky, still tethered to the post. I looked fearfully at her huge frame and pulled a handful of wild grass out of the ground.

“Caligula, here, girl,” I murmured, holding out the grass
and reaching to stroke her nose. At the touch of my hand she reared up, kicking out at me, snorting and baring her teeth. I jumped aside. The chain on her neck rattled as she pulled at it wildly, trying to free herself.

I took a deep breath. I’d been riding horses since I could walk, but I’d never seen a horse like this, raised for destruction. “Shhh,” I whispered as I reached out for the reins,
pulling them down firmly to look her in the eye.

She paused, and for a moment I thought I’d connected with her. But then she yanked the reins up so quickly that they slipped through my hands, the leather pulling on my bandages and reopening my wounds.

I stared into her dark eyes. Wesley had managed to control her using sheer force, but I lacked the strength. I made low, soothing noises as I
reached up and gently slid the halter out from under her ears. She spit out the bit and looked at me with an almost curious expression. “It’s just you and me now, Caligula,” I murmured. “Can you help me get to London?”

She stood utterly still, blinking at me as I climbed onto her back using the post as a mounting block. Without the reins, I laced my fingers tightly in her mane. I hoped my weight
would be enough to direct her. The moment she felt
me on her back she took off running, throwing me backward on the saddle.

We hadn’t been riding for long when what was left of the sun rose in the east, silhouetting the bare branches of the trees against a brighter patch of gray in the thick darkness. That was all I needed for now. Straightening myself in the saddle, I nudged the warhorse slightly
with my left leg, moving her to the right, toward the sliver of gray against the horizon.

Some time later, we trotted up to the edge of a motorway. I pulled Caligula to a stop, squinting into the distance to read the faded, graffitied signs. The gray concrete slab of highway was buckled and broken, the yellow traffic lines faded. This was the motorway to London, but riding on such an open road
was not safe. Hollister’s forces patrolled the interstate, capturing any lone travelers or refugees from the raided towns.

I tried not to look at the cars scattered across the highway, at the rotting skeletons that sat in the drivers’ seats, the smaller bodies of children curled up in the backseats. These people had been driving when the Seventeen Days hit. They had never had a chance.

A rumbling
sound came from down the road. I swiftly
slid off Caligula and led her back into the trees, peering out to see what was coming. In the distance, far down the long stretch of highway, a cloud of riders on horseback appeared. Caligula neighed softly, picking up on my fear, and I stroked her coat, shushing her under my breath. There were hundreds of them. The army was a blur of gray on warhorses,
the stock horses and diesel trucks behind them. Armed guards sat on top of the trucks, sevils and guns aimed in all directions. As the trucks passed, I heard the horrific screaming of the prisoners inside, banging against the vehicles’ metal sides, trying to escape the fate that awaited them in the Death Camps.

When they had passed and the road was empty again, I rested my head for a moment against
Caligula’s neck, breathing in the warm horsey scent of her. Wesley had rescued me from the Death Camps—I owed him my life. Glimpses of our night together flashed through my mind: the feel of his lips, the warmth of his arms around me, the low sound of his voice. Somehow, the memories already felt far away, but they gave me the strength I needed. They gave me the hope that love still existed
in this dark world, that it would exist even after I was gone.

I touched the gun tucked into my belt, checking to make sure it was still secure. The woods were safer than the road;
the best plan would be to ride along the edge near the thinning trees, following the direction of the highway. I let Caligula graze for a moment more, then climbed up onto her back. “To London!” I said. Her ears flicked
back for a moment, almost as though she understood me, and then she took off.

Clouds of soot and ash hung like a veil over the city. A thick swarm of pigeons flew overhead. I rode through district NW30, Caligula’s hoofbeats echoing hollowly on the deserted streets. From the silence and dark windows, I knew this district had already been invaded by Hollister’s army; its people must have been captured
and their homes plundered. I stuck to the shadows as we moved past rows and rows of burned-out houses.

Tacked to a boarded-up storefront was a poster of a young brown-haired girl. She sat in a sailor’s dress, her hands neatly folded in her lap, her silky hair falling below her shoulders. She had pale skin and rosy cheeks.

WANTED ALIVE

ELIZA WINDSOR

NAME YOUR REWARD

I moved closer to the
poster, staring into the girl’s bright, hopeful eyes. This picture had been taken a few years ago, in a private sitting for my father; we hadn’t distributed royal portraits since my mother’s death. My father thought that keeping our faces out of the public eye would keep us safe; and there hadn’t been much money for mass printing photographs anyway. I studied the poster. This happy, sheltered person
looked nothing like me. They were looking for a girl who no longer existed.

“Help! Somebody, please help!” A woman’s high-pitched screams came from a park nearby. I hesitated, wanting to intervene, but desperate to get to the Tower. “Please, no!” she cried, and then, more shrilly, “Help!”

I kicked Caligula, urging her forward and drawing my gun as we approached. I had to at least try.

As I
neared, the screaming stopped. A cold, empty silence filled the air. I pulled back on Caligula, reluctant to enter the park. The thought of what could have happened to the woman sickened me. I could have helped her, but I was too late.

Even during the Seventeen Days, London had emergency aid crews to help those in need. Now everything—police, firemen, hospitals—was gone.

I rode on into the night.
Finally, the grim turrets of the Tower of London appeared against the skyline. Rising above them all, like a knife slicing open the horizon, stood the Steel Tower. The windowless prison of steel was once protected by an electrical current strong enough to kill anyone on contact. But the current, like every other system that provided order, was gone. As I rode closer I saw a line of Hollister’s
soldiers guarding the Tower, standing around the moat, sevils at their sides. Somewhere inside was Cornelius Hollister.

We reached the moat surrounding the Tower, and I left Caligula in the dark shelter of an underpass. I had no way to tether her, but I took off her saddle and rubbed her down quickly with a bit of saddlecloth. My nose wrinkled as I caught the brackish stench of the moat’s stagnant
water. I pulled a few weeds for her and left them in a pile. “Please stay, Caligula,” I said. “I need you.” I looked into her eyes, willing her not to leave. They were big and brown now, no longer red with rage.

I took a deep breath and pulled the army hat low on my forehead so that my eyes were in shadow. I straightened my uniform, tightening the belt, buttoning the jacket, double-knotting the
shoelaces on my boots. I stared down at my reflection in the river water. The burn below my eye shone
red and throbbing in the dim light. I ran my fingers along the wall, gathering black soot on my fingertips, rubbing it around the scar, wincing at the pain. Now it looked dirty, dark. More like a bruise.

Now I looked like one of them.

20

DARK CLOUDS OF SOOT SWEPT ACROSS THE CITY SKY, THE DAY
- light turning to dusk. The sound of a crank wheel echoed from behind the Tower wall. The drawbridge was being lowered and the guards were changing positions, right on schedule. I crouched down, preparing to run, stretching my aching muscles with a bitter smile.

I had spent the day staking out the Tower and now knew every inch of the
grounds, the moat, the wall around it. I had memorized the drawbridge schedule. If I ran quickly I could reach the soldiers about to march inside, joining them and making my way unnoticed to the kitchens. From there, I would follow Hollister’s dinner to his chambers. His location
might be a secret, even to his followers, but my rumbling stomach reminded me that everyone had to eat.

I took off
at a sprint toward the Tower wall, keeping low to the ground and trusting to the gathering dark to hide my movements. I paused for a moment in the shadow of the wall to catch my breath and wipe the sweat off my forehead. Two lines of guards were marching steadily toward the drawbridge. As the last soldier passed, I fell in line behind him, keeping my head low, the rhythm of my feet matching his.

I shivered as we crossed the drawbridge into the Tower. I had always been so afraid of this place, ever since we had come to visit when I was a little girl. The chopping block, the marks in the stone from where the axe had fallen over and over, the bloodstains that still remained after hundreds of years of rain. I thought of the torture chambers where innocent prisoners had suffered—were still
suffering. I wondered if they screamed, unheard and unanswered, like the woman in the park. I knew her cries would haunt my nightmares.

Once inside, finding the kitchens was easy. I followed the smell of food and the line of hungry soldiers. Keeping my eyes downcast, I stepped to the back of the line, shuffling
forward into a stone entryway. I felt for the gun hidden inside my jacket. In the
darkened hallways of the Steel Tower a bell chimed, and a voice rang out from upstairs: “Prisoner feeding time.”

The line of soldiers made their way down into a dank dungeon kitchen. Iron pots bubbled over the flames. At the chopping block, a line of cooks severed the heads and tails of rats and mice, sewer snakes and frogs, skinning them and tossing the carcasses into the pots. A cage sat on
the floor beside the fire, filled with rats that ran from side to side in a frantic effort to escape their fate.

I glanced across to the other end of the kitchen where a feast was being prepared. Large platters of fruits and cheeses, freshly baked breads, and a tower of chocolate truffles sat on shining silver trays. Bottles of champagne cooled in buckets of ice. I had no idea foods like this
even existed anymore. I felt almost dizzy. All I’d eaten today was a handful of weeds and half a stale biscuit I’d found in my jacket pocket. Was all of this for Hollister? I thought of what he had said to me before he killed my father.
Because England is starving, and you are having a ball.
Seeing this feast, I hated him more than ever.

“Stop staring, it’ll only make your mouth water,” the girl
next to me said.

I nodded and looked straight ahead, where an old woman with white hair and bushy white eyebrows stirred the pots with an enormous ladle. “Fill up the bowls! Feeding time for cells one through nine!” she yelled. I nearly gagged as I watched her unlatch the top of the rat cage, lowering her twig-thin arm inside. Quick as pulling an apple from a tree, she plucked out a squirming
rat by its tail and tossed it into a bubbling pot, fur and all.

Keeping in step with the soldiers in front of me, I copied their every move, picking up a tray, filling a glass with gray water and a bowl with one ladleful of the rat-and-insect stew. I kept my face expressionless, hard, averting my eyes from the rat foot and mouse head in the bowl on my tray. The soldiers made a line up the stairs.
I gripped the tray in my hands, walking shakily behind the girl in front of me.

She paused, glancing to her right and left, looking for a chance to gossip. She put her lips close to my ear. Her breath was sour. “If you want some of the good stuff, talk to me later,” she declared self-importantly. “I could help you get some—for a price.” She smiled, showing her yellowed teeth.

My eyes darted
to the tray in front of her. She wasn’t carrying a bowl of stew like the rest of us. Instead, her tray held
a pretty pink teacup containing a mix of herbs: rosebuds, lavender, anise, and something else, a yellow flower I couldn’t identify.

“That tea smells nice,” I said quietly, wondering why her tray was different. Was she the one tasked with serving Hollister?