Winter (74 page)

Click. Click.

Scarlet reached for her back pocket.

Empty.

She cursed. Shoving the gun into her waistband, she spun around, searching the ground for another weapon. Having been so focused on targeting her enemies, she was surprised to find herself in a sea of bodies and blood.

A drop of sweat slid down her temple.

How many had they lost? It seemed like the fighting had just started. How were there so many already dead? Dismay filled her lungs.

This was a battlefield. A massacre. And she was caught in the middle of it.

She released a shaky breath, wishing she could release her terror along with it. Her grand-mère’s voice had disappeared as soon as she’d put away the gun. Now there was only the sound of killing. Screams and war cries. The stench of blood.

Spotting an axe, she bent to pick it up, and didn’t realize until she found resistance that the blade was buried in a body. Grimacing, she shut her eyes, gritted her teeth, and pulled it free. She didn’t check to see who the body belonged to.

She was exhausted in every way, exhausted halfway to delirium. Her attention fell on a middle-aged woman who at first glance reminded her of Maha, but older. The woman was trembling from shock and her arm was cut and torn—by teeth, Scarlet guessed—and she was using her good hand to drag an injured man to safety.

Scarlet stumbled forward, gripping the axe handle. She should help her.

She went to drop the axe, but then her fingers twitched, which was her first warning. Eyes widening, she looked down at her hand. Her knuckles whitened on the axe handle, gripping it tighter. A shudder ripped through her body.

Someone else had control of her hands.

But they hadn’t thought to take her tongue, at least.

“Get away from me!” she screamed, to no one in particular. To anyone close enough to hear. “
Run!
”

The woman paused and looked up. There wasn’t enough time. Scarlet’s disjointed legs stumbled toward her and she took the axe in both hands and raised it overhead, her muscles flexing under its weight. “
Run!
” she yelled again, panic clawing at her throat, her mind overcome with the horrible reality of being under a thaumaturge’s control.

Comprehension filled the woman’s face and she scrambled backward. She turned to run, but tripped.

Scarlet screamed in anguish. The woman threw her hands up to protect herself. Scarlet slammed her eyes shut, pushing out tears she hadn’t known were there, and her arms swung the axe toward the woman’s stomach.

The axe came to a jarring stop, halting mid-swing.

Gasping around her own heartbeat, Scarlet dared to look up.

A form, massive and dark and covered in blood, towered over her. Scarlet whimpered. In relief, in gratitude, in a thousand feelings that didn’t come with words. “
Wolf.
”

His eyes were as vibrant green as ever, despite being more sunken than before—a result of his protruding nose and jaw.

Scarlet’s arm tried to pull the axe away, but he tore it from her grip.

Her mindless fingers changed tactics, scrabbling for a weakness, though there weren’t many. Her thumbs dove for his eye sockets.

Wolf caught her easily, still gripping the axe while his arms came around to smother Scarlet, pinning her arms to her sides. She screamed with frustration, and she wasn’t sure if it was her own frustration or that of a thaumaturge screaming through her. Her legs jostled and kicked and stamped, her body writhing against Wolf’s iron grip. He was immovable and merciless, bending his body around her like a cocoon.

The thaumaturge gave up, moving on to control an easier victim. Scarlet felt the release like a rubber band snapping inside her limbs. She shivered, melting into Wolf’s embrace with a sob.

“Oh stars, oh stars,” she cried, burying her face in his chest. “I almost—I would have—”

“You didn’t.”

His voice a little rougher, but still his.

Planting her hands on his chest, Scarlet pushed herself away and peered up at him. Her breaths were still rattling inside her lungs, the sounds of battle were still echoing in her ears, but she hadn’t felt less afraid in days. She reached up, hesitant at first, and brushed her fingers over the prominent new cheekbones, along the unfamiliar ridge of his brow. Wolf grimaced. It was the same face he’d made when she’d first discovered his fangs.

She found the scar on his left eyebrow, and the scar on his mouth, and they were right where she remembered them on the night she’d kissed him aboard the train heading to Paris.

“It is still you, isn’t it? They haven’t … changed you?”

She saw his jaw working. “Yes,” he choked. Then, “I don’t know. I think so.” His face crumpled, as if he might start crying, but he didn’t. “
Scarlet.
I am so sick of the taste of blood.”

She dragged the pad of her thumb along his lower lip, until it collided with one of the sharp canine teeth. “That’s good,” she said. “We don’t serve a whole lot of blood on the farm, so we were going to have to work on your diet, anyway.” Noting a smear of dried blood on his cheek, she tried to scrub it away, but quickly gave up. “Have you seen Cinder? We should find—”

“Scarlet.” His voice trembled with desperation and fear. “They did change me. I’m dangerous now. I’m—”

“Oh, please. We don’t have time for this.” Digging her hands into his hair—the same soft, wild, unkempt hair—she pulled him toward her. She wasn’t quite sure what a kiss would be like, and it was different and awkward in that hasty stolen moment, but she was confident they could perfect it later. “You have
always
been dangerous. But you’re my alpha and I’m yours and that’s not going to change because they gave you a new jawline. Now come on. We should—”

Behind Wolf, a soldier let out a cry of pain and crumpled to the ground, bleeding from a dozen different wounds. Wolf pulled Scarlet back, shielding her. There was blood coating his side, and she remembered that Iko had shot him, but he hardly seemed to notice the wound.

She looked again, scouring the weapons, the limbs, the bodies.

Less chaos than before. The battle was beginning to dwindle.

There were not so many people left to fight and still she could see the thaumaturges gathered in the distance. Some had fallen, certainly, but their numbers were holding. It was too easy for them to take control of the civilians, and with the wolf soldiers keeping one another occupied …

Was it possible they were losing?

A controlled civilian came running at her, a spear held over his head. Wolf swiped him away and snapped the spear in half before Scarlet could react. Turning, he growled, and yanked Scarlet to one side moments before a knife slashed through the empty air. With a single throw of Wolf’s fist, the unsuspecting man fell unconscious. Though he was still holding the axe, Wolf didn’t raise it. After all, these were their allies, even if they had become weapons for the enemy.

The more that fell, the easier it would be for the thaumaturges to take control …

“Stay down!” Wolf yelled, pushing Scarlet to the ground and hunkering over her body. A living shield. His instinct was still there, at least. The desire to protect her above all else.

That was all the confirmation she needed.

Feeling more safe than she should have, Scarlet stayed low and scanned the chaos for any sign of Cinder or Iko or Alpha Strom or—

She spotted a wolf soldier, one she didn’t recognize, about ready to launch himself at them. “Wolf!”

Wolf snarled, baring his teeth.

The soldier hesitated. He sniffed once at the air, looking from Wolf to Scarlet and back again. Then he turned and rushed off to find some other victim.

Wetting her chapped lips, Scarlet placed a hand on Wolf’s elbow. “Are we losing?” she said, trying to count, but it was impossible to tell how many of the wolf soldiers were theirs and how many Levana’s. She did know the civilians were falling faster and faster as the scales tipped in the thaumaturges’ favor.

“Not for long,” said Wolf.

She craned her head up. His eyes were still flashing dangerously, scanning for immediate threats. “What do you mean?”

His nose twitched. “Princess Winter is close, and … she’s brought reinforcements.”

Eighty-Five

“We’re almost there,” said Iko, as she and Cinder crept down the main corridor of the palace. They could still hear the sounds of the battle raging in the distance, but the palace was quiet in comparison. There had been no sign of Levana since they’d entered and Iko almost expected the crazed queen to jump out from behind a corner and try to stab them with her pointy-heeled shoes.

Seeing Levana on the palace steps was the first time Iko had ever seen the Lunar queen, and her scarred face made Iko wish she wasn’t immune to glamours. After years of hearing about the queen’s famous beauty, the truth had been something of a letdown.

But the truth was out. Thanks to Cinder’s video, now everyone knew what lurked beneath the illusion. Hopefully they would be able to find the queen while she was still shaken from it.

Cinder’s grip tightened on her bloody knife. “Two guards up ahead.”

They rounded a corner, and she was right—two guards stood in front of a set of ornate doors, huge guns already trained on them.

Iko froze and raised her good hand in a show of innocence. She tried to smile sweetly, but with her missing ear and a twitching cheek muscle, she was not performing at the height of her abilities.

Then recognition sparked through her processor. “
You!
” she screamed. “He’s … that’s the guy that saved Winter.”

Though the guard was immobile, probably thanks to Cinder, his face was free to twist with disgust as his eyes traveled the length of Iko’s battered body, dead wires, loose parts, and all.

“And you’re that disturbing robot.”

Iko bristled. “The correct term is
escort-droid,
you ignorant, inconsiderate—”

“Iko.”

She clamped her mouth shut, though her synapses were still firing.

Cinder cocked her head to the side. “So you’re the one who killed Levana’s captain of the guard?”

“I did,” he said.

The second guard snarled, casting his glare between his companion and Cinder. “
Traitor.
”

A low, humorless laugh echoed through the first guard’s throat—Kinney, Iko remembered. “You’re wasting your energy controlling me. I have no intention of shooting you.”

“Fine,” Cinder drawled, though Iko could tell she didn’t fully trust him. “So long as you don’t try to harm us, I have no reason to manipulate you.” It wasn’t a real concession. If he tried anything, Iko knew Cinder could stop him.

The muscles in Kinney’s arms relaxed. “So you’re the cyborg that’s been causing so much trouble.”

“Wow,” Iko mused. “He’s pretty
and
smart.”

His wrinkling nose made her wonder if she was starting to overdo it on the sarcasm, but her smarting ego made her irate. She’d gotten used to people looking at her like she was human. Not only human, but
beautiful.
But now she was stuck with a flopping arm and shredded skin tissue and a missing ear, and all this guard saw was a broken machine.

Not that his opinion mattered. He was clearly a jerk.

Except for the whole saving-Winter’s-life thing, which was probably a fluke.

“Is Levana in there?” Cinder asked, gesturing to the barred doors.

“No, just the coronation guests. Our orders were to contain them until either the queen or a thaumaturge retrieves them—I suspect she’s preparing to slaughter all the Earthens if you don’t surrender.”

“Sounds like her,” said Cinder, “but I doubt she has the strength to glamour so many people at once right now. Otherwise, I think she would have come straight here.”

Kinney frowned, speculative. He wouldn’t have seen the video. He didn’t know that the truth beneath Levana’s glamour had been revealed.

“Where else would she go?” asked Cinder. “If she was trying to lure me somewhere, somewhere she feels safe and powerful.”

He shrugged. “The throne room, I guess.”

Cinder’s jaw flexed. “That’s where the feast was the other night? With the balcony over the lake?”

Kinney had started to nod when the second guard reeled his head back and spat. Literally
spat
on this gorgeous tile floor.

“Oh!” Iko cried. “You heathen!”

“When she catches you,” the guard snarled, “my queen will eat your heart with salt and pepper.”

“Well,” said Cinder, unconcerned, “my heart is half synthetic, so it’ll probably give her indigestion.”

Kinney looked almost amused. “We guards tend to be treated well here. You’ll find that a lot of us will stay loyal to Her Ma—to Levana.” The queen’s given name was awkward and Iko wondered if he’d ever said it before.

“Why aren’t you?” Cinder asked.

“Something tells me I’m going to like your offer more.” His gaze slipped toward Iko. “Even if you do keep strange company.”

She huffed.

Stepping forward, Cinder disarmed the second guard, taking his handgun for herself. “Maybe when this is over I can convince them that I intend to treat you pretty well too.”

Cinder turned, and Iko could make out the conflict warring across her facial muscles. “Stay with Kai. In case she does send a thaumaturge after them, I want someone there who can’t be controlled. And try to get him and any Earthens away from here.” She inhaled sharply. “I’m going after Levana.”

“No, wait,” said Iko. “I should come with you.”

Ignoring her, Cinder jutted a finger toward Kinney. “If you’re loyal to me, then you’ll be loyal to the Earthen emperor. Protect him with your life.”

The guard hesitated, but then brought a fist to his heart.

Her new gun in one hand and her knife in the other, Cinder turned and started running back the direction they’d come from.

“Cinder, wait!” Iko yelled.

“Stay with Kai!”

“But …
be careful!
”

When Cinder turned the corner, Iko swiveled back to the two guards, just as the second guard realized he had control of his body again. Gaze darkening, he lifted the gun, aiming for Iko.