Unsurprisingly I didn’t sleep, and my eyes are itchy and sore. My head aches. It was a long drive. We stopped several times, but I wasn’t let out. Talon is wearing a mask again, so I guess that means Feather has forgiven him, or at least doesn’t want him recognized. I don’t think he slept much either; there are dark purple blotches under both his eyes. He hasn’t spoken to me or even looked at me since I got out of the van. We’re all on edge. Tension crackles in the air like static—a stillness just before something detonates.
Feather reaches into a metal box fastened to the inside wall of the van and pulls out a rifle. She throws it to Scar. “I want you in those trees there. Keep the gun trained on the cops at all times. They’ll have their own snipers, so don’t use it unless absolutely necessary. But if anyone is going to die, I don’t want it to be me.”
The thought of Scar watching, gun primed, is not comforting, but then neither is the thought of the police snipers. They might shoot someone accidentally. Involuntarily my gaze flits to Talon.
Feather takes another gun—a small pistol—from the box and tucks it in her belt. “We didn’t get you one,” she says to Talon. “I know you don’t have much experience with guns. Against your ethics.”
“And you might get confused and shoot one of us,” Scar adds with a leer.
“Right, Princess, listen up.” She gives me instructions in short, sharp sentences. I am to walk through the trees and out into the field beyond. I am not to stop. I am not to look back. I must keep walking, no matter what. When I am halfway across the field, the police will release Marble. We will then pass each other. I am not to talk, look, breathe, blink at him. I am to keep walking straight. “Do not mess this up. Talon and I will be behind you the whole time. Any funny business and we will shoot. Got it?”
Whatever happens today, I’ll never see Talon again. I shouldn’t care—he’s my kidnapper. The man who stole me from my family and kept me locked in darkness and silence and fear. But that is only half the story, and like he said, no one is ever just one thing. It takes a whole lifetime of decisions to make you who you are. As well as Talon the kidnapper, he is Talon the birder, Talon grieving for his dead brother and dad, Talon who was kind to me when no one else was, and . . . and as crazy as it sounds, I like those Talons. I suspect if I spent more time with him, I would like them even more. And now it’s time to say good-bye. But how? Words may be a powerful weapon, but sometimes the words you want don’t exist.
“Let’s get a move on,” Feather snaps. She prods me with the gun, and it’s too late to say anything to Talon, so I begin walking down the path toward the grassy area. I count my steps in my head to keep me focused. Now is not the time to freak out. It’s twenty or so paces to the edge of the field. There is a fence running around it on one side and densely packed trees on the other three. Anyone could be hiding in them.
I’m on my eighteenth step when I hear it: a soft, undulating melody that rises above the sound of our tramping feet.
Talon is whistling. Twiddle-oo twiddle-eedee.
A robin.
Twiddle-oo twiddle-eedee.
I turn my head, and he nods so slightly that it is barely a movement at all. Good-bye, Robyn.
I nod back. Good-bye, Talon.
Sometimes you don’t need any words at all.
• • •
I break through the trees and start walking across the field. We’re on top of a hill, and it’s windy. The sky is dark like it might rain any second. The field is small, not much larger than the Downing Street garden. A big chunk of fence is missing where mud and grass have fallen down the hill in a landslide, leaving a steep bank of earth. This quickly levels out into a hill that rolls down into the smudges and smears of trees below. The rest of the field is pretty much empty. Where is Marble? Where are the police? Despite Feather’s instructions, I have no clue as to how this is going to work.
I’m more than halfway across the field when a figure emerges from the wood in front of me. He is tall with broad shoulders. A dark-gray hood is pulled up over his head so that I can’t see his face, and he is bent over as though in pain. He shuffle-walks like it hurts to move even that tiny amount. Is he sick? Has someone hurt him? Beaten him? I look around for someone else. Surely there’s a police officer here? They wouldn’t have sent him on his own.
I am right next to him when he collapses. His legs just seem to dissolve underneath him, and he hits the ground with a thump. This is the last thing I was expecting, and I don’t know what to do. Feather’s scream shakes me to my senses. She and Talon had been hanging back, but she runs out of the trees now. Marble groans, and I turn back to him.
“Are you okay?” I ask. “What happened?”
As I roll him over, his hood falls back to reveal eyes that are blue-gray, not black like his sister’s. The rest of his face is covered by a mask. After everything I’ve been through, my instinct is to run from masked men.
He catches me easily, pulling me down into the cave of his arms. “It’s all right, Robyn. My name is Commander Tate. My team and I are here to rescue you. You’re safe.” As he draws his gun, I feel anything but.
Feather, realizing that this is not her brother, yells, “Shoot! Shoot!” She and Talon run for the trees.
Tate pushes me facedown on the ground at the same time as a black van tears out of the trees and pulls up next to us. A noise like a firework explodes right by my head. Everything is lost in the intense white sound. It is like being at the bottom of a swimming pool. I can see shapes and hear vague noises, but it’s all very far away, and then there’s a louder rushing noise and I’m spat back out again.
I have heard that sound before. The world has bleached out behind my eyes like the luminous white of newly fallen snow.
My father’s blood is a dark stain on the white-laced courtyard. . . . In the distance, the sirens scream, but they are too far away. Already Dad is losing consciousness, his eyes rolling back to milky white, his mouth drooping as the blood spills out. . . .
But it is not my dad’s blood this time.
Something wet is dripping down my neck. My fingers come away red and sticky. Tate lets go of me as he clasps his arm to try and stem the blood pouring from it. Figures in black uniforms, their faces covered, pour out of the van. One drops to his knees beside Tate and, after snapping open a first-aid box, begins efficiently bandaging his arm. Another one comes for me. “Robyn, hello. How are you doing?”
“I’ve . . . I’ve been better,” I say.
The woman pulls her mask up over her face. She smiles. “We’re going to get you out of here, okay? Are you hurt?”
I shake my head and she helps me up, one hand under my arm.
The van has blocked my view of the rest of the field, but I can hear that it is chaos out there. Shouts of “Hands up” and “Drop your weapon!” are interspersed with Feather screaming for her brother, followed by more gunshots.
“Who is shooting?” I ask, panicked. “I can’t see! What’s going on?”
“You don’t need to worry about that. Hop inside the van for me and let’s get you out of here.”
“No. You don’t understand. Talon—the boy with the green eyes—he isn’t like the rest of them. He was kind to me. I have to know if he’s all right.”
“You shouldn’t concern yourself with that.” After forcing me down into the front row of seats, she climbs in after me. “Simon,” she calls to the driver, “we’re ready.”
“You’re not listening—”
I’m cut off by the sound of more gunshots and then Talon crying out. This time I move too quickly for her to hold me back. I’m already out of the van and dashing around it before she can even shout. Talon is standing at the edge of the field, right by the landslide. Feather is lying crumpled at his feet. Two officers walk free of the trees behind them with a handcuffed Scar. A third special-ops guy appears a second later. He is loweri
ng a gun. I run across the field, my only thought to get myself between Talon and that gun. Before I can reach him, Talon crouches down. When he stands again, he has Feather’s pistol in his hands. What the hell is he doing? The trees will be full of snipers. He should put his hands up. He should surrender.
“Put the gun down, sir,” one of the officers says.
I’m close enough now to see that Talon is holding the gun with both hands. They are shaking. His mask and T-shirt are splattered with blood. I say his name and he turns toward the sound of my voice, but his eyes are misty with fear and shock. It almost breaks my heart. One more step, and I am able to clutch his hand, drawing him close to me. “It’s okay,” I say. “It’s all right.”
“They—they shot her.”
“Yes, but they’re not going to shoot you.”
“Miss Knollys-Green?” The officer with the gun is very close to us now. Another officer is close behind him, while the third walks Scar back across the field. I’m guessing there must be another van waiting among the trees for any surviving kidnappers.
Surviving kidnappers.
My fingers squeeze Talon’s.
“Miss Knollys-Green,” the officer says again. “I’m Nigel Thomas. We are here to help you.” He is a large man, well over six feet and really muscular, made even more so by his combat gear. Unlike the woman and Tate, he has some sort of glasses over his eyes as well as a mask. He looks like a giant insect or a robot. Not human at all, and not like the kind of man who would understand that not all kidnappers are the same. “It’s over, sir,” he says to Talon. “One of your gang is injured. The other is in our custody. We have you surrounded. I need you to drop the gun and let Miss Knollys-Green go.”
Can’t this man see that it’s me holding on to him? The gun jerks about in Talon’s hand because he is shaking so much.
“He isn’t like the others,” I say. “He just wanted to help his brother and his friend. You have to promise that you’ll listen to him. You won’t hurt him.” Talon is murmuring incoherently about being fine and that I should just go. I ignore him.
“You have my word that he will be treated fairly. As will the others.”
But Talon is not like the others.
I don’t want to hand Talon over to these men who don’t know him like I do. It’s so unfair. The police cheated. None of this would have happened if they’d brought Marble like they’d promised. Why would Dad do this? Why gamble with my life like this?
Not everyone likes the methods I use to run the country.
Your dad may have to make choices . . . difficult ones . . . that we may not agree with or understand. He may not always be able to explain them to us.
Even though I may come first in Dad’s heart, I don’t always come first in his head. And it is his head that rules Great Britain. I will not send Talon into that world.
For better or worse, we are the choices we make.
Other people’s choices have brought us here just as much as Talon’s. Feather’s. Marble’s. Even my dad’s.
What can I do, though? I can’t fight the police. How can I protect Talon?
Talon and I are pressed up against the edge of the field, right by the gap in the fence I noticed earlier. Below us is the steep drop of the landslide. My father’s men stand in front of us with their guns and their masks and their lies. And behind us the land falls away into nothing. Right now, I will happily take nothingness over more death and more lies.
We are the choices we make.
I make mine.
After easing my fingers from Talon’s, reassuring him all the time that I’m not going anywhere, it’s very easy to press both palms against his chest and push. His eyes widen, and I will him to understand that I’m trying to help him. His arms windmill, and then he is falling. The gun is knocked out of his hand as he hits the ground, and it thankfully bounces away harmlessly.
It isn’t a conscious decision that makes me fling myself after him. Instinct takes over, and the next thing I know, my body is hitting the compacted mud and the special-ops men are shouting for me to stop.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Falling is rather like flying, except that instead of dropping away below you, the earth hurtles up to smack you in the face again and again. As my head hits a fallen branch, I wonder why I didn’t just run. I hadn’t had much time to think, and throwing myself down a steep hill seemed the last thing the police would expect me to do and so it would give me the best advantage to get away. Also I’d pushed Talon, so he’d had no choice but rolling; it felt right that I went down the hill the same way. The landslide is steep but short, and after only a couple of turns—legs over head over heels over arms over elbows—I’m at the bottom of it. All my body parts are mixed up, and each one is thundering with pain, and it takes a vital half second before I can stand up. By then, a police officer is already beginning the descent.
“What did you do?” Talon asks, picking himself up and looking at me like I’ve done something amazing.
There’s no time to answer. Instead I grab his arm and tug him into a run. The rest of the hill is less acute, until it flattens out completely and disappears into a bank of trees. “Come on!” I shout, dragging him into the wood.
He is slow at first, but his pace quickens and his eyes have lost their dazed look. I hope that means he didn’t bang his head. My own head is oddly empty, like my brain has been shaken out of it.
“You helped me escape,” he puffs.
“Just keep running,” I say. “They are right behind us.”
“Are you sure you want to do this?”
For some reason, the sight of Addy playing on the stairs of Number 10 comes into my mind. It is replaced by the memory of Talon’s trembling hand clutching mine. Right now my sister doesn’t need me; Talon does. “I’m sure.”
And just like that, I go on the run from the British police.
We slam down a makeshift path through the trees. We need to get as far away from the police as we can, and then we need to find somewhere to hide so we can work out what to do next. What the hell are we going to do? I did not think this through. No time for doubt now. “Faster,” I say through gritted teeth, storming ahead and forcing Talon to move more quickly to keep up.
It starts to rain. Thin spats at first, and then full-on sheets that soak our clothes instantly and make our hair slick to our heads. Water drips into my eyes, and my feet slide in the mud. The sweat dripping down my back turns icy, and I have a cramp that feels like a knife is sticking right under my ribs. I know the police must be following us, but every time I glance back, I see only rain and leaves. Gray day is turning into gray evening.
There’s the sound of snapping undergrowth nearby and I jump, swiveling around in time to see a pebble bounce off the bark of a tree. A blackbird takes off with a hoot and a flap of wings.
“Do you hear that?” Talon whispers.
“It’s just a bird.”
He shakes his head. At first there is only the sound of the rain hitting the trees, and then I hear it: Something large moves through the undergrowth nearby. There is a squelch of mud followed by a swish of wet leaves. It is getting closer. Talon tugs me down so that we are crouching in the mud behind a bush. We stare out into the gathering darkness.
Squelch swish, squelch squelch—
Talon puts a hand on the small of my back to push me farther down into the undergrowth, just as a police officer, dressed all in black, including a face mask, comes into view. His eyes scan the wood, and my heart thuds in my throat. There are shouts nearby, and a dog barks. The man passes close to our hiding place. Fear turns my stomach over. What am I doing? Where are we going? Do I really think I can outrun the British police, and what for? For a moment I want this to be over, but then I remember: I’m not doing this for me; I’m doing it to protect Talon. I force myself to keep still. Talon’s hand is steady on my back, and I focus
on the way his fingers press against the angles of my spine.
Finally the police officer moves away. As he disappears through the trees, Talon and I slowly stand and then run in the opposite direction. The undergrowth is thick, and we keep stumbling over rotten stumps and twisted roots. We’re not going fast enough. There are sounds on either side of us, and every now and then I swear I catch a glimpse of a black uniform between the trees. Talon seizes my hand, steering me away from a low-hanging branch that would have knocked me out otherwise. I have to keep focused. I can’t afford to let the terror take me over.
“Okay?” Talon asks.
I am about as far from okay as it is possible to be, but I nod. “We need to find somewhere to hide. They’ll catch us if we keep running like this.”
The trees are dense here, but the undergrowth is low and mostly brambles and nettles. I don’t like our chances of hiding among it. We jog on a bit farther. I’m exhausted; this is more running than I’ve ever done, and the fear is weighing me down too. What will they do when they find us? Handcuff us? Shoot us? Logic tells me they won’t shoot the PM’s daughter, but my brain is sliding beyond rational thinking now.
Finally I spot somewhere that we could rest awhile. A large bush that looks a bit less prickly than the others. It’s surrounded by stinging nettles, but there’s no other choice. We pick our way through them as carefully as we can, and then Talon snaps a few branches to create a path for us to crawl through. By some miracle the shrub is wider than it looked at first. There’s an open area in the middle of it, laced over with branches and bracken. It’s long enough for us to lie down in. We both collapse on our backs, chests heaving. Thanks to the canopy of leaves, the ground is relatively dry and we’re protected from the rain.
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