King's Cage

by Victoria Aveyard

  Moving quickly, I take what I can off the bodies. A pistol and ammunition from an officer. A red scarf from the woman. She died for me. Another time, Mare, I chide myself, pushing aside the quicksand of such thoughts. Using my teeth, I tie the scarf to my wrist.

  Bullets ping against the windows, a spray of them. I flinch, dropping to the floor, but the windows hold firm. Diamondglass. Bulletproof. I’m safe behind them, but also trapped.

  Never again.

  I slide up against the wall, trying not to be seen as I observe. The sight makes me gasp.

  What was once a wedding celebration is now all-out war. I was in awe of the house rebellion, Iral and Haven and Laris against the rest of Maven’s court, but this dwarfs it substantially. Hundreds of Nortan officers, Lakelander guards, deadly nobles of the court on one side, with Scarlet Guard soldiers on the other. There have to be newbloods among them. So many Red soldiers, more than I ever thought possible. They outnumber the Silvers at least five to one, and they are certainly, clearly soldiers. Trained to military precision, from their tactical gear to the way they move. I start to wonder how they even got here, but then I see the airships. Six of them, all landed directly on the Square itself. Each one spits soldiers, dozens of them. Hope and excitement roar through me.

  “Hell of a rescue,” I can’t help but whisper.

  And I’m going to make sure it succeeds.

  I’m not Silver; I don’t need to pull my ability from my surroundings. But it certainly doesn’t hurt to have more electricity, more power, on hand. Closing my eyes, just for a second, I call to every wire, every pulse, every charge, down to the static cling of the curtains. It rises at my demand. It fuels me, heals me as much as Wren.

  After six months of darkness, I finally feel the light.

  Purple-white flares at the edges of my vision. My entire body buzzes, skin shivering beneath the delight of lightning. I keep sprinting. Adrenaline and electricity. I feel like I could run through a wall.

  More than a dozen Security officers guard the entrance hall. One, a magnetron, busies himself boarding up the windows with cages of twisted chandelier and gilt paneling. Bodies and blood in both colors cover the floor. The smell of gunpowder overwhelms everything but the blasts outside. The officers secure the palace, maintaining their position. Their attention is on the battle outside, the Square. Not their backs.

  Crouching, I put my hands to the marble beneath my feet. It feels cold beneath my fingers. I will my lightning against the stone, sending it out along the floor in a jagged ripple of electricity. It pulses, a wave, catching them all off guard. Some fall, some rocket backward. The strength of the blast echoes in my chest. If it’s enough to kill, I don’t know.

  My only thought is the Square. When the open air hits my lungs, I almost laugh. It’s poisoned with ash, blood, the electric buzz of the lightning storm, but it tastes sweeter than anything. Above me, the black clouds rumble. The sound lives in my bones.

  I streak purple-white bolts across the sky. A sign. The lightning girl is free.

  I don’t linger. Standing on the steps, overlooking the turmoil, is a good way to get shot in the head. I plunge into the fray, looking for a single familiar face. Not friendly, but at least familiar. People collide all around me with no rhyme or reason. The Silvers were taken unawares, unable to form up into their practiced ranks. Only the Scarlet Guard soldiers have any kind of organization, but it’s rapidly breaking down. I weave toward the Treasury, the last place I saw Maven and his Sentinel. It was only a few minutes ago. They could still be there, surrounded, making a stand. I will kill him. I have to.

  Bullets whistle past my head. I’m shorter than most, but still, I hunch as I run.

  The first Silver to challenge me head-on has Provos robes, gold and black. A thin man with thinner hair. He throws out an arm and I rocket backward, my head slamming against the tiled ground. I grin at him, about to laugh. When suddenly I can’t breathe. My chest contracts, tightening. My ribs. I look up to find him standing over me, his hand clenching into a fist. The telky is going to collapse my rib cage.

  Lightning rises to meet him, sparking angrily. He dodges, faster than I anticipated. My vision spots as the lack of oxygen hits my brain. Another bolt, another dodge.

  Provos is so focused on me, he doesn’t notice the barrel-chested Red soldier a few yards away. He shoots him through the head with an armor-piercing round. It isn’t pretty. Silver spatters across my ruined gown.

  “Mare!” he shouts, hurrying to my side. I recognize his voice, his dark brown face—and his electric-blue eyes. Four other Guardsmen move with him. They circle up, protective. With strong hands, he hoists me to my feet.

  Forcing a breath, I shiver in relief. When my brother’s smuggling friend became a true soldier, I don’t know, and now isn’t the time to ask. “Crance.”

  One hand still on his gun, he raises the radio clawed in his other fist. “This is Crance. I have Barrow in the Square.” The hiss of empty feedback is not promising. “Repeat. I have Barrow.” Cursing, he tucks the radio back into his belt. “Channels are a mess. Too much interference.”

  “From the storm?” I glance up again. Blue, white, green. I narrow my eyes and throw another bolt of purple into the crash of blinding color.

  “Probably. Cal warned us—”

  Air hisses through my teeth. I grab him tightly, making him flinch. “Cal. Where is he?”

  “I have to get you out—”

  “Where?”

  He sighs, knowing I won’t ask again.

  “He’s on the ground. I don’t know where exactly! Your rendezvous point is the main gate,” he shouts in my ear, making sure he can be heard. “Five minutes. Grab the woman in green. Take this,” he adds, shrugging out of his heavy jacket. I pull it over my tattered dress without argument. It feels weighted. “Flak jacket. Semibulletproof. It’ll give you some cover.”

  My feet carry me away before I can even say thank you, leaving Crance and his detail in my wake. Cal is here somewhere. He’ll be hunting Maven, just like me. The crowd surges, a swiftly changing tide. If not for the Guardsmen pushing through the fray, I could force my way through. Blast everyone in front of me, clear a path across the Square. Instead I rely on my old instincts. Dancing steps, agility, predicting every pulsing wave of the chaos. Lightning trails in my wake, staving off any hands. A strongarm knocks me sideways, sending me careening through arms and legs, but I don’t return to fight him. I keep moving, keep pushing, keep running. One name screams through my head. Cal. Cal. Cal. If I can get to him, I’ll be safe. A lie maybe, but a good lie.

  The smell of smoke gets stronger as I push on. Hope flares. Where there’s smoke, there’s a fire prince.

  Ash and soot streak the white walls of the Treasury Hall. One of the airjet missiles took a chunk out of the corner, slicing through marble like butter. It lies in a pile of rubble around the entrance, forming good cover. The Sentinels make full use of it, their ranks bolstered by the Lakelanders and a few of the purple-uniformed Treasury guards. Some of them fire into the oncoming Guardsmen, using bullets to defend their king’s escape, and many more utilize their abilities. I dart around a few bodies frozen solid on their feet, the violent work of a Gliacon shiver. Another few are alive but on their knees, bleeding from the ears. Marinos banshee. The evidence of so many deadly Silvers is all around. Corpses speared by metal, necks broken, skulls caved in, mouths dripping water, a particularly gruesome body that seems to have choked on the plants growing out of its mouth. As I watch, a greeny throws a handful of seeds at an attacking swath of Scarlet Guard. Before my eyes, the seeds burst like grenades, spitting vines and thorns in a verdant explosion.

  I don’t see Cal here, or any other faces I recognize. Maven is already in the Treasury, headed for the train.

  Clenching a fist, I throw everything I can at the Sentinels. My lightning crackles along the rubble, sending them scurrying back. Dimly, I hear someone shout to push forward. The Guardsmen do, continuing to fire round aft
er round. I keep up the pressure, sending another blaze of lightning across them like a cracking whip.

  “Incoming!” a voice screams.

  I look up, expecting a blow from the sky. Airjets dance through the stormy clouds, chasing one another. None of them seem concerned by us.

  Then someone pushes me aside, throwing me out of the way. I turn in time to see a person I recognize barrel along a cleared pathway, his head lowered, body armored on the head, neck, and shoulders. He picks up speed, legs pumping.

  “Darmian!”

  He doesn’t hear me, too busy crashing toward the marble blockade. Bullets ping off his armor and skin. A shiver sends a blast of icicles at his chest, but they shatter. If he’s afraid, he doesn’t show it. He never hesitates. Cal taught him that. Back at the Notch. When we were all together. I remember a different Darmian then, the one I knew. He was a quiet man compared to Nix, another newblood who shared his ability of impenetrable flesh. Nix is long dead now, but Darmian is very much alive. Roaring, he clambers over the marble blockade, careening into two Sentinels.

  They fall on him with everything they have. Stupid. They might as well be shooting at bulletproof glass. Darmian responds in kind, dropping grenades with cold rhythm. They bloom in fire and smoke. Sentinels fall backward, few of them able to withstand a direct explosion.

  Guardsmen vault over the rubble, following in Darmian’s wake. Many overtake him. The Sentinels are not their mission. Maven is. They flood into the Treasury, hot on the king’s trail.

  As I run forward, I let my ability press on ahead. I feel the lights of the Treasury’s main hall, spiraling down into the rock beneath us. My sense jumps along the wires, deeper and deeper. Something big idles below, its engine a rising purr. He’s still here.

  The marble beneath my feet is easy to scale. I scrabble over the rubble on all fours, my mind focused a hundred feet down. The next grenade blast catches me unawares. Its force blows me backward in a wave of heat. I land hard, flat on my back, gasping for breath, quietly thankful for Crance’s jacket. The explosion blazes over me, close enough to burn my cheek.

  Too big for a grenade. Too controlled for natural flame.

  I scramble to my feet, forcing my legs to obey as I suck down air. Maven. I should have known. He wouldn’t leave me up here. Wouldn’t run away without his favorite pet. He’s come to put the chains back on me himself.

  Good luck.

  Smoke follows the swirling fire, making the already dark Square hazy. It surrounds me, growing stronger and hotter with every passing second. Tensing, I send lightning through my nerves, letting it crackle over every inch. I take a step toward his silhouette, black and strange in the shifting firelight. The smoke curls, the fire shooting with raging hot blue flame. Sweat drips down my neck. My fists clench, ready to run him through with every drop of rage collected in his prison. I’ve been waiting for this moment. Maven is a cunning king, but no fighter. I’m going to rip him apart.

  Lighting ripples over our heads, flashing brighter than the flame. It illuminates him as the wind picks up, blowing away the smoke to reveal—

  Red-gold eyes. Broad shoulders. Callused hands, familiar lips, unruly black hair, and a face I have ached for.

  Not Maven. All thoughts of the boy king disappear in an instant.

  “Cal!”

  The fireball hisses through the air, almost engulfing my head. I roll beneath it on instinct alone. Confusion rules my brain. He’s unmistakable. Cal, standing there in tactical armor, a red sash tied across him from waist to hip. I fight the animal need to run toward him. It takes every fiber of control to step back.

  “Cal, it’s me! It’s Mare!”

  He doesn’t speak, just pivots on his feet, keeping me in front of him. The fire around us churns and contracts, pulling inward with blinding speed. The heat crushes the air from my lungs, and I choke down smoke. Only lightning keeps me safe, crackling around me in a shield of electricity to keep me from burning alive.

  I roll again, bursting through his inferno. My dress smolders, trailing smoke. I don’t waste precious time or brainpower trying to figure out what’s going on. I already know.

  His eyes are shadowed, unfocused. No recognition in them. No indication that we’ve spent the last six months trying to get back to each other. And his movements are robotic, even compared to his military-trained precision.

  A whisper has his mind. I don’t have to guess which one.

  “I’m sorry,” I mumble, even though he can’t hear me.

  A blast of lightning throws him back, the sparks dancing over the plates of his armor. He seizes, twitching as the electricity pulls on his nerves. I bite my lip, trying harder than I ever have before to walk the narrow line between incapacitation and injury. I err on the weak side. A mistake.

  Cal is stronger than I ever realized. And he has such an advantage. I’m trying to save him. He’s trying to kill me.

  He fights through the pain, charging. I dodge, my focus shifting from keeping him at bay to keeping out of his crushing grip. A fire-fueled punch arcs over my head. I smell burned hair. Another catches me in the stomach and I fall backward. I roll with the momentum and pop up again, my old tricks returning. With a twist of my hand, I send another bolt of sparks dancing up his leg and into his spine. He howls. The sound cuts my insides. But it gives me a head start.

  My focus narrows to one thing, one person’s devilish face. Samson Merandus.

  He has to be close enough to bewitch Cal and send him after me. I search the battle as I run, looking for his blue suit. If he’s here, he’s hiding well. Or he could be perched above, looking down from the Treasury roof or the many windows of the adjoining buildings. Frustration eats at my resolve. Cal’s right here. We’re back together. And he’s trying to kill me.

  The heat of his rage licks at my heels. Another blast rips along my left, sending needles of white-hot agony down my arm. Adrenaline drowns it out quickly. I can’t afford pain right now.

  At least I’m faster than he is. After the manacles, every step feels easier than the last. I let the storm above fuel me, feeding on the electric energy of the other lightning-wielding newblood somewhere. Her blue hair doesn’t cross my vision again. Too bad. I could use her right now.

  If Samson is hiding near the Treasury, I only have to get Cal out of his circle of influence. Skidding, I turn to look over my shoulder. Cal is still following me, a shadow of blue-tinged flame and anger.

  “Come and get me, Calore!” I shout to him, sending a blast of lightning at his chest. Stronger than the last, enough to leave a mark.

  He twists sideways, dodging, never breaking step. Hot on my trail.

  I hope this works.

  No one dares get in our way.

  Red and blue and purple, fire and lightning, chase in our wake, splitting the battle like a knife. He pursues with the singular resolve of a hunting dog. And I certainly feel hunted across the Square.

  I angle for the main gate, to whatever rendezvous Crance mentioned. My escape. Not that I’ll take it yet. Not without Cal.

  After a hundred yards, it’s clear that Samson is running with us, just out of sight. No Merandus whisper has a bigger range than that, not even Elara. I twist back and forth, scanning the bloodbath. The longer the battle pushes on, the more time the Silvers have to organize. Army soldiers in clouded gray uniforms flood the Square, systematically winning over pieces of it. Most of the nobles retreat behind the wall of military protection, though a few—the strongest, the bravest, the most bloodthirsty—continue fighting. I expect members of House Samos to be in the thick of it, but I see no magnetrons that I recognize. And still no other familiar members of the Scarlet Guard. No Farley, no Colonel, no Kilorn or Cameron or any of the newbloods I helped recruit. Just Darmian, probably blasting his way through the Treasury, and Cal, trying his best to put me in the ground.

  I curse, wishing for Cameron above all of them. She could silence Cal, keep him contained long enough for me to find and destroy Samson. Instead,
I have to do it myself. Keep him at bay, keep myself alive, and somehow root out the Merandus whisper plaguing us both.

  Suddenly navy blue blurs by at the edge of my vision.

  Long months in Silver captivity have made me attuned to house colors. Lady Blonos drilled her knowledge into me, and now, more than ever, I thank her for it.

  I whirl, changing direction with a vengeance. Ash-blond hair darts through the Silver soldiers, attempting to blend into their ranks. Instead, he stands out, his formal suit in sharp contrast to their military uniforms. Everything narrows to him. All my focus, all my energy. I throw what I can in his direction, loosing jagged lightning upon Samson and the Silver shield between us.

  His eyes lock on mine and the lightning arcs like a cracking whip. He has the same eyes as Elara, the same eyes as Maven. Blue as ice; blue as flame. Cold and unforgiving.

  Somehow my electricity bends, curving around him. It slingshots away, rocketing in another direction. My hand swings with it, my body moving of its own accord as the lightning races at Cal. I try to shout out, even though warning a bewitched man will do nothing at all. But my lips don’t move. Horror bleeds down my spine, the only sensation I can feel. Not the ground beneath my feet, not the bite of new burns, not even the smoky air in my nose. It all disappears, wiped away. Taken.

  Inside, I scream because Samson has me now. I can’t make a sound. There is no mistaking the jagged brush of his brain against my mind.

  Cal blinks like someone waking up from a long sleep. He barely has time to react, lifting his arms to protect his head from the electric blow. Some of the jagged sparks turn to flame, manipulated by his ability. Most of them hit home, though, dropping him to his knees with a pained roar.

  “Samson!” he screams through gritted teeth.

  I realize my hand is moving, straying to my hip. It draws the pistol I took and puts steel to my temple.

  Samson’s whispers rise in my head, threatening to drown out everything else.