by C. R. Pugh
I pinched my eyes shut and felt my throat tighten. “I can’t think about that,” I choked.
“But we will still need you, Brother.”
“Both of you, knock it off,” Pierce growled, sneaking up behind us. “Ravyn isn’t going to die. She’s very hard to kill, unless you’ve forgotten.”
Tallon glared at him. “Eavesdropper.”
Pierce rolled his eyes. “When are you two going to understand I can’t help it.” He gave each of us a hard stare. “No more talk of dying. No more dying, period. Is that clear?”
“Are you and Archer ready to go scout out the compound?” I asked him, ignoring his belligerent remarks.
“Of course,” Pierce huffed. “We’re always ready. Archer even suggested we try and shoot out one of the monitors in the front. And maybe one of the guards.”
I inwardly cringed at the suggestion, but it would be a sure way to let Wolfe know we were coming and we would not be backing down from the fight.
“I know what you’re thinking, Brother,” Pierce added. “But soldiers are going to die today. Better them than us. And it might enrage Wolfe enough to make a mistake.”
“Do it,” I said. “We’ll be right behind you.”
Once Pierce and Archer had readied their weapons, I watched them jog away into the forest. An hour later, the Warriors and I were within a mile of the compound. We stopped next to a small creek to await Pierce and Archer’s news of what was happening. Brock, Max, and a few of the other Warriors could be heard placing their bets on various things, as they had always done before the hunts.
Owen, an older Warrior who had trained under Hawke, smirked at his sister. “I wager I’ll take down five of those soldiers before you kill one, Edra.”
“Oh, really?” Edra sassed back. “I bet I kill more soldiers than you. I’ll be keeping count.”
“That’s pretty arrogant, Edra.”
“What do I get if I win?” she asked.
“Respect.”
Edra smacked the back of Owen’s head.
Max chuckled at Owen and Edra’s antics, then suggested, “Edra, if you win, you don’t have to help us rebuild the barn when we get back to Peton.”
Edra narrowed her eyes at Max, considering his terms, and held out a hand for Owen to shake. “I like that bet. You’re on, Owen.”
Sitting against the trunk of the tree about thirty feet from everyone, I pulled out my whetstone and sharpened my blades. I wanted to be alone before the fight. My heart ached, thinking about where Ravyn might be. Not knowing was making my stomach clench. I tried to hold on to the reminder Pierce had given me: Ravyn is hard to kill. It was the only thing keeping me together.
An alarm was raised a few minutes later. I surged to my feet, thinking we were under attack.
I sprinted to the western edge of the clearing to Brock, who had taken it upon himself to keep watch. “What do you see?” I asked.
“Pierce and Archer,” Brock replied, squinting against the glare of the sunshine coming through the trees behind us. “They don’t look like they have good news.”
Why doesn’t that surprise me?
Standing beside Brock, I waited for my brother and Archer to join us. “They don’t look injured, at least,” I mumbled.
Once Pierce and Archer had climbed the slight incline to close the distance between us, I noticed their frowns – the look in their eyes was grim.
I clenched my hands into fists. “Just tell me.”
“We spotted her,” Archer said.
“The soldiers had Ravyn surrounded,” Pierce added. “She wasn’t fighting them.”
“She must have let them take her,” I murmured, accepting the inevitable. I ran my hand down my weary face. “Ravyn told me she was going to find a way inside the compound. She’s the only one who can get close to Wolfe.” I glanced back and forth between Archer and Pierce, swallowing back my ever-growing fear for her. “How long ago?”
“A few hours now,” Archer replied.
“Any sign of Camellia?”
The muscle in Pierce’s jaw ticked. “We saw her … from a distance.” Pierce stared off into the trees, clearly furious.
I turned to Archer, my stomach clenching. “Camellia was with them?”
Archer rubbed the back of his neck. “Camellia wasn’t with Ravyn. A different group of soldiers found her. They took her inside the compound too.”
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35
Ravyn
The dark-haired soldier gripping my arm was TS43. The blonde was TS57. The other two were numbered 64 and 81. I’d glimpsed their numbers etched into the backs of their necks. I didn’t know them and they didn’t know me. They only knew my number and the fact that the General wanted me back in his clutches.
How did General Wolfe create so many of these mindless soldiers?
What was I saying? Kieron had been turned into Wolfe’s mind-slave over a year ago and it had only taken him a few weeks to do it. I’d been a prisoner in almost complete isolation after he realized I hadn’t succumbed to his torture. There was no telling at this point how many soldiers there were. Wolfe had been hiding them all inside his compound, waiting to unleash them on the continent.
Thinking they were in complete control, the four soldiers escorted me straight to the front doors of the compound. The dark-haired soldier was still gripping my arm as we passed by the four guards who stood on sentry duty out front. They barely gave us a second look.
The front doors of the compound were gone along with all the debris from the blast a few weeks ago. The doors had been replaced by wooden panels. The blonde soldier who had disarmed me earlier slid the wooden panel open and I was pushed through the opening with the barrel of a rifle shoved into my back. Once the wooden panel was back in place, numbers 64 and 81 moved in front of me and led the way down the entryway. The blonde and the dark-haired soldiers stayed behind me.
The dark-haired man barked, “Move!” and shoved me in the back with the barrel of his rifle again to push me along. I let out a squeak to feign distress and kept my head ducked down, hoping to appear weak and vulnerable as I stumbled forward.
It was almost too easy.
We took a right at the first junction and made our way down the next corridor to the elevator. Once inside the elevator, they positioned themselves around me. On my right, the dark-haired soldier still had his rifle aimed at me, but he was the only one doing so. The blonde soldier stood to my left with one of my pistols poking out of his waistband. My fingers prickled in anticipation.
The doors to the elevators closed and I made my move.
I snatched my pistol out of the blonde soldier’s waistband and swung him around to shield me. The other three soldiers fired, grazing my shoulder and forearm. The boy in my arms protected my torso. I took two shots at each of them and it was over. The men dropped to the floor at my feet.
Staring down at the four soldiers lying dead on the elevator floor, I let a sense of deadly calm wash over me. The adrenaline pumping through my veins masked the pain from my wounds.
The General didn’t warn you about me.
I took back my weapons from the blonde soldier and flipped the emergency switch to shut down the elevator. The lights dimmed and the humming went silent. Using one of the rifles, I shoved open the trapdoor in the ceiling leading up into the elevator shaft. A couple of weeks ago, I had used this same method to escape the compound. This time it would be my hiding place until Thorne drew the soldiers out. I didn’t know how long it would take, but it was only a matter of time before someone came to investigate the broken elevator if they hadn’t already heard the shots fired. I couldn’t be in here when they forced open the doors.
Using the handrails as a foothold, I climbed up to the ceiling, gripped the edge of the opening, and pulled myself up through the trapdoor.
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36
Audrick
The floor was hard
and cold against the side of my bruised face. I had been lying on the tile floor for days. My glasses were missing so my vision was a bit blurry. Or maybe the world had gone fuzzy due to my swollen face. Several of my teeth were loose and there wasn’t a place on my body that didn’t ache. After an hour of his torture, Renny had given me serum to heal. The following day, the torture started all over again. I regretted that I couldn’t hold out longer than thirty minutes, but I was no fighter like Ravyn. Grandfather had beaten me until I had revealed everything to him and that weasel, Renny.
Grandfather had continued his beatings every day to punish me. Or perhaps he had decided to turn me into one of his mind-slaves too.
I blinked. That was all I was capable of doing without wincing in pain. Even breathing was difficult. My ribs were broken in a few places.
Is it day four or five of his torture? I wondered.
At least I could say I had served my penance for allowing Ravyn to be brutalized for so long. This was my punishment.
Not long after I’d broken under his torture, Grandfather had sent a small unit of soldiers to Ahern. I couldn’t remember why. I’d been given a concussion on two occasions by Grandfather’s hand. He’ll be lucky if I can recall the recipe for the serum.
A pair of blurry black boots paced back and forth in front of my face. I stiffened in fear. Pain coursed through every inch of my body. It was Grandfather. He had finished up today’s torture and was preparing to leave the holding cell.
Please go away, I thought. There’s nothing more I can tell you.
“Do you want me to give him the serum yet?” Renny asked him in his whiny and patronizing tone.
Grandfather snorted. “No. Let him lie there for another half hour. I want to make certain he’s learned his lesson.”
“As you wish, General.” The clanking and tinkling of metal utensils sounded in the corner of the room. Renny must have been putting the vial of serum back on the table along with Grandfather’s other instruments of torture.
Three sharp knocks sounded on the metal door.
“What is it now?” Grandfather grumbled to himself. His boots disappeared from my fuzzy vision. He jerked the door open and snapped, “What do you want?”
“There is a small army forming a perimeter around the compound, sir.” The voice was female, but from her monotone voice, she had to be one of his soldiers.
“Small army? Define small.”
“We counted about fifteen or twenty fighters,” she replied.
Grandfather chuckled and I heard his boots step closer to me. My body tensed again and I moaned in agony from the unrelenting pain.
How had Ravyn survived this for a year?
“Twenty fighters,” Grandfather gloated. “Is that the army Ravyn told you was coming to destroy me?”
My heart sank at the news that so few had arrived. I closed my eyes and took a deep and painful breath. Twenty wasn’t what I had been expecting, but Ravyn hadn’t divulged any numbers to me. Twenty fighters was still better than no one, and from what I had seen in the last battle with the soldiers, they should not be underestimated.
Grandfather spun to face the soldier once more. “I want six units to prepare for an assault.”
Six units? Over seventy soldiers!
I groaned again.
“Yes,” Grandfather drawled, walking back over to me, his black boots coming to a stop in front of me. “Those people will be slaughtered. There will be no one left to stop me.” His boots turned toward the soldier standing at the door. “Do it, now. I want these fighters eliminated by nightfall. Without them, Peton will be mine.”
“Yes, General,” the female soldier answered. Her boot steps faded away down the hallway.
“Renny,” Grandfather snapped. “Go back up to the control room and get the monitors up and running.”
“But I -”
“No excuses. Just go! I will meet you there.”
Renny fled the room at a trot. Grandfather sauntered back to me and stood where I could glimpse his boots again.
“Test Subject One’s sister should be here shortly,” Grandfather murmured to me. “And you know what that means?”
I blinked and swallowed. Even that was painful.
He went on without a pause, knowing I could not answer. “It means Test Subject One will be coming back. She has no choice.” His voice darkened into a sinister growl. “She belongs to me.”
He turned on his heel and left me alone on the floor, slamming the door behind him.
***
I woke to the sound of the door creaking open. Someone was trying to slip inside undetected. I ought to be frightened, but somehow, I wasn’t. Grandfather and Renny were the only two who might return, and they would not be sneaky about it.
Though my vision was still distorted, I could make out a dark form padding across the floor toward me. The booted feet were smaller than Grandfather’s. It couldn’t be Renny. He would be donning his white lab coat. This person was dressed head to toe in black.
My eyes widened when I heard a familiar female voice murmur a foul word.
Ravyn? I tried to say her name but could only manage a painful groan through my bloodied and swollen lips.
“Shh,” she whispered.
Ravyn moved away from me and I heard the tinkling of metal instruments on the table nearby. What are you doing? You shouldn’t be here. They’ll find you.
She crossed the room and knelt down beside me once more. I startled a bit at the prick I felt on my hip. Ravyn was administering the serum to me.
I groaned again, trying to urge her to run and leave me behind. The General would kill me once he had Ravyn in his grasp again. There would be no one to help her escape next time.
“Stop trying to speak,” Ravyn muttered. “Trust me, I know how this feels. But you’ll be feeling better soon.”
I moaned again and felt a tear leak out from the corner of my eye. Ravyn swiped her thumb across the side of my face and caught the small drop of salty liquid before it fell to the floor.
“I’m so sorry, Audrick,” she whispered, her voice trembling. “After everything you’ve done for me, you don’t deserve this.”
What was she doing here?
As if she’d heard what I’d asked in my mind, she answered, “I have business to take care of, so I can’t stay while you heal.”
I swallowed hard. Ravyn had come to kill my grandfather.
“Here.” She placed something long and thin into my pants pocket. “Don’t move a muscle.”
Move? I couldn’t if I tried.
“You’re a bloody mess. They won’t know you’re healed when they return.”
What is she talking about?
I eased my hand toward my hip, gritting my teeth through the excruciating pain. Inside my pocket, I felt something hard against my thigh, covered in leather. Reaching further down, my fingers brushed against the cool steel of a blade and its hilt. My eyes widened.
“Be brave, Audrick,” Ravyn said. She turned and exited the room as silently as she had come.
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37
Thorne
We waited fifty yards from the compound. Pierce had picked a spot a hundred feet to my left within a thick grove of trees and brush. Aaron’s brother, Tameron, had joined his small group of Warriors. To my right, up on the hill, was Brock. They’d spread out behind the trees and a large boulder that was wedged between two pines. Owen and his sister, Edra, were part of his small unit. My group was hidden behind a fallen log and some thick shrubs. Every Warrior had a rifle snug against their shoulder pocket.
My heart ached thinking it should have been Gunter with me, leading the fight. His death had left a gaping hole in my chest. I shook off my guilt and focused on the task at hand.
I looked around for Tallon, but she had disappeared within the brush as I’d instructed her to do.
Archer crept through the trees behind me and knelt down. “Everything is ready.”
“The guards at the front are gone,” Archer remarked, pointing at the front entrance. “There were four standing at post when Pierce and I were here earlier.”
I stared at the compound. The pine trees provided ample cover for the soldiers when they decided to show themselves. Charging out the front doors wouldn’t make them sitting ducks by a long shot, much to my irritation. I had given Pierce and Brock the go-ahead to open fire as soon as soldiers made their way out. We needed to deplete their numbers as much as we could before we resorted to hand-to-hand combat.
It still might not be enough.
I shook my head at my own disheartening thought. It was enough to help Ravyn do what needed to be done on the inside. We could retreat and regroup if we needed to.
Peering out of the corner of my eye, I saw Pierce was studying the compound like I’d been doing. Feeling my stare, he turned and nodded his chin at me. I nodded back, remembering what he had said to me in Ahern. No more dying.
A tingle of dread filled me. It was worse than the anticipation I’d always felt when I led our Warriors out of Peton for the hunt. There had always been a chance that someone would be injured or killed in the Valley. This was different. Odds were good that we would not all be going home today or tomorrow. The thought was like a heavy stone around my neck, weighing me down, but every Warrior here knew this was a battle worth fighting.
Movement from the front of the compound caught my eye. The wood panels blocking the entry shifted.
I whistled at Pierce and Brock. Every Warrior waited and watched with their weapons ready. Once the enemy dared to show themselves, the fight would commence.
The wood panel in the entryway of the compound burst open and three small, black objects were tossed out into the trees one after another. None of the soldiers emerged and no shots were fired.
