Garden of Thorns

by Amber Mitchell

  She places a hand on the metal bars keeping me locked in and gives me a small half smile. “I’m sorry you were stuck in a filthy place like that. You’ll have to tell me more about it sometime.”

  My curiosity gets the better of me. “Why should I?”

  She cocks her head to the side like she’d never considered I’d question her.

  “Because,” she says. “You and I are going to be friends.”

  She punctuates her ridiculous statement by slipping through the door and slamming it shut, the sound reverberating through my head.

  With prying eyes finally gone, I lunge for the food she left behind, knocking the bread onto the floor in my haste. I snatch it up and stuff a flaky piece into my mouth, scoffing at Marin’s final statement. Why she thinks I’d ever be friends with the people holding me captive is ridiculous.

  I stuff another piece of bread into my mouth and look around. My eyes fall onto the small pile of rocks she left to light the room and I smile, an idea blooming in my mind. Maybe the girl was onto something, because only a friend would leave me everything I need to escape.

  …

  I wait for what feels like an eternity, not daring to move. Sunlight creeps back into my cage, fighting off the gloom. When my bones ache from sitting at attention for so long, I dart over to the pile of rocks and grab the longest piece, the cool mineral sending a shiver down my body as it glows faintly under my touch. Rushing back to the comfort of my bed, I stick the piece of Zarenite underneath my red blanket. Then I wait, expecting to hear footsteps, for someone to shout at me not to move, but the only sound to greet me is the water dripping from above.

  I pull the rock out and flick it against the wall several times, a point taking shape with each small movement. Sparks fly, and I’m brought back to the moment the first firework exploded in the Garden.

  The mesmerizing way the weapon forms under my hands blocks out all other distractions. I don’t hear the bars to my cage open or the footfalls of someone approaching. All that alerts me to someone else’s presence is a throat clearing.

  I jump, the nearly completed blade slipping from my grasp and slicing open my palm. A hiss escapes my lips as a pool of blood blossoms from a long slice running across my hand, and pain shoots up my arm.

  I turn to the newcomer, and Rayce appears in the beam of light. Our time apart has been far kinder to him than to me. While I’ve lost more sleep than I’ve managed to gain, the bags under his eyes have lightened and he’s changed into a fresh ivory tunic. Thick stubble peppers his chin in a very Varshan fashion.

  “You cut yourself with that stone you were sharpening.” He tsks. “Tell me, what exactly where you planning to do with that thing once you finished making it?”

  Light pours down on him, streaking his dark hair into a thousand shades of black. He drops the sack he was carrying onto the table.

  “Did you come to threaten me for information I don’t have?” I ask, pressing my hand closed. Blood trickles down my arm.

  “I came with a peace offering,” he replies, pulling out a woven basket with a top on it, a few smaller steaming pots, a water jug, and a cloth napkin. “But instead, I’m going to clean that wound. Lucky for you, I brought a first-aid kit, too.”

  “That won’t be necessary.” I wipe my bloodied hand on my dirty robe.

  He turns to look at me, his brow furrowed in frustration, and grabs a small brown vial, the water jug, and fresh bandages.

  “Do you have to make everything difficult?” he asks. “I’m coming over there.”

  He doesn’t wait for my response, dipping into the darkness of my side of the cell without a second thought. I push my feet out, trying to slide farther back into my crawl space, but my back is already pressed against the cold stone. There is no escaping his closeness, and he doesn’t seem to care that I don’t want him near.

  He sits on the opposite edge of my bed, placing the clean bandages between us. This close, I realize his gaze isn’t nearly as hard as I imagined. He looks nothing like the man who locked me in here yesterday.

  “You’re going to have to promise not to make another one,” he says, picking up the makeshift knife.

  I straighten. “How did you know I had anything?”

  He gives me a lopsided grin and sets the bottle down. “We’ve had people watching you day and night. We know exactly what you’ve been up to. Now, let me see that hand.”

  I press my bleeding hand against my chest.

  “Come on, what good is refusing going to do? I’m trying to help you.”

  “I’ve had plenty of your help,” I say, meeting his gaze. “Your need to ‘keep me safe’ is why I’m in here in the first place.”

  “You could be back in the Garden,” he says.

  “Or I could be free,” I counter.

  “Or you could be dead—and I wasn’t going to let that happen. Ensuring your safety is the only thing I was able to get right over the past few days.”

  The conviction in his voice catches me off guard, and no matter how hard I squeeze my hand, I can’t stop the bleeding. Pain surges from the wound, nearly bringing tears to my eyes.

  “Fine,” I say, holding my palm out.

  He takes my hand in both of his, his warmth enveloping my skin. Though his hands dwarf mine, his touch remains light, his thumbs ghosting over my open palm.

  “That,” he says, motioning to the knife, “was a test. And you failed.”

  I pull my hand away from him, and he laughs as he grabs the brown bottle and tips it over a clean scrap of cloth. He waves for me to return my hand, but I don’t.

  “Don’t you have anything better to do with your time than test a single captive?” I ask, annoyance coloring my voice. “Didn’t you say you have families to notify?”

  He stiffens at my words, the smile dropping from his face. I look down at my bleeding hand, see the bandages sitting between us and the way his shoulders slump, and for some stupid reason guilt washes over me. Though I haven’t agreed with any of his methods, he has done his best to keep me out of harm’s way. I swallow the lump forming in my throat.

  “How did that go?” I ask, holding my hand back out to him. “It couldn’t have been easy.”

  He takes a deep breath and looks down at my outstretched hand, an unreadable look on his face. He picks up a clean cloth and presses it to my cut, holding it and my hand tightly in between both of his.

  “It wasn’t,” he whispers. “It’s the worst part about leading.” He looks up, meeting my gaze with eyes on fire. “But it’s also one of the most important things I can do. I’m not like my uncle; I don’t view people as insects. Those men and women that died for our cause deserve to be honored, and their families deserve to know of their sacrifice from their leader.”

  Who is this guy? I look past the long scar twisting down one side of his face and the dark hair falling onto his forehead and really peer into the dark eyes of this person…this person who refused to let me go and might have saved my life at the same time. Is what he’s saying true? He really cares about those he’s responsible for?

  It would be the first time a man actually did since I passed through the Blue Gate.

  “I’m not sure I can believe you,” I say. I expect him to protest, but silence stretches between us, and I search for something else. Fern’s face comes unbidden into my mind, and before I can stop myself, I speak. “But if I were in your position, I’d want to do the same thing. The Gardener killed the girl I grew up with the night I escaped, but she doesn’t have any family to tell.”

  His grip loosens on my hand, and his lips part slightly.

  “I promised I’d protect her, but it turns out I couldn’t.” Her face, distorted in anger as she yells at me, fills my head, but then I can feel her warm fingers rubbing circles on my back right before a performance and the panic in my chest fades into something worse. “I…miss her.”

  My hand in Rayce’s is a strange sight, so I study the shape they make rather than looking at his face. E
ven though everything I said was true, saying it out loud to someone who didn’t even know Fern is embarrassing.

  “What was her name?” Rayce asks.

  “What?”

  “Her name,” he repeats.

  “Fern.”

  He runs his free hand through his hair before dropping it back over mine gently.

  “I can’t take back her death,” he says, and even though I get the feeling these are words he’s practiced, the sincerity on his face holds me captive, like he’s feeling her loss with me. “But I’m sorry that it happened.”

  I pull my hand back from him and turn away, clearing my throat.

  “That’s why you were so desperate to escape,” he says, all of my actions apparently connecting in his head. “You said you grew up with her.”

  “She took my beatings,” I say, turning back to him. I watch his face, unflinching, so he understands what kind of monster he forced me to leave my family with. “That’s how the Garden works. We’re assigned another girl who sleeps in our cages with us, who we bond with, to share our life stories and secrets and hopes and fears with, and then one of us is chosen to dance and the other takes our punishments. The dancers are responsible for their flesh, our misstep becomes their pain, and we have to watch, have to sleep next to them while they lie broken and bleeding.”

  He stills, listening. This time I hope the silence is uncomfortable for him.

  His voice is hoarse when he finally responds. “That must be a pain too horrible to name. No one should have to suffer that way. I wish there was something we could do to ease that suffering. All I can offer now is that’s something the rebellion will not allow to exist in the new world we’re going to create.”

  He picks up the cloth and scoots closer to me. I stiffen as he pulls my hand back to him and places it gently on his lap. His callused fingers trailing along my flesh make me want to pull away, but I need to have this wound treated or it could become infected. Sensing my discomfort, he moves slowly, like he’s afraid he’ll frighten me, and presses the rag against my wound.

  Whatever he used from the vial stings, and I suck in a breath through my teeth.

  “That bad?” he asks, his eyes soft as he inspects my wound.

  “A little,” I answer through clenched teeth.

  “Here.” He leans forward and puckers his lips a few inches from my broken flesh.

  My heart reacts like I’ve been running, and my entire world focuses on the point where our skin touches. He blows on my stinging cut, the whisper of butterfly wings against skin. The cool air is the perfect balm for a pain I can’t even feel anymore.

  I blink back my surprise and yank my arm away from him.

  “Aren’t we touchy,” he says, but the corner of his mouth quirks up. “It’s better anyway. I’m not really fond of blood.”

  “Then why not just give me the cloth and let me clean the wound myself?”

  He stands up and stretches, turning an inch away from me so I can’t see his face. “Because it’s my responsibility as a leader to forgo my own fears for the sake of my people. If I shied away every time I saw a little blood, what kind of warrior would I be?”

  A bitter chuckle escapes my lips, and he turns his head back to face me.

  “Something funny?” he asks.

  “Like a man would ever put anyone before himself.”

  He studies me for a long moment. “I can see why you’d think that way, coming from the Garden.”

  “How do you think I wound up in the Garden?” I don’t hide the contempt shaking my voice. “Another boy wanted me to put my faith in him once, too, and that turned out so well for me.”

  He places his hand lightly over mine that still clutches the cloth to my wound, and his eyes never leave mine.

  “I’m sorry about what happened to you in the past, but I will prove you wrong now. I’m going to make you believe in me, not because I want you to, but because that’s what you need.”

  Maybe it’s the restless nights or my intense need to get out of this cage, but for a second, my breath catches. We stare at each other, two tiny sparks in the darkness with nothing to do but burn. Then he clears his throat, removes his hand, and looks away, snapping me out of the stillness of the moment.

  “Anyway, you should bandage that now, since it’s clean. Don’t want it getting infected. Besides, you’re expecting company.”

  I take the white bandage still sitting on the bed and wrap it around my clean wound. A creaking sound bounces off the walls as the iron door swings open. I shoot up like we’ve been caught doing something inappropriate, even though Rayce was already standing. He tosses a curious glance my way then walks over to the wooden table in the middle of the room as a stream of people flow into the cage.

  “What’s this?” I ask Rayce.

  Even though I don’t trust him, the feeling of betrayal sinks into my stomach. For the briefest second, it felt like we understood each other, and now it seems his whole act was a setup.

  “This,” he says, holding out his hands, “is the Zareen council, and we’re here to decide if we can let you go free.”

  Frustration surges through me as I stare him down, and my hands curl into fists. The fresh white bandage stains red as blood releases from the wound. An irreversible mark not unlike the one Rayce just made on my heart.

  Chapter Twelve

  Seven people crowd into my cell, shrinking the area considerably. Rayce sits on one of the stools in front of the table, crossing his arms over his chest as he stares at me. Arlo stands a few feet behind Rayce, his hand resting on the hilt of his stunner, and Oren, his arms full with a rolled parchment, a pot of ink, and a quill, sits on another stool next to Rayce. Marin guards the door in the back, and a girl with black hair chopped off just below her ears walks toward me, two people scuttling around behind her, all dressed in crisp brown robes with thick black bands tied around their waists.

  The girl leading them stops in front of me, and her long fingers wrap around my chin before I can blink. Her skin chills mine more than the constant cold in the air, and her nails dig into my cheeks.

  “Don’t touch me!” I snap, jerking away from her claws.

  “Let her look you over,” Rayce says. “She’s checking to make sure you’re okay since you passed out from the Zarenite. It’s only a safety precaution.”

  I clench my jaw and take a step backward. As the girl stares at me with her cold eyes, I’m reminded of the emperor sizing me up the night I escaped, and my stomach rolls.

  “She doesn’t have to grab her without asking,” Marin says, and I’m grateful for her input. Her prying might have been frustrating before, but she’s the only one here now who hasn’t tried to force her way into my personal space.

  “You aren’t to interrupt, Shing,” the black-haired girl says, her voice completely devoid of any pitch. There’s no rise and fall, no cadence, and somehow that makes her even more intimidating than if she were yelling.

  “And you aren’t my commanding officer, Piper,” Marin says.

  That name shakes me. This is the girl Rayce and the others were talking about over the fire pit. They were trying to rescue her sister before I interrupted their plans by trying to take Rayce hostage. I wonder if she knows what happened and is angry with me. I turn back to her, searching for any trace of what she might be feeling, but her soulless eyes don’t reflect anything. The corner of her mouth finally turns down an inch, like I’m a bug that she can’t decide whether to pin or squash.

  “Take this down,” Piper says, snapping her fingers.

  The man and woman standing behind her with parchment each begin to scratch away as she speaks.

  “Body heat elevated, obvious signs of sleep deprivation and dehydration, but whether they are directly related to ingestion of Zarenite remains to be seen.” Piper taps her finger on her chin for a moment, her eyes drilling into my face. “This girl is the reason Kyra is still locked up. What a waste.”

  Her comment answers my previous questio
n, though I gather from the snarl on Marin’s face that her rudeness isn’t an unusual occurrence. I press my lips together, forcing down the rising need to pummel this girl. I won’t ever get them to trust me if I attack her.

  “That’s enough now,” Oren says. “Rose couldn’t have planned to interrupt the rescue of your sister if she didn’t know about it.”

  “Unless she did know about it,” Piper says, walking back to stand near Arlo. She tucks her hands into her long sleeves and stares directly at me. “It’s entirely possible the emperor had prior knowledge of Zareeni presence that night and her act was an assassination attempt on our leader’s life.”

  Her accusation presses down on me as if she had her foot planted on my back, but I resist the urge to look away. Instead, I stare straight back into her dead eyes.

  “That’s what we’re here to figure out,” Rayce says.

  The quietness that washes over the room is so complete the constant drip of water sounds like a waterfall. Every eye on the room focuses on me clinging to the dirty robe that still hides what’s left of my sparkling Garden outfit. I feel more exposed now than when I perform. At least then they’re all faceless bodies in the crowd, passing judgment on me without the added pressure of knowing their names, the way their voices sound.

  “Why don’t you come sit?” Rayce asks, but the firmness in his voice doesn’t really give me a choice. He’s completely morphed from the man who just cleaned my wound. In front of the council, he really is the leader of the rebellion, and I can see why the Imperial City is so frightened of him.

  He tilts his head toward the stool across the table, directly in the patch of light.

  My every step feels like I’m walking into the open jaws of a cobra, the splash of light momentarily blinding me. I slide onto the stool, the rough edge of the wood sticking through my thin white robe. Suddenly, I’m onstage again, the burning spotlight focused on me as I drop from the sky. But this time I don’t have my rope to catch me.

  Even though my breath comes out in ragged puffs, I stare into Rayce’s dark eyes, unwilling to waver. I place my hands on my knees, and Oren leans over the table, his stool squeaking under his enormous body.