by Kyla Stone
“They’ve tried before,” sniffed Perez. “They’re no threat.”
“This is a coordinated attack.” Her mother’s voice trembled. Her gaze found Amelia’s, her eyes beseeching, begging for something that Amelia did not yet understand. “They’ve recruited soldiers and allies from other factions.”
“Is that so?” President Sloane’s face hardened. “Then we’ll be ready for them.”
The room hummed in an explosion of voices. Amelia felt disconnected from her own body, hovering over everything, as if watching from a great distance. Her thoughts were jerky, disjointed. Her mother hadn’t just betrayed the New Patriots. In doing this, she’d betrayed their friends, too—Gabriel, Willow, Finn, Celeste, and Benjie.
President Sloane turned to General Daugherty. “Double the guard and patrols. Prepare your men. We must eradicate this cancer once and for all. Vera, please arrange a room for Mrs. Black befitting of her status.” President Sloane hurried out of the room, her gaggle of advisers trailing her, all of them speaking in low, tense voices, gesturing wildly and swiping at their Smartflexes and holopads.
Within moments, the grand hall was completely empty except for Amelia, her mother, and their guards.
Her mother rushed to her and clasped her hands. She was haggard from her ordeal as a captive of the Headhunters; too thin, but still beautiful—her hollow cheekbones curving elegantly in the soft light, her delicately arched brows raised, her cupid-bow lips pursed in dignified concern. Her mother peered into Amelia’s eyes. “Amelia, darling. It’s me. Are you all right?”
“What did you do?”
Her mother stiffened. “What I had to do to keep you safe. I saved you, Amelia. I saved us all.”
The cold went all the way through her bones.
Her mother had done everything for her. All those years, enduring the humiliation and abuse at the hands of Declan Black, all to keep Amelia healthy and alive. Now she was doing it again—sacrificing anything and everything, whatever it took.
This time, she’d sacrificed too much.
“No,” Amelia whispered in a choked voice, “you didn’t.”
3
Willow
“What were you thinking?” Raven asked eighteen-year-old Willow Bahaghari, her voice sharp as a razor blade. She stood in the center of the moonlit clearing, her hoverboard grasped in one hand, the hood of her jacket shielding her face in shadows.
“We were trying to find you,” Willow said sheepishly. “We carved birds on trees to send you a message.” She gestured behind the tent at the carving on a pine tree that looked like some toddler’s post-modern scrawls. “And we set fires so you would see us—”
“Me and every other criminal, thief, and murderer in the Blue Ridge Mountains,” Raven retorted.
Every inch of Willow’s body still hummed with adrenaline. The last hours had been a whirlwind of emotion. She, Finn, and Benjie had barely survived an infected grizzly bear’s attack. Finn had finally managed to shoot the beast dead seconds before it mauled Benjie.
She stared at the tendrils of smoke from their little fire rising up through the trees until her eyes blurred. Suddenly, she felt incredibly foolish. “Okay, I get it. Stupid idea. I’m a fighter, not a living-in-the-wilds survivalist.”
“Clearly.”
“It wasn’t our finest moment, I agree.” Finn rose to stand beside Willow. At 6’6”, he towered over her tiny five-foot-nothing frame. She was short and thick, where Finn was huge all over, with broad shoulders, a barrel chest, and tree-trunk arms and thighs. His medium-brown skin glimmered in the moonlight, his cheeks breaking into that lopsided grin she’d come to adore.
Finn gripped her hand. She squeezed back. He was her best friend. He was her person. Only moments ago, they’d shared their first kiss. She could still feel the sweet, woodsy taste of him on her lips.
“We’re here now,” Finn said.
The dark woods pressed in all around them. Icicles hung from the branches, glittering like jewels. The wind rattled the bare trees. Their branches scraped against each other in eerie, haunting notes. From somewhere to her left came the soft thud of powdered snow falling from a tree limb.
Raven’s giant wolf, Shadow, stalked the clearing, his hackles raised, tail stiff, growling low in his throat. His thick black fur rippled in the breeze.
Willow had forgotten how huge he was, with long legs, broad shoulders, and a sinewy, muscled chest. His regal head reached past Finn’s waist, and that was saying something. In the moonlight, he looked like some supernatural creature out of a Greek myth.
Raven had said Shadow was a hybrid—the progeny of a mod and a natural wolf. Hybrids were supposed to be impossible.
The scientists had all insisted mods wouldn’t kill—or breed. They were usually larger than their original counterparts, but they were genetically engineered to be docile, meek enough to pet or even ride at the zoo—for an additional fee, of course. With so many wild animals going extinct every year, the zoos had needed replacements. Mods had fit the bill.
Shadow was huge—but there was nothing docile about him. Though he and Raven had a special bond, he wasn’t tame, not by a long shot. His amber eyes glittered with intelligence and cunning. His movements hummed with strength, power, and virility. He was every inch a wild thing, a creature that followed the laws of nature, of survival, of predator and prey.
Shadow circled the dead bear, hackles raised, growling menacingly. The sound sent shivers up Willow’s spine. She was grateful he was on their side. His jaws looked like they could rip out her throat if he were so inclined.
Raven studied the campsite, her eyes narrowing as her gaze roamed over the tent, the campfire, their packs. After dinner last night, Willow and Finn had taken her pack with all the food in it, looped a rope through both straps, thrown the rope over a thick branch at the edge of the clearing, and hauled the pack up so it was a good twelve to fifteen feet above the ground—out of reach of curious, hungry bears.
They hadn’t counted on the bear wanting them instead.
“Contrary to what you may think right now, I’m not that stupid,” Willow muttered sullenly.
Raven cocked her eyebrows and angled her chin at the enormous, furred mountain of dead grizzly in the center of the clearing. For a second, Willow saw its sinister onyx eyes, its glistening jaws opening to bite and rip and kill as it loomed over Benjie’s prone form. She tasted acid on her tongue, the ghost of terror strangling her throat.
“You managed to survive anyway,” Raven said. “Congratulations.”
Willow felt the judgment in her voice and bristled, even though it was true. She’d felt trapped and useless in the New Patriots compound, with Amelia, Silas, and Micah off infiltrating the Sanctuary and Gabriel plotting a war with Cleo Reaver, all while the Headhunters and New Patriots closed in around her.
She had been stuck between a rock and a hard place. Staying had been dangerous. Leaving, possibly more so.
She’d thought they could find Raven and the Settlement and beg for help for their friends. But she’d underestimated the danger of trekking over a hundred miles through a winter wilderness infested with killer wildlife—all with an eight-year-old.
This had been a ridiculously stupid idea. Her mind filled with all the horrific possibilities that might have been. She shuddered.
Benjie ducked out of the tent, his hair sticking up all over his head as he blinked sleepily and rubbed his forehead. His eyes were white and round in his beautiful brown face.
Raven’s gaze landed on his slashed coat, the edges of the fabric stained with blood. Her mouth tightened. “Were any of you bitten?”
“No,” Willow said. “Only clawed a few times and hurled around like rag dolls. We’re not infected.”
Raven’s shoulders relaxed a fraction. She pushed back the hood of her jacket with a sigh. She was Japanese, tiny and fine-boned, with shining black hair that skimmed her shoulders and a round, delicate face. But her eyes were sharp, cunning, and fearless. She knew
how to survive, how to hunt and trap, and move silently as a ghost through the forest on her hoverboard. She was formidable in her own way.
“You never showed up at our meeting spot,” she said. “I thought something happened.”
“Something did.” Willow explained about the Pyros, the deadly gang in Atlanta who’d taken them hostage, Jericho’s murder, and their rescue by the New Patriots. She described Amelia’s attempt to find the cure inside the Sanctuary, and Cleo and her mother’s half-mad determination to take the Sanctuary for themselves, no matter the cost.
“Did you go to the Settlement after we didn’t show up?” Finn asked Raven.
“Shadow can’t get hemmed in. Neither can I.” Raven’s eyes glinted in the moonlight. “Besides, I thought you might be stubborn enough to survive.”
“We are,” Willow said. “And now we need your help again. We have to get to the Settlement.”
Raven tilted her head, studying them. “What for?”
“We need their help.”
“The Settlement doesn’t give help. They’ll take you in. But they don’t leave. They don’t fight.”
“They can’t just hide from the world,” Willow muttered. “Don’t they know what’s happening?”
“Why didn’t you stay at the compound?” Raven asked, ignoring her. “It’s safer there.”
“No, it’s not,” Willow said. “The Patriots can’t be trusted. They’re violent and treacherous. Every single one of them would stab their own mother in the back if it helped their precious cause. Besides, they joined forces with the Headhunters.”
Raven stiffened. “Headhunters?”
“The thugs who attacked us at Sweet Creek Farm—”
“I remember who they are.” Raven scowled. “Cerberus. Does he still wear that white wolf pelt?”
Cerberus was the vicious leader of the Headhunters, the gang of violent bikers who’d survived the apocalypse by trading in-demand supplies—including humans. The Headhunters had taken Elise Black captive. They’d killed Nadira. “Yeah. Why?”
Raven didn’t answer. Her expression closed like a fist, her eyes going hard. She activated her hoverboard and dropped it to the ground. It hovered six inches above the mingled dead leaves and melting snow. “I’ll help you. I’ll take you to the Settlement. But I can’t promise anything. They’re not my people.”
Willow nodded, more relieved than she wanted to admit. “That’s all we can ask. Thank you.”
Willow glanced at Shadow. The wolf stalked through the clearing and stood protectively at Raven’s side. He stared at them with his penetrating amber eyes, his ears pricked forward, looking for all the world like he understood everything they were saying. Willow resisted the instinct to take a step back.
“Let’s go,” Raven said.
Finn scratched the back of his neck with his good hand. “You mean right now? In the middle of the night?”
Raven pointed at their campfire, smoke still swirling up through the trees. “You made yourself a target for humans. A bigger target for predators, with a fresh kill they can smell for miles.”
“Now sounds great,” Finn said swiftly.
Finn and Willow hurriedly packed the tent and their supplies, Willow doing most of the work since Finn was one-handed, his wounded right arm still numb and bound in a sling. She tugged on her boots and refastened them, hissing at the pain in her side. It seemed to be fading a bit, and at least she could move. She was lucky that bruised ribs and a vicious headache were the worst of her injuries.
“Ready for a midnight adventure?” she whispered in Benjie’s ear. He nodded sleepily, rubbing at his eyes. She tugged Benjie’s knit cap over his ears and zipped up his jacket. Her fingers grazed the slashes in the fabric. She repressed another shudder and shoved away the horrible images of what might have been. Together, she and Finn had managed to keep Benjie safe. They could do it again.
When they were ready, Raven set off. She slowed her board to keep just ahead of them. She hovered easily over the twisting roots, fallen branches, and thorny, snow-covered underbrush that Willow, Finn, and Benjie were forced to trudge through on foot.
Benjie twisted around to look behind them at the campsite barely visible through the trees. “Aren’t you gonna call Shadow?”
“He’ll come when he comes,” Raven said.
Several minutes later, the wolf bounded through the woods, veering in to race past Raven and nip at her heels before taking off ahead of them, a shadow among shadows, as silent as his namesake.
An owl hooted from somewhere above them. A wolf howled in the distance. Ten yards ahead of them, Shadow’s ears pricked, his tail lifting. He answered with a howl of his own, lifting his muzzle toward the sky.
“He’s howling at the moon,” Benjie said sleepily.
“A myth,” Raven said. “Projecting their call upward allows the sound to carry farther. Another wolf can hear him over six miles away.”
“Wow,” Benjie said, impressed.
Shadow paused at the edge of a copse of birch trees, glancing back over his shoulder at Raven. He gave an eager, high-pitched whine before plunging into the darkness.
Time passed with aching slowness. The seconds, minutes and hours blurred into the next aching step, the next steaming breath, the burning in her exhausted thighs, the scrape of branches and thorns, the watery darkness sifting all around them. The occasional snap or crunch of something moving deep in the woods pierced her with needles of fear.
Beside her, Raven’s gaze roamed constantly, always scanning her surroundings, taking everything in. Every so often, she stilled the hoverboard to touch a bent twig, or hopped off to squat and brush aside a pile of dead leaves and clumped snow, squinting at the markings of tiny—and not-so-tiny—tracks. She could read the signs of the forest—who or what had traveled there previously. In the dim moonlight, her face was tight with concentration, with focus.
“What is it?” Willow asked.
“A big cat.” Raven brushed off her knees and stepped back on her hoverboard, slightly favoring her left leg. “Leopard. Probably a mod. But best not to take chances.” She turned twenty degrees southeast and kept going.
Willow checked to make sure Finn and Benjie were keeping close. Finn was carrying Benjie on his broad back, hunched forward slightly with Benjie’s arms wrapped around his neck, his good arm around Benjie’s leg. They were busy entertaining each other with silly jokes.
“Why did the cookie go to the doctor?” Benjie asked.
“Because he broke his arm?” Finn guessed.
“No! Because he was feeling crummy. Get it? Crumb-y?”
Finn chuckled. “That’s a good one, Sir Benjie.”
He gave Willow a crooked smile, though lines of fatigue appeared around his mouth and between his brows. Her chest constricted even as butterflies fluttered in her stomach. He was exhausted. They would need to rest soon.
“Not yet,” Raven said, as if reading her mind.
Willow puffed out a breath, watched the white, steaming whorls in the cold air. “Can I ask you a question?” She took Raven’s silence as consent. “You said the Settlement people weren’t your people. I thought your mom lived there.”
“She did.”
“But not you?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
Raven was silent for a long time; so long, Willow thought she wouldn’t answer. Conversing with Raven was like pulling teeth. Worse than Silas, almost.
Suddenly, Raven halted. She squatted and examined something on the ground. Shadow slunk out of the darkness and pressed in beside her, sniffing the dirt, ears pricked and tail raised.
“Coyote scat,” she said, rising. “Nothing to worry about.”
Willow strained her ears to listen for danger, but it was hopeless over the crunch and snap of their own lumbering movements. She tripped over a tree root hidden beneath the snow and cursed.
“I lived with my dad at our private zoo, Haven Wildlife Refuge,” Raven said finally. “He ha
rdly ever left—he preferred animals over people. He was a war vet. Saw enough that made him believe in being alone. He could survive off the land, taught me what I know. My mom, she wanted…other things. She didn’t like the government, what was happening. The Settlement people did their own thing, kind of off-the-grid, so she decided to live there. I visited her once, but it wasn’t for me.” She fell silent again.
Finn huffed beside Willow, breathing heavily, too focused on hiking through the steep woods to say much. Benjie clung to Finn’s neck, his eyelids fluttering.
She patted Benjie’s back and exchanged another look with Finn. Her heart ached with her love for them. She would kill anyone or anything that tried to hurt them.
She turned back to Raven. “And when the virus came?”
“We didn’t know at first.” Raven angled her hoverboard around the trunk of a massive oak tree. “The visitors stopped coming. The keepers got sick. Dad finally switched on the old holoscreen. Then we knew how bad it was. He wanted us to stay put, thought we could ride it out. He didn’t know he was already infected.
“My mother messaged, said she was coming. But she never did. Afterward, I went to the Settlement to look for her. They said she left to find me. Something must have happened to her along the way...”
Raven’s voice trailed off, choked by grief. Willow didn’t know what to say. So she listened, the only thing she could do.
Raven cleared her throat. “Anyway, before my dad died, I went into town to get medicine. The Headhunters saw me. They followed me back to the refuge.” She paused for a long moment. “The Headhunters aren’t good people.”
Willow glanced at her. There was a note of repressed grief and rage in Raven’s carefully controlled voice. Willow couldn’t make out her features in the thick shadows.
No wonder Raven had reacted so strongly when Willow mentioned the Headhunters. Willow had thought it was because of what went down at Sweet Creek Farm, but she was wrong.
“There was a boy with them,” Raven said hesitantly. “Damien. He’s blonde with piercings. Our age. Did you see him at the compound?”
