“It’s fine.” He took a choppy breath. “Sorry. It’s my head.” Maybe Reed would forgive him if he blamed it on getting his brain rattled.
Sparks made a big show of turning back to look at them now that the kissing had stopped. She started to say something and stopped short when a young boy and girl ran by, their shoes slapping hard against the pavement. They ran like they’d stolen something or were trying not to get stolen themselves.
Nate recalled the children playing outside—how they’d played at Breakers and GEMs.
Something shuttered inside of him. Nothing was ever going to change what he was. Now that the Breakers were bold enough to walk around in the day, it would be easier than ever for Reed to turn him in and take whatever reward the Breakers had to offer. Reed had a perfect way to keep Brick and Sparks and Pixel fed and sheltered.
And Nate was keeping that from him. From all of them.
“We need to go,” he said, gripping the wall to stand. His head went sludge-filled, and he tried not to retch.
Reed steadied him. “You need help.”
Nate fought the urge to shove him away. Embarrassment stung like a torn blister. But Reed wasn’t the one who deserved getting shoved and snapped at. “I’m fine.”
“I know a sick-den nearby.” Sparks fidgeted with her sleeve where it covered the silvery scars that mottled the inside of her arms. “Bunch of Servant weirdos, but the lady in charge let me stay as long as I needed to. I saw her helping out at the wreck. Maybe she’s got room for one more. And you’re small.”
“I’ll use the salve I got for Pix. It’s fine.” Nate sucked a breath in, teeth clenched. He’d forgotten the most important thing. “My coat! It’s in a fire bin up the street. It has all the buttons and wires in it still.”
“Don’t worry.” Reed’s hand brushed against Nate’s, and he gave him a quick, strange glance before taking him by the elbow. “We’ll find it.”
Walking amplified the sharp pulse of Nate’s headache, but it wasn’t half as bad as thinking about how stupid he’d been to kiss Reed.
“The explosion woke you up?” he asked, hoping that talking would make them look more like friends on a stroll than tired scavengers looking for stolen tech in a bin.
“It knocked me on the ground. I thought my bones were cracking open.”
“Everyone in the Withers must have heard it,” Sparks said.
“Any closer, and I would have got burned up. Hold on—it’s this one.” Nate retrieved his coat from the fire bin. A cloud of ashes rose from the wrinkled fabric. He sneezed. “How do you think the Breakers did it?”
“You ought to know, Tinkerer,” Sparks said. She walked in front of them, waving her arms and elbowing people to clear the way for Nate’s uncoordinated steps. “Isn’t that what you do?”
“That’s a different kind of tinkering.” Nate pulled his coat on and patted as much of the dirt and ash off as he could. It stuck to his palms and crusted around his fingernails. “I’ve never worked with explosives.”
“Think they’ll send more A-Vols to break up the crowd?” Sparks watched the distant Gathos City skyline like she wasn’t listening to a thing he said.
Nate stumbled with a wave of nausea. The smell of burning flesh clung to his hair. People had died, roasting in the twisted metal. He didn’t want anyone else to die today. “I hope not.”
“Wish I could have got some fancy things from that train,” she said, wistful.
“We don’t scavenge by day,” Reed said. “It’s reckless. And this was reckless enough.” When he made his voice like that—sharp and sure—he didn’t sound like another kid at all.
Sparks gave a shrug, but she lowered her chin. Even in a small gang, the order of things mattered. And Reed was in charge.
It had been reckless for Reed and Sparks to come out looking for him. Both of them had had narrow misses with trappers. Reed’s green eyes and Sparks’s silvery scars made them easy to spot. Especially in the clear light of day.
Trappers didn’t take well to being outrun.
Guilt gnawed at Nate. They’d always worked so hard to stay in the shadows.
“Wishes?” he asked. During the coldest days and nights of the last winter, Pixel had made up a game of wishes. She’d known exactly how to bring them comfort. Nate needed it now. If he didn’t stop gnawing on his own guilt, he was going to collapse in a useless heap.
“It’s not a good day for wishes,” Reed said shortly.
Nate kept up as best he could, clumsy with pain and lingering sickness from the acrid smoke. He had plenty of wishes—but right now all he wanted was a way to go back and fix the rift deepening between him and Reed.
Maybe it was already too late.
