Yeah, me either. No mood for that.
Siret was back in his position of Point, and from there he cut a straight path to the entrance of a skyreacher.
Holy crap!Emmy was going to lose her mind when she heard about this.
“Don’t let it collapse on me,” I pleaded, my voice a little high as we walked through the door. Or stalked, more accurately. We were all badass again, stalking and shit. Elowin was going down. I would be the sixth in line to take a shot at her … no need to go first, Point had already been claimed. We approached a large, polished cage, and I found myself distracted by the dweller who was standing beside it, his hand resting on a huge, wooden pulley. I was staring at him because he was by far the biggest dweller that I had ever seen. He had muscles upon muscles, and height to go with it. I might have even mistaken him for a sol, except that other than his size, he was typically plain-looking. His clothes were dull and modest—and he was staring back at me, I realised.
I glanced down at myself, at the clothes that were far too fancy for a dweller, even though they were simple and dark-toned. The material was still sol-quality, meaning that the boys had robbed some poor girl who was around my height and stature, or else the clothes were another manifestation of Trickery’s magic. Which was actually a little weird … because that meant that he had designed my underwear. Actually, it was weird in either scenario, because the alternative was that I was wearing some other girl’s underwear.
Muscle Dweller was still staring at me, his mouth popped open a little bit. It must have been obvious that I was a dweller. It was probably the wild curls that hadn’t been brushed in a few sun-cycles, and the way I barely even topped the triplets’ shoulders, even though they were shorter than the twins.
“Eyes on the wheel, dweller,” Coen snapped to Muscle Dweller, herding us into the cage.
“And eyes on us, Willa,” Siret added. He sounded serious, which was a new tone for him.
I gave him a surprised look, but he only met my eye stubbornly. Challenging me to argue with him. Well … I wasn’t going to argue with him before, but hechallengedme, dammit. I opened my mouth, ready to shoot off some retort, but the cage chose that moment to lurch, and I tumbled sideways into Rome. He looked down at me, planting a hand on my shoulder to keep me steady as the cage began to rise. I tried not to squeal, but some kind of a sound must have escaped me, because one of the crazy sols stuffed into the cage with me laughed.
“She’s never been in a cage before,” Yael noted, sounding amused.
“I’ve been in plenty of cages,” I returned, huddling into Rome so that I didn’t accidently fall out of the cage—even though I probably wouldn’t fit through the bars. “I got stuffed into a cage by my mother that time a visitor came over totalkto her in private, and Teacher Fern used to lock me in a cage every time we had physical fitness classes. She wasn’t allowed to actually ban me from the class, since attendance was mandatory … so she just put me in a cage in the middle of the back field, and all the other kids ran laps around me—”
“You’re getting off-track again, Rocks,” Coen interrupted.
“Right.” I shook my head. “Point is, I’ve just never been in a moving cage, because cages aren’tsupposedto move!”
“It’s how you get to the higher rooms.” Rome’s voice rumbled through his chest, vibrating against my cheek, and I turned my face up a little to look at him.
His hand slipped from my shoulder to the middle of my back, pressing me closer for a moment, before his gem-like eyes flicked away.
“So what’s the plan?” I asked. “Are we going to wait outside her home for her to leave and then … what?”
“We don’t wait. We break in, and then we kill her,” Coen informed me stoically.
“What?” I managed, choking over the word. “I thought you were just saying that. Like being dramatic and stuff.”
Coen spun as the cage groaned to a stop, his intense eyes glittering down at me. “I’m neverdramatic and stuff,” he said, grabbing the front of my shirt and hauling me out of the cage.
We ended up in a hallway, with several, numbered doors spaced out right to the end. They were like the dorm rooms back at the academy. Coen took the lead, dropping my shirt to grab my hand instead, and we stopped in front of Number 113. He dropped my hand, and I knew that he was moments away from kicking the door down like a crazy, deranged sol, so I quickly raised my fist and knocked. They all turned to stare at me, looking like I’d just stolen their favourite toy and ripped its head off.
“What?” I asked defensively. “Just trying to be polite.”
“We’re here to kill her,” Siret reminded me, his voice a frustrated groan.
“Don’t see why we can’t kill her politely,” I muttered back. “And … I mean … don’t really see why we have to kill her at all.”
The door swung open then, and Elowin’s shocked eyes took us in for a moment, before she tried to slam the door back in our faces. Coen pounced forward, knocking the door fully open and, as a result, knocking Elowin to the ground as well. I hurried in after Coen, the others at my back. I wasn’t so excited about the kick-ass mission anymore. I didn’t really want to murder anybody, even if theyhadlocked me in a magical dungeon with the intention of eventually getting rid of me.
“Guys—” I started, a little hesitantly, scrambling to Elowin’s side and trying to help her up.
I never got to finish my request, however, because Elowin seized me, dragging me upright as she stood, and a flash of silver was the only warning I got before there was a dagger at my throat. The five Abcurses froze, staring at the knife. I could have sworn that they even stopped breathing.
Elowin laughed. “That’s right. Good boys. You don’t want me to kill your little toy now, do you?”
Yael started forward immediately. I guessed it was only okay when he called me a toy, and not anyone else. I tried to suck in as little air as possible, not wanting to push my throat out against the blade, but it didn’t seem to be working. Either that, or Elowin was beginning to apply pressure. I winced, feeling the break in my skin, and Yael paused, his chest heaving with the heavy motion of his breathing.
“Nobody fucking move,” Aros instructed quietly, as if even the sudden sound of his voice would convince Elowin to cut me deeper.
“Yes, nobody move,” Elowin parroted, skipping over the swear word like a complete, knife-wielding snob.
