I lunge at him, ducking under his gleaming blade. We go down in a flurry of limbs, his body as hard and heavy as a steel wall. My daggers are gone, so I hone in on where I stabbed him earlier and punch him as hard as I can, before I lose the small advantage of surprise I have. Shivhai grunts and brings a boulder sized knuckle flying toward my head. I roll off him before it can connect. We both scramble to our feet and he flies toward me, cracking a kick against my ribs. He goes for my face, but I bring up my arm and sweep a kick toward his knees, aiming for the one I’ve already injured.
He goes down, and I instantly realize my mistake as his hand grabs for the discarded revolver. He whips it up, pointing it at me once more. The bullet is already in the chamber, and we are close enough that one move will send me to the grave. But the Darkness won’t claim me yet. Mirren is still in the hands of the enemy, and I won’t succumb until she’s safe. She is one mistake in a lifetime of them I can still rectify.
Shivhai cocks a lopsided grin. It pulls at his gnarled face humorlessly. “I wonder what the Praeceptor will say when he finds out you’ve comehome.”
The word reverberates through me, and a wave of nausea rises as I realize Shivhai’s intent. He lowers the revolver so that it is no longer aimed at my heart, but at my knee. He has no intention of killing me. His plans are far, far worse.
“What kind of greeting do you think he’ll give the boy who betrayed him? That tried to cut out his heart even as he cared for you? You’ve seen enough traitors’ executions. Do you think he’ll be so kind, to simply let you die in humiliation? I think you know better than that. Know that he’ll drag out your miserable life foryears, peel the skin from your bones just to wait for it to grow back and then do it again. You will never know the peace of Darkness.”
I suddenly forget I’m still fighting; that Mirren isn’t safe, and neither is Denver and they’ll never be if I get myself shot and dragged in front of the Praeceptor. I only see the Praeceptor’s cold eyes on the last day I saw him. The way they widened, ever so slightly, as my blade went through his chest. The way his hot blood mixed with my hotter tears as I yanked the blade back out. And ran.
I watch in frozen horror as Shivhai’s finger squeezes the trigger. As the shot rings out, I brace myself for an impact that never comes. Slowly, so slowly, I see the pistol on the ground alongside a dagger.Mydagger. And Mirren, face flushed, running full speed toward me.
While I was frozen, she must have thrown the dagger and knocked the revolver from Shivhai’s hand. I don’t have time to wonder at her aim or her courage as she collides into me. Her skin is hot against mine, her face covered with tears and blood and dirt, but she feels so alive, I am reawakened.
The red that spilled over my vision at Shivhai’s voice clears. The Praeceptor’s cold laugh fades into the background. Three soldiers tear after Mirren and my mission becomes clear once more.
I spiral, down, down, down into that abyss. The fire feeds me again, burning, until I am no longer someone concerned with the boy I used to be or the man I will be tomorrow. Now, I am only the weapon. And I will have my blood.
* * *
Mirren
Dumi’s blade is like hot iron as it sweeps across my chest, but I manage to dance back before she can give me more than a flesh wound. Tears spring to my eyes and blood soaks my shirt. Anger lights her face, bright and deadly as she moves toward me. Lithe muscles line her arms and there’s no doubt in my mind that she can take my head off with one more well aimed swing. Her pale skin glitters in the moonlight.
My face sobers and if Dumi is surprised by the abrupt end of my blubbering, she doesn’t show it. Only continues to assess me as if I’m the threatening one in this situation. As if I’m the one holding the sword. And though I’m not, I’m not unarmed. I possess that which has always come so naturally to me. The bite of my tongue. “How wretched is your soul that you would deliver one of your own to that monster? To be used and beaten?”
Her face twists in rage. “Youare not ‘one of my own’. You are a Similian robot, raised only to follow orders and work your government’s fields.”
I raise my chin and straighten my shoulders. “I am a woman, like you. Like your sisters. Like your mother and aunts. How can you not see their faces when you look at mine? And you still fed me to him as if I were no more than cattle, and he, a lion. Just look at you. You stink of self-loathing.”
Dumi snarls, but her sword arm drops enough that I know I’ve hit my mark. That I’ve unsettled her. It’s all I need. I turn, sprinting toward the heart of the camp. The dagger bounces in my pocket as run, but I’m useless with it. I’ll never be able to outmaneuver three trained soldiers. My only hope is that I’m fast enough to make it to Shaw. And that he hasn’t left me behind.
Dumi cries out in surprise. Feet storm behind me. My breath burns in my lungs, but I can’t take the short way across camp or they will know the slaves are gone. I wind my way through the catacomb of tents. It’s only because I’ve made it personal with Dumi that she doesn’t alert anyone else. She will be the one to make me pay for the insult. As if erasing me will also erase the sting of the truth.
Her determination to be the one to capture me spares me for the moment but will be worse if she catches me. I pump my legs harder and throw myself around the last tent. My heart bursts in my chest as Shaw comes into view. Alive and whole. My relief is a palpable thing as it floods my chest but it’s short lived.
Shaw appears unhurt, but his normally caramel skin is leeched of color. And he is still. Not the normal stillness, a predator ready to pounce, but a heavy one. Like he is mired to the ground.
My eyes travel across the clearing and a cry escapes my throat as I see Shivhai. Bloodied and bruised, but very much alive. And pointing a gun at Shaw.
I don’t stop to consider what’s stopped Shaw in his tracks. Instead, I grab the only thing I have. The dagger. The soldiers’ exerted breaths sound behind me. I don’t break pace as I hurl the knife as hard as I can at Shivhai’s hand. There’s no hope of hitting his hand with the blade but knocking his trajectory off track will buy Shaw a moment to move. To fight back.
A gunshot rends the silence of the night. It can’t have hit Shaw, can’t have felled him. We are too close to the end of whatever this is. He survived the Boundary men and the yamardu, and it isn’t possible that something as mundane as a bullet will slow him.
I crash into him, with a force borne of both desperation and momentum, but he doesn’t go over. He is steady as he wraps his arms around me, keeping us both upright. My hands tangle in his shirt, searching him for injury. I cling to him, the camp a blurred whirlwind around us, praying that infernal grin of his will appear and he’ll save both our lives.
His skin is fevered against mine. He glances down at me once, his eyes pale and bright through his thick lashes. His lips part in surprise and something unspoken sparks between us. Before I can consider it, Shaw throws me behind him.
He yanks a sword from one of the unconscious soldiers littering the ground and snaps it up just as Dumi slashes hers toward his chest. The clang of steel rings out and the sound frees Shaw from whatever bound him. He spins and arcs and weaves, his long limbs moving in a graceful dance of blood. He glances over his shoulder as he swings the sword in an elegant arc, succinctly disarming the blonde soldier, but his eyes hold no victory.
They are fixed on Shivhai moving toward the pistol once more.
I propel my body forward, my mind straining against me.Hide, Mirren! Don’t put yourself in his sights once again.
But I can’t, because if Shivhai reaches that gun, it isn’t just Shaw that will die. It’s both of us.
I reach it just before he does, the metal cool and foreign against my skin. He roars in frustration and swings his thick arm out in front of him. I dance backward, the gun trembling in my hand. The wound Shaw gave him bleeds freely and I wonder if it’s too much to hope that he will just bleed out.
