All is ready. Await the signal. Do not hesitate.
Underneath, the initials: M. T.
She read through the rest of them, then shoved the notes into her jacket and stood, pulling the boy up with her. He resisted, but she shook him once—hard, but not cruel—and his legs obeyed.
“We’re going to the Caves,” she said. “If you try to run, I will make you regret it.”
He glared at her, but wisely stayed quiet.
The last switchback to the stronghold was choked with smoke. The air here was thick and greasy, making it hard to breathe without coughing. The first bodies appeared at the mouth of the lower tunnel—two men and a woman, all rebels she’d known by face,one by name. Elias, who had sneered at her at every opportunity. So, not only Maven’s supporters had hated her. Still, she wouldn’t have wished this fate on him. They had been left as a warning, slumped together in a tableau of defeat. Their wounds were deliberate and ugly. Alina looked away, unwilling to give Maven the satisfaction of her horror.
They entered the Caves through the old kitchen entrance, a low, cramped corridor that twisted and doubled back on itself. The boy tried to keep pace, but she was faster and surer than she’d ever been. The darkness was nothing to her now; she felt the shape of the tunnels as if they were mapped on the insides of her eyelids. As they moved deeper, the sounds of battle sharpened—shouting, the crash of stone, the crackle of the Gift turned wild and out of control.
They emerged into the first antechamber. The smoke had filled it so completely that the walls were nearly invisible, just the suggestion of stone in a swirling brown fog. Three rebels crouched behind an overturned table, makeshift spears pointed at the corridor beyond. One of them—Liska, the girl with that bright, infectious laugh—saw Alina and her prisoner, eyes going wide with recognition and relief.
“Liska,” Alina called, her voice slicing through the haze, more commanding than ever. “Report.”
Liska hesitated, mouth open, then remembered her training. “It’s chaos,” she said. “They’re splitting us up, isolating the Gifted and taking them out first. There’s fighting in every quarter. We’ve lost the mess and the main armory. Some people switched sides”—she shot a glance at the boy, who glared back—”but most are just hiding. No one knows who to trust.”
Alinanodded. “Where’s Kael?”
“Last I knew, the mess,” Liska replied. “He’s holding it with Marcus and maybe eight others. But Maven’s pushing hard. He wants the hall, badly.”
Alina looked at the prisoner, then back at Liska. “Tie him up and gag him. He’s a courier. Check him for hidden blades.”
Liska blinked, then scrambled to obey, calling for the other two rebels to help. They pinned the boy’s arms behind his back and trussed him with the efficiency of people who had been on the wrong end of an ambush before.
Alina wiped sweat from her brow, surprised at how clear-headed she felt. She was not afraid, there was no hesitation. She was at one with herself and with her surroundings, steady and sure. She could sense the tension in the stone around her, the way the very bones of the Caves shivered with anticipation. It was as if the ground itself was waiting for her to decide what to do next.
She could do this.
She moved through the corridors, letting the Gift guide her. She needed no light; she could feel the air shift before every junction, could taste the presence of enemies ahead. When she rounded a corner and found three of Maven’s loyalists blocking the way, she simply exhaled, and the dust in the air surged forward in a blinding, suffocating cloud. The men clawed at their eyes, hacking and coughing. She slipped past them, silent as breath, and continued toward the mess.
Everywhere she went, the chaos seemed to abate for a moment. In the heart of the storm, Alina was the calm, her mind focused needle-sharp on the path ahead. She reached the mess in minutes, walking right in with a measured gait.
The hall was a wreck. Every table was overturned or smashed, the floor littered with the wounded and the unconscious. On thefar side, Kael was pinned against the wall by a brute she recognized as one of Maven’s lieutenants. Seraphina stood beside him, a fanatic glint in her eyes. Marcus was nearby, bleeding from a cut on his scalp, but still upright and snarling like a wolf.
Maven was standing in front of Kael, saying, “Is that enough? Or do you need another lesson?” Kael’s head hung, eyes closed. Alina willed away her panic. She needed to stay clear and focused. Around them, everyone had stopped in their tracks, staring at her, but Maven was so intent on his target he had lost track of his surroundings. Only when she stood five paces beside him did he realize something had changed.
“I see you are right where you always wanted to be, Maven.” His head snapped around, eyes wide. For once, he had no mask in place, had no tailored comment ready. Kael slowly opened his eyes, saw her, and closed them again. He shuddered and looked at her again, still pinned to the wall by the brute. His face underwent several transformations—disbelief, relief, joy, love, fear—all in plain sight for everyone who cared to look. He started to struggle against the man holding him but could not get free, Gift apparently spent.
Having recovered from his shock, a smile crept on Maven’s face, and in that smile was every cruelty she’d ever known.
“You made it,” he said, voice smooth as silk. “I hoped you would.”
She stepped closer, every rebel in the hall following at her back.
Maven spread his hands. “Behold, the prodigal. Have you come to join the winning side?”
Alina shook her head. “You’re done, Maven. It’s over.”
He tilted his head, as if considering a particularly difficult math problem. “You don’t understand,” he said. “It’s never over. Power simply changes hands.”
She took another step forward, and the Gift flared around her, light and heat performing to her will. The rebels behind her gasped. Maven’s eyes widened, just for a fraction of a second.
“You want power?” she asked. “Fine. Take it.”
She released the Gift—not as a weapon, but as an invitation. The air in the room thickened, the stone underfoot humming with the energy of it. Maven reached out, tried to seize it, but the current was too much; it swept over him, through him, and for a moment he was illuminated—every vein, every flaw, every secret laid bare to the world.
