Cara
The dream did not begin with fire.
It began with certainty. The labyrinth opened for me as if it were waiting. Doors unlatched as I reached them. Corridors were straight and bright. The stone beneath my bare feet was warm.
And I ran, driven by some instinct that guided me forward, the way a hand might rest at the small of my back—not pushing, not quite—but making it clear which way I would go.
Ahead, a final door stood open.
Light flickered beyond it, golden and violent. Heat pressed against my skin before I reached the threshold, a warning my body understood before my mind did. My steps faltered.
Behind me, soft, familiar, commanding and soothing all at once: “Good girl. You’ve done so well. You’re almost there.”
My hand came up, bracing against the stone beside the doorway. The surface burned and I snatched my hand away.
The hand on my back was gentle until it shoved me forward.
I stumbled through into the arena, heat already beating on my face.
I turned back and the door was gone. I was in the center of the arena, sand sliding underfoot in soft piles. Fear stood thirty feet away, handsome in his light armor and cloak, his hands at his sides. He gave me a warm, approving smile.
And I burst into flame.
I woke with a ragged intake of breath, sweating against the sheets, the coin too hot in my palm. My fingers were so tight around it that they were hard to unfurl. I tossed the coin away from me desperately, heard it hit the ground with a clink, then roll.
I was so angry that I could not catch my breath. Terrified, too. Still terrified from the dream.
From what he had done to me.
Fear stirred restlessly. I put my hand on his shoulder, even though I could’ve sworn his skin burnt me, too, and murmured soothing nonsense in his direction that I did not mean one bit. I just didn’t want him to wake. Not yet.
I dressed in the dark without looking at him.
I needed to talk to someone who didn’t belong to Fear.
When I paced out of Fear’s room, it was almost dawn. Most of the barracks were quiet, but when I went down one floor, there was a flurry of activity.
Amber was packing. I heard it before I saw it: the soft sounds of packing, weapons checked and re-checked; the low murmur of shifters checking in with each other as they worked their plan.
Ander was in the corridor, speaking quietly to Nixi and Beck. When Ander saw me, he cut himself off mid-sentence and clapped Beck on the shoulder. “You’ll handle it.” Then he moved toward me as if I were the most important person that could have entered this hall. “Are you all right?”
I studied the packing. “There’s a better chance of surviving whatever punishment the queen has planned if we get free of the capital.”
“Yes. And she has even more reason to move against Fear.” He looked past me toward the Bismyth corridor. “You should stay close to him.”
“I needed to talk to someone who doesn’t owe Fear anything.”
He gave me a brief, assessing look. “You look like you haven’t slept. Are you all right, Cara?”
“I haven’t. Nightmares.”
He opened his mouth, and then his head turned, a fraction of a second before I heard it.
The shadows came alive.
Nightwalkers moved differently: too smooth, too coordinated, as if they shared one mind. There were six of them, and they filled the corridor in silence.
The blade at her chin caught the torchlight as Nixi’s jaw lifted with it, the line of her throat very still, her eyes cutting sideways to Ander with an expression that was doing tremendous work staying composed.
