I sigh, reaching out to grab his forearm. “Be safe, brother.”
He clasps mine in return, his face burning with fierce determination. “You as well. If I’m not back in a few hours, don’t immediately panic in case I needed to do something to preserve my cover. But if a day passes, assume the worst and just abandon ship.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “Bull-fucking-shit are we leaving you in there. Just don’t make us save you too.”
He nods sharply before descending and settling in to wait. The waiting; it’s always the hardest part. Adrenaline floods our systems, making us startle at every stray noise. We want to fight, to get this over with, but we need to have patience if we want to pull this off.
Cai returns a few hours later, much to our relief, and leans back against the trunk. He swipes a shaky hand down his face, no doubt as relieved as we are. Not that he’ll ever admit it, but that place is going to be the star of our nightmares for years to come.
We were trained not to show fear, but that doesn’t mean we don’t feel it. And right now? Macho bullshit aside, we’re terrified. Scared we’re going to lose Ezra, that we’ll get in there and find out her brothers are already dead, or that we’ll be captured again. We’ve killed people because we were forced to, but that doesn’t mean we enjoy it. Ezra and Cai play with Legos in their downtime for Fate’s sake; none of us want to be here. But we will come, we will conquer, and we will get the fuck out of here.
“Then onto phase one.” We reach into our backpacks and pull out the world’s largest bottles of clear, liquid laxatives. “The well isn’t far, but we should still go in pairs so we can make it look like a guard rotation if we have to.”
We thread branches through the straps of our bags to make sure they’re secure before jamming the bottles as far into our pockets as we can manage while we make our way lower. They’re clear plastic with no label, so the hope is if we run across someone, we can just claim them to be huge water bottles.
But if we’re forced to take a drink to prove it, this will end terribly. We can’t exactly stage a prison break if we’re stuck voiding our bowels in the woods.
Soren and I pass by two men, but they don’t give us a second look. We manage to dump our bottles in the well and return without incident. Cai and Ezra are already gone when we return to the tree, but they are only fifteen minutes behind us.
“Any issues?”
Ezra shakes her head, grinning. “Nope. Now we just need to wait until morning when it’s almost guaranteed everyone will have ingested at least a little bit. I doubt everyone will be affected, but if it takes out a few, that’s good enough for me.”
We half doze in the branches, trying to preserve our energy. It didn’t take long to pick up on the guard rotation; two men running the perimeter near the main entrances, a pair passing by every twenty minutes. There have to be other entrances in and out, but primarily they hover near the one we escaped from and the entrance near the space used as a makeshift parking lot. All of that equipment, hauling in women, and supplies means trucks in and out since it’s too much to carry up the steep incline.
The sound of a truck nearby has us instantly on edge, but it comes and goes without any incident. We’re jumpy, startling at the smallest noise out of place, but at least we know no one will be sneaking up on us this time. After another couple of hours, it’s time to enact the next part of the plan.
“Come on,” she whispers, leading us down towards the cars.
We wait for the guards to move on and Soren starts tapping on his thigh, keeping track of the time for us. While he does that and stands watch, Cai and I flip open our knives, going down the line to puncture the coolant reservoirs on each of the vehicles so that they develop slow leaks. All the while, Ezra moves from one end of the cars to the next, heating up her hand enough to clamp the exhaust pipes closed. We didn’t want to make things as obvious as flat tires so that they would waste time climbing into vehicles to chase us, and waste more time when they overheated and have to climb back out. A few minutes can make all the difference when you’re on the run, and we’re not sure how we’ll be getting out of here, so need any advantage we can get.
Ren signals us we’re out of time and we bolt, getting far enough away to hide behind a few tree trunks before the next rotation of guards come into view. Once they pass, we circle back around, waiting for our opening before approaching the door.
With incredible precision, Ezra begins welding the door to the frame from the outside, making it appear seamless so as not to arouse immediate suspicion when the guards come back. It’ll be impossible to open, so as soon as someone tries, the clock starts ticking. But we want to funnel them towards the other exit to increase the likelihood they’ll use the vehicles and so we have a better idea of what direction we’ll be attacked from. I’m sure there are several other secret entrances, but we can only work with the knowledge we have.
We dart off again, taking a few minutes to catch our breath and reconvene. “Alright, you have the oil, Cai?” she asks and he withdraws a bottle from one of his pockets. “Perfect, time to smoke ‘em out.”
I grab her elbow before we start walking, kissing her hard as panic starts to creep in. “Stop freaking out, angel, everything’s going to be fine.”
She smiles knowingly, curling a hand around the nape of my neck to draw me down once more. “Phew, I feel much better now. You?”
I hug her tightly against me before knowing I have to let go, that we’re on a strict timetable. “Me? Not worried in the slightest. How could I be when the angel of death is on our team?”
She shakes out her hands, gearing up for a fight. “Take no prisoners, show no mercy.”
“Claw our way to the top,” Soren agrees, drawing his weapon, “even if it kills us.”
Cai locks eyes with her, licking his lips. “Because it takes more than blood to be a dragon; you have to be brutal, even when you don’t want to be.”
He kisses her, as does Ren. We’re all walking away from here, or none of us are. I steel myself, cracking my neck, and we break into a silent run.
We slow down when we get to the entrance, slipping inside the spider’s lair. They weave their traps, lure you in with no intention of letting you go, but we will burn the place to ash even if we can’t manage to escape.
Schooling our faces into unreadable masks, we march down the slope towards the central room, passing dozens of other men. No one gives us a second glance as we make our way through towards the tunnel we came out of the first time, assuming those cells are the best place to start searching for her brothers.
As we walk, she lets the oil trickle to the ground along the wall, creating a nearly imperceptible path. When we get the first off shooting tunnel, she stops, not wanting to make a clear path to us. She and Soren head down that way, pouring some at the base of a door down the hall and trickling back up to make a false trail.
We continue on in a similar fashion until our tunnel is the last that remains, knowing we need to make this one ignite as well so it isn’t suspicious. It will be more smoke than actual burning, and we hope that will be enough to obscure our actions and give the women time to escape. But when we’re done, it’s going to have to burn, no doubt about it. I just hope that Saige will be able to get enough women on board to help free anyone restrained before it goes up in flames, and that they find the courage to run.
