My ears begin to ring. My heartbeat thudding at my throat.
Several others in the saloon who had been seated silently only moments ago stand up and rush toward the Theorists, and the room erupts. Glasses break against the blunt edges of tables, then are thrust forward as weapons. Shouts echo along the low ceiling.
I need to move. Need to react. But it’s all happening in slow motion, time stuttering through me.
To my left, more shouts erupt; a woman yells something, but it’s lost in the din of too many voices.
My eyes flash to the barman and he’s reaching for something, a large piece of carved wood, flat on one end, and he wields it like he’s about to crack the skull of anyone who attempts to reach across the bar for him.
My heartbeat screams in my ears and I push up from the stool—this is my chance to slip out of the saloon, unseen, unnoticed. But when I try to push away from the bar, the tangle of men is too close, shoulders ramming into mine, shoving me back, crowding the space between the door and me.
Panic rises in my chest. My ears ring even louder.Too many people. No way out.The room turns thick with the smell of blood and sweat.
Only a few feet away, the shorter man who started it all—with the knife now against his throat—kicks Samuel in the knee, hard, a loudcrack, and Samuel staggers back, dropping the knife to the floor and cursing under his breath.
Shit.Too much happening too fast.
I thrust out an elbow, trying to force my way through the crowd,but I’m shoved back, my rib cage slamming into the edge of the bar top. I let out a weakened cry, grabbing my side—the same place where my ribs had just started to heal. But two of the brawling men are now right beside me, throwing punches, growling like feral dogs, and I can no longer tell if the barfight is between locals and Theorists, or just any man against any other.
I try to duck past them, under an arm, but a blow lands against my temple—a fist or an elbow, I can’t be sure. I spin around—the liquid-hot pain lancing through my skull—and I try to grab for the edge of the bar, the stool, but instead I’m met with the hard floor, facedown, with athud.
The air is knocked clean out of my lungs. And I stay this way for a half second, gasping.
My vision swirls from the alcohol, from the blow to my skull, from the clot of too many people, the sweat and smoke, and I reach up, trying to hook my fingers around something, to pull myself up before I’m crushed beneath the boots of these men. But one of them steps on my ankle, and I cry out. A shrill, guttural sound.
Then, as if the breathable air has been yanked from the room, everyone falls suddenly, strangely quiet—the entire saloon sunk into a dull, eerie, unnatural hush.
My eyes whip up, searching their faces.
The two men nearest to me have stopped fighting, blood dripping from the nose of one of them, droplets hitting the floor beside me, while the other stands with mouth hanging open, a bruise already expanding in the space between his eyes.
But it’s not just the two men gaping down at me; others in the saloon squint at me like insects buzzing toward candlelight. Even thewoman who opened the door for me, who ushered me inside, has shuffled close, thin eyebrows driven together in curiosity.
Then, her blue eyes widen in wonder, in shock.
“She has marks on her neck,” the woman shrieks, pointing a long, hooked finger at me, mouth stuck open, revealing her row of mangled and missing teeth.
Shit.Shit, shit, shit.
I scramble upright, touching the back of my neck quickly, tugging my hair over the mark. The tattoo. As if I could undo what’s been done, pretend there’s nothing to see.But it’s too late. When I hit the ground, my hair fell forward… exposing my bare neck.
Shit.
If anyone finds out who we are,Mom would warn,run!
But I’m surrounded, caged, eyes piercing me like ravens picking apart a dead rabbit.
“It’s a constellation,” the woman shouts so everyone in the saloon can hear, her upper lip curling on one side, nostrils flaring.
My eyes dart to the front door, but there’s no way through. The crowd is pushing in closer, shoulder to shoulder, trying to get a look at me, pinning me against the edge of the bar.
“Where’d you get that?” one of the men asks, and when I swivel my gaze, I see it’s him—Samuel—the bolo-tie man, shuffled close and gaping down at me.
The breath I had been holding in my throat drops into my stomach. Rots there. Turns inside out. Grows into something else: a ticking rage burning at the top of my rib cage.
But he peers at me as if he doesn’t recognize me—maybe he’s too drunk. Too many glasses of dark liquor swimming behind his eyes,too many punches to the skull.
Fear reworks itself inside me, takes on a new urgent rhythm, and I know I need to get out of here—away from this man before he remembers me. Before his boss appears and decides to finish what he started. I inch back against the bar, my breathing coming quick and panicked now, the pain in my ribs expanding into my chest. My gaze flashes through the crowd, searching for an opening, a way out. But they only move closer. Boots scrape across the wet floor, hands twitching at their sides—calculating.
