Kilorn pants and sweat beads on his brow. He rips off one of his own sleeves, using it to bandage up Shade’s leg. Blood stains it quickly. “Can you jump?”
My brother furrows his brow, feeling not his pain but his strength. I understand that well enough. Slowly he shakes his head, his eyes going dark. “Not yet.”
Kilorn curses under his breath. “Then what do we do?”
It takes me a second to realize he’s asking me and not my older brother. Not the soldier who knows battle better than us. But he’s not really asking me either. Not Mare Barrow of the Stilts, the thief, his friend. Kilorn is looking to someone else now, to who I became in the halls of a palace and the sands of an arena.
He’s asking the lightning girl.
“Mare, what do we do?”
“You leave me, that’s what you do!” Shade growls through clenched teeth, answering before I can. “You run to the river, you find Farley. I’ll jump to you as soon as I can.”
“Don’t lie to a liar,” I say, trying my best to keep from shaking. My brother was only just returned to me, a ghost back from the dead. I won’t let him slip away again, not for anything. “We’re getting out of here together. All of us.”
The legion’s march rumbles the ground. One glance over the edge of the crater tells me they’re less than a hundred yards away, advancing fast. I can see the Silvers between the gaps in the Red line. The foot soldiers wear the clouded gray uniforms of the army, but some have armor, the plates chased with familiar colors. Warriors from the High Houses. I see bits of blue, yellow, black, brown, and more. Nymphs and telkies and silks and strongarms, the most powerful fighters the Silvers can throw at us. They think Cal the king’s killer, me a terrorist, and they’ll bring the whole city down to destroy us.
Cal.
Only my brother’s blood and Kilorn’s uneven breathing keeps me from vaulting out of the crater. I must find him, I must. If not for myself then for the cause, to protect the retreat. He’s worth a hundred good soldiers. He’s a golden shield. But he’s probably gone, escaped, having melted his chains and run when the city began to crumble.
No, he wouldn’t run. He would never run from that army, from Maven, or from me.
I hope I’m not wrong.
I hope he isn’t already dead.
“Get him up, Kilorn.” In the Hall of the Sun, the late Lady Blonos taught me how to speak like a princess. It is a cold voice, unyielding, leaving no room for contest.
Kilorn obeys, but Shade still has it in him to protest. “I’ll only slow you down.”
“You can apologize for that later,” I reply, helping him hop to his feet. But I’m barely paying attention to them, my concentration elsewhere. “Get moving.”
“Mare, if you think we’re leaving you—”
When I turn on Kilorn, I have sparks in my hands and determination in my heart. His words die on his lips. He glances past me, toward the army advancing with every passing second. Telkies and magnetrons scrape debris out of the street, opening the obliterated way with resounding scrapes of metal on stone.
“Run.”
Again, he obeys and Shade can do nothing but limp along, leaving me behind. As they clamber out of the crater, scrambling west, I take measured steps east. The army will stop for me. They must.
After one terrifying second, the Reds slow, their chains clinking as they halt. Behind them, Silvers balance black rifles on their shoulders, as if they were nothing at all. The war transports, great machines with treaded wheels, grind to a screeching stop somewhere behind the army. I can feel their power thrum through my veins.
The army is close enough now that I hear officers bark orders. “The lightning girl!” “Keep the line, stand firm!” “Take aim!” “Hold your fire!”
The worst comes last, ringing out against the suddenly quiet street. Ptolemus’s voice is familiar, full of hatred and rage.
“Make way for the king!” he shouts.
I stagger back. I expected Maven’s armies, but not Maven himself. He is not a soldier like his brother, and he has no business leading an army. But here he is, stalking through the parting troops, with Ptolemus and Evangeline on his heels. When he steps out from behind the Red line, my knees almost buckle. His armor is polished black, his cape crimson. Somehow he seems taller than he did this morning. He still wears his father’s crown of flames, though it has no place on a battlefield. I suppose he wants to show the world what he’s won with his lies, what a great prize he’s stolen. Even from so far away, I can feel the heat of his glare and his roiling anger. It burns me from inside out.
Nothing but the jets whistle overhead; it is the only sound in the world.
“I see you’re still brave,” Maven says, his voice carrying down the avenue. It echoes among the ruins, taunting me. “And foolish.”
Like in the arena, I will not give him the satisfaction of my anger and fear.
“They should call you the little quiet girl.” He laughs coldly, and his army laughs with him. The Reds remain silent, their eyes fixed on the ground. They don’t want to watch what’s about to happen. “Well, quiet girl, tell your rat friends it is over. They are surrounded. Call them out, and I will give them the gift of good deaths.”
Even if I could give such an order, I never would. “They’re already gone.”
Don’t lie to a liar, and Maven is the grandest liar of all.
Still, he looks unsure. The Scarlet Guard has escaped so many times already, in Caesar’s Square, in Archeon. Perhaps they might escape even now. What an embarrassment that would be. What a disastrous start to his reign.