Assassin's Maze

by Everly Frost

  Slade’s urgent voice meets my ears. “Can you fly?”

  “No! She’ll pull me from the air.”

  “Then, let’s run,” he shouts. “Don’t blur. I need to see where you are.”

  As soon as he puts me back on my feet, we jump the fence and pelt through the neighbor’s yard, leaping over the next fence into the playground beside it. Our feet fly on the pathway through the open area, darting around the play equipment. Normally, we would never wear protective suits without blurring, but luckily nobody is around at this time of night.

  The pull on my wings finally releases. I speed up at his side. “I can fly now.”

  Slade says, “Back to Saber Lane.”

  No arguments here.

  We dart into a copse of trees out of sight so we can blur and take to the sky. The wind rushes past me and relief floods me.

  As soon as we land on Saber Lane outside the bookshop, Slade pulls me close to check me over, running his hands over my back and shoulders. “Did she hurt you?”

  Trying to ease his worry, I attempt a smile. “I’m okay. Really.” My smile turns crooked. “Do I need to remind you that I can’t lie to you?”

  He blows out an exhale, his remaining worry still creasing his forehead as he draws me inside the bookshop. I close and lock the door and we catch our breath, both of us leaning against the counter. We’re more out of breath from shock than anything else. I don’t hear anyone upstairs so I assume that Archer is still at Tansy’s. In fact, they are probably having dinner at the Diner by now. We won’t travel west until tomorrow, so we have all night to prepare.

  The revelations from his mother are still sinking in. “You have the ability to control metal… and change it.”

  From the beginning, Slade had questioned how the rings were really made and how they carried so much power.

  He says, “It explains how the ringmakers were able to take the feathers without being killed when they touched them, and then to manipulate the feathers into rings without damaging the power inside them.”

  “It also explains how you tore an iron vault apart.” I run my palm across his cheek. “I’m sorry about your mom.”

  His shoulders hunch a little. For a second, the mask he wears to hide his pain slips over his features, but he shakes it off. “She couldn’t control her impulses. I understand now why my brother didn’t stay away from Amalia.”

  I tangle my fingertips in his hair. “But you did. You gave Amalia back her feather. You never tried to hurt me.” I search his eyes. “How are you different?”

  His expression becomes reflective. “I was drawn to Amalia’s feather. Just like I was drawn to you, I won’t deny that.” He laughs suddenly. “Wanting you in my bed in the dorm wasn’t just about needing you to watch my back.”

  I smile at him, warmth filling my stomach at the way he strokes my back. “But?”

  His forehead crinkles. “Tell me something, Hunter. When was the first time you touched me?”

  I think back. “Maybe in the men’s showers after Fallon knocked you out.”

  “You did something to wake me up, didn’t you?”

  I nod. “I drew out your consciousness.”

  His arms slide all the way around me. “I think you left a little of yourself behind. Is it possible that you curbed my power? Or at least gave me the ability to control it on a subconscious level?”

  I press a kiss to his lips before I tip my head back. “Not on purpose.”

  “Well, something happened.”

  “Maybe it was something I did, maybe it wasn’t. You made different choices throughout your whole life. You held Amalia’s feather in your hands and you chose to give it back. You chose to control whatever impulses you were born with, the same way I control my impulse to kill everything that breathes. We all make choices.”

  I withdraw my arm and pull the glass case from the satchel around my waist. “What will we do now? Your mom didn’t help us.”

  He smiles. “Actually, I got everything I needed.”

  “You did?”

  He reaches for the case. “May I?”

  He places it on the counter and opens the lid.

  He says, “Let’s see what I can do.”

  Without touching the ring, he hovers his palm over it, a look of concentration falling over his features. I step back, the feeling of having my wings wrenched from my back still too raw in my memory to want to be near that power again.

  When he lifts his hand higher, the ring rises too. He shifts a little on the spot, his focus becoming even more intense. The Keres ring lifts into the air between his two palms. He twists his hands side to side in opposite directions and the ring twists around on itself, forming a shape like an infinity symbol. When Slade draws his hands apart in increments, it stretches the ring until the shape separates. There are now two smaller rings floating in the air between his palms.

  He closes his fists and the rings compress, each forming a solid ball, which rapidly elongate and round out at one end, flattening at the other.

  With a satisfied smile, Slade allows them to lower back to the glass case, flat ends resting downward. His concentration lifts. He snaps the case shut and holds it out to me so I can see its contents.

  I consider the two perfectly formed bullets made from Keres power. “You did it.”

  “Two bullets,” he says, but he becomes very serious. “I want you to know that I will never use my ringmaker power on you.”

  “I know—”

  He captures my gaze, compelling me to hear him. “But I also need you to know… that I won’t use it on Archer.”

  My lips part. Of course. We need her to release her wings to open the maze. If we can’t get inside the maze, then I won’t survive.

  Slade could force her to do it. He could rip her wings out of her back but it would tear her apart.

  “I would do anything to save you,” he says, “but I will not break her.”

  Tears form in my eyes. “Whatever time I have left, I want to live it to the best that I can. I won’t give up, Slade. But I won’t make compromises either. We will find another way.”

  He rubs my arms, kisses me with soft lips, and rests his forehead against mine. Then he smiles. “We need Cain’s jet.”

  My senses light up. “Yes, we do.”

  Slade gives me a slow grin, confirming my thoughts when he says, “They have been apart for long enough.”

  A few days is a lifetime when you love someone the way Cain and Archer love each other. With a smile, I say, “Hand me your burner phone.”

  I lay the phone on the counter and put it on speaker. Cain answers with his Master Assassin’s voice, stern and uncompromising. “What’s wrong?”

  I say, “I’m calling in the favor you owe me.”

  “Hunter?”

  “It’s me. Slade is here with me.”

  There’s a pause. “And Archer?”

  “She’s safe, Cain. She completed her first mission today and I’ll recommend she be promoted. She fights as well as you said she does.”

  There’s another silence. I picture the phone held in his ever-tightening fist. “What’s the favor?”

  “I need your jet. There’s a chance I can be healed. We need to go west to Vlad’s territory—”

  “It’s yours. It will be waiting for you at the airport in the morning.”

  “Thanks, Cain.” I smile at Slade. “But that’s not the favor. When I returned your dagger to you and you said you’d help me… well… I’m not about to waste that on something you’d do for me anyway.”

  His response is cautious. “Then what do you want?”

  I inject as much steel into my voice as possible. “You’re coming with us.”

  Chapter Twenty

  We only take what we can carry on our backs: our protective suits, including one for Tansy and a new one for me, along with a few changes of clothes and our weapons—mostly tranquilizer darts since none of us is sanctioned to kill, although we each carry multiple daggers
and handguns. Tansy’s spellbook takes up a lot of room in her bag so I carry some of her things in mine. I also take my katana, and as a last-minute thought, I place the verdan plant in my bag too. I don’t know what we’ll encounter in the maze and the sap is fabled to kill anything, assuming I can access it in a dark environment.

  Before I leave Saber Lane, I say goodbye to Ridley. It’s an emotional moment. He doesn’t know all my secrets, but if I get through this, I’m going to tell him everything. If I don’t get through it… then I don’t want to die regretting my last words to him.

  “Thank you, Dad, for being there these last few months.”

  His response is a gruff hug. “Whatever mission you’re going on, just make sure you come back.”

  “I will, Dad.”

  He hugs me tight, clearing his throat, trying not to show his emotions. “Then give the fair lady hell, Hunter. For your mom.”

  “I’ll do that.” I press a kiss to his cheek and hug him once more before we leave.

  An early spring frost sparkles on the tarmac as we approach the jet just after sunrise. I closed out yesterday’s missions in my ledger last night, and then wrote a blunt message to the Guardian:

  You said Cain couldn’t see Archer again, but I’m afraid he owes me a favor that he is required to honor. We’re traveling into Vlad’s territory. No rules broken.

  Her terse reply came back to me: You’re testing the boundaries of the Code and my patience, Hunter.

  To which I replied: I’m Rogue, remember?

  There was a long pause in which I practically heard her sigh, and then she wrote: Be safe.

  Now, Cain waits on the tarmac at the foot of the stairs. He is a tower of muscle and strength but his black hair emphasizes the rings under his eyes, his features carefully set in a controlled expression. I guess nobody has been getting a lot of sleep.

  The moment we step out of the SUV, his focus is on Archer.

  She lags behind while Tansy strides ahead to greet Cain first. He gives her a polite nod. “Blessings on your power.”

  “Thank you, Cain. We need all the blessings we can get.”

  She glides up the stairs and inside the plane. Slade and Cain bow to each other, never taking their eyes off each other in the customary way. I, on the other hand, give Cain a hug, dropping my head to his shoulder for a moment. “Thank you for coming.”

  I walk slowly up the stairs, wanting to give Cain and Archer space, but I also don’t want to leave her alone in case it’s too much for her. She chewed her nails in the car all the way here, such a ferocious woman terrified of her own emotions and afraid to show them.

  She is completely blank, controlled as she steps up to him. “Cain.”

  His expression softens, the light returns to his eyes, and he takes a careful step toward her. He murmurs something in her ear. Not many men, let alone women, are as tall as Cain, but Archer barely has to tip her head back to meet his eyes. Whatever he said, all of the tension leaves her shoulders. She turns her cheek into his for the briefest moment, pressing her face to his in a gesture of trust. Before they move apart, he plants a gentle kiss on the corner of her lips.

  She spins away and hurries after me, her eyes downcast, but her body is… lighter, happier.

  She says, “Let’s go.”

  Cain takes the steps two at a time after us and tells us to settle in to the plush leather seats. There are eight, all single, situated on either side of the passenger cabin, grouped in twos that face each other. Slade and I take the two at the front on the right, facing each other. I indicate the set on the left for Archer. Cain sits opposite her. Tansy mumbles something about being the “fifth wheel” as she takes a seat in the back, but she smiles as she says it.

  “How long will it take to get there?” I ask, sinking into the immaculate seat.

  “Four hours.”

  I’m surprised. “Only four?”

  “This jet is the fastest on the market.” Cain gives Archer a secret smile as he says, “I like to travel fast.”

  I arch an eyebrow at them. I’d love to know what went on between them when they were together, but what I already know about Archer is that she’s an incredibly private person so I’m not about to ask.

  Taking a seat, Cain doesn’t waste time leaning across the aisle to Slade and me. “Tell me what I’ve missed.”

  By the time we land, he knows the whole story. He takes it in his stride, but his focus is frequently on Archer, his expression darkening when we tell him she needs to release her wings to open the maze. Slade doesn’t leave anything out, including his power to control metal and the fact that he could hurt both Archer and me.

  The tension inside the passenger cabin rises ten thousand percent at that point. Cain’s power swirls around him, a bright threat that increases with every word Slade speaks, until Slade says, “I won’t do it, Cain.”

  Cain doesn’t believe him. It’s apparent in every line of his tense face and coiled muscles, menace hanging in the air between them. He was prepared to fight Slade to the death for Archer. Judging by his response now, his determination in that regard hasn’t dimmed.

  He says, “Hunter will die if we don’t get inside the maze. You would do anything for her—”

  Slade leans in to the haze of power surrounding Cain, flinching against the biting pain but holding Cain’s eyes, his response barely more than an instinctive growl: “I will die when Hunter does. I want to believe that will be in a really long time from now. But when I go… I will go with a clean conscience.”

  I lean across the distance and reach for Slade’s hands. I don’t know what will happen to him when I die. In fact, I don’t know what will happen to me if he dies. Either way, we are living for these moments together, making the most of them, making them count.

  I say, “If we never open the maze, then Amalia will die too.” I give Cain a deadly grin. “Silver linings.”

  Cain leans back in his chair, his power fading, his expression incredulous. “You really mean that?”

  “I do. We do.”

  Cain says, “That’s why you’ve annihilated her operations.”

  I give Cain a pleased smile. “She has nothing in Boston now but an empty brownstone with a rose bush out the front. If I wasn’t worried about the people living next door to her, I would have destroyed that, too.”

  Cain considers me carefully for a moment before he turns to Slade. “Who will succeed you if things don’t go to plan?”

  “Ridley is looking after the Legion for now. But I’ve given him the name of my successor.”

  Cain doesn’t let it go. “Who?”

  “Lutz Logan.”

  Cain taps his thigh before he leans forward on his knees, giving Slade a shake of his head. “No.”

  Slade glowers at him. “You don’t have any say in it, Cain.”

  Oh boy, these two… I prepare to jump into the conversation when Archer speaks up, the tone of her voice allowing no argument. “Lutz Logan belongs with Parker.”

  We all stare at her in surprise.

  I ask, “Cain’s sister?”

  She shrugs at Slade. “Lutz won’t ask you for his freedom, Slade. That arrogant bastard doesn’t think he deserves it. It’s true: he doesn’t. Nobody deserves Parker. But nobody will ever love her the way he does. If you saw him with her… it’s like a monster protecting an angel. I’ve never seen a brute brought down by a single smile before.”

  Cain sighs. “Lutz protected Parker during Amalia’s attack. My sister has been through a lot. She trusts Lutz and he is… very good with her.”

  Cain takes a deep breath and speaks aloud what we’re all thinking. “Nobody on this plane is getting a happy ending.” His focus remains on Archer. “I want one for Parker.”

  Slade gives them both a helpless look. “Assassins don’t leave their Faction. That’s like inviting death to your door. Lutz would have a target on his back for the rest of his life. It would put your sister in danger.”

  “Not if you make him an
ambassador,” Cain says.

  “A what?”

  Cain leans forward again. “It’s about time we had better communication between Factions, isn’t it? We should each have an ambassador in the other territories.”

  Slade barely hesitates. “Done. Think carefully about who you send to the Legion, Cain.”

  Cain smirks. “I’ll give it some thought.”

  I laugh. “Don’t even think about sending someone to my territory.”

  “Not even your father?” Slade asks, quieting me with a disarming smile.

  I laugh. “Okay… I’ll admit… I would welcome my father. But I can’t reciprocate. There’s only Archer and me and…”

  Oh, Cain, you clever assassin.

  Cain gives me a hopeful expression, the most vulnerable look he’s ever given me. But he doesn’t say anything, doesn’t ask for what he wants: for Archer to live with him.

  Carefully, I say, “We have to convince the Guardian to sanction the whole thing.”

  Cain growls, “She won’t be the Guardian much longer. She has a year to hand over her title now that I’ve ascended.” He gives me a look.

  My eyebrows lift. Me? I give him a small shake of my head. Of all the choices for the best person to hold up the Assassin’s Code, it isn’t me. Won’t happen. And yet…

  I look between Slade, Cain, Archer, and Tansy, who has remained quiet. The relationships between the people in this cabin are incredibly complicated and astonishingly simple at the same time. We are bound up in rules, wound so tight around us that we can barely breathe. Cain and Archer want to be together. I want to be with Slade. Tansy… well… she won’t admit it but the further we fly, the more often she looks out the window as if the time isn’t passing quickly enough.

  We all want to break free.

  We all want a different way.

  But we’re all ignoring the fact that we’re about to go into battle and we don’t know who will be alive at the end of it.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The jet touches down in a private airport outside of Portland. True to Cain’s prediction, we arrive mid-morning, which will give us plenty of time to travel to the forest during daylight. We change into our protective gear before we land, but pull on everyday clothes over the top to appear more normal, ready to travel from the moment we arrive.