by Amie Gibbons
The first wore a sapphire, the next a ruby, and the third an emerald.
Was that significant?
The prisoners were strapped into the stockades, bent over and locked in.
But I knew more was about to happen, based on the crowds’ voices picking up again.
The first man drew even with the prisoners. He raised his hands and the crowd shut up.
He smirked.
He had power, and he liked it.
I hated him immediately.
He spoke to the crowd, pointing to each prisoner in turn.
Stating their crimes, maybe?
I don’t know why we were standing there watching.
Morbid fascination.
Like a train wreck, probably.
The girl was in the middle, and her explanation was the longest. Didn’t surprise me, since I already knew from my half vision thing that she was sort of part of the ruling class, which meant she’d done something big and bad.
Or something they considered big and bad, anyway.
Who knew what was against the rules or considered a crime here?
These guys could’ve been mass murderers or petty thieves.
Or something I wouldn’t even consider a crime.
Since this was some sorta feudal and socialist society, they probably arrested people for speaking out against the rulers and stuff like that.
The men took up positions behind the prisoners after the first one was done talking.
The crowd pressed in behind us.
Eager.
Grant got behind me and AB, protecting us from people pressing us into the wooden barriers surrounding the stockades.
More and more people closed in around the square.
They must’ve known there was gonna be an event here.
So they had some form of mass communication, maybe even something like the internet. Or they hung flyers or something.
Anticipation made my blood run hot.
But under that was a current of fear.
People out and cheering in the streets, but terrified of what was about to happen.
Probably cuz they knew one wrong step, piss off the wrong ruler, and that’d be them.
I sucked in a breath.
What was about to happen to these people?
Whipping? went through my head, and I shrugged to myself.
They wouldn’t need actual whips here. They had magic.
The main man cleared his throat, and the guards who’d walked the prisoners out, all wearing face masks and plain black uniforms that resembled martial arts gis, stepped forward.
We were a little off to the side, so we were able to see as the guards undid the prisoners’ bottoms and pulled them down.
Leaving them all naked from the waist down.
The young guy screamed louder, the anger taking on more and more panic.
My stomach dropped to my feet, and AB gasped as the three rulers stepped forward.
They were going rape these people for punishment.
Right here in the middle of the square for everyone to see.
My legs went jelly and shook so hard I was surprised I could stand.
“No,” Grant said in my head, hand falling on my shoulder. “We don’t need to watch, but we can’t do anything. There are almost a thousand Fae here. Pull out the compass, find Shawn. Don’t look, Ariana.”
I gulped hard, but there wasn’t enough moisture in my mouth to spit.
I wanted outta here.
Now.
AB made a strangled sound next to me.
And before I could think of saying anything, she pulled her gun, jumped over the wooden barricade, and shot the middle man, the leader even among the rulers, right between the eyes.
Chapter eight
“Fuck!” Grant snapped.
AB shot the next guy before anyone even moved, the magic silencer on it keepin’ it from killing our ears.
The crowd gasped.
Too shocked to do much of anything about it, apparently.
Grant grabbed the wooden plank that was about as tall as his hips, and pulled.
It didn’t budge.
He lifted his leg to step over it and stopped like a wall was in his way.
I tried as he dropped his leg and pulled out his gun.
I couldn’t get over either.
A magic blocker.
And AB hadn’t even paused.
So Emily had been right about that.
AB shot at the third guy as he whirled, missed, and she shot him as he raised his hands.
Grant shot at one of the guards.
And the bullet ricocheted off the shield down into the ground.
I couldn’t breathe as I pulled my gun, turning on the crowd.
To keep them back, but also cuz I couldn’t watch AB in there.
She was on her own, cuz we couldn’t get through.
And I was shaking so hard, imagining what’d happen if they captured her.
Or us.
The crowd backed away from us.
Nobody wanting to mess with the guns?
Or maybe relieved somebody had intervened?
I swear I felt some of that coming off the crowd.
The guy screaming was still going, but he sounded a lot happier, cheering instead of panicking.
AB’s gun went off.
Three times in quick clips.
I risked a glance over my shoulder to see she’d shot off the locks.
The prisoners were lurching out, struggling to get their pants up.
The woman nodded once at AB and ran to the fallen rulers.
I looked back in front of me, making sure nobody was coming from this way.
If any of them were inclined to stop us, none were trying.
They may’ve been here for the spectacle of the punishment, but they weren’t upset it’d been stopped.
I glanced back, and the guy was saying something to AB, pushing her shoulder to get her moving back toward us.
The woman had taken the three necklaces and ran to the back of the square.
She paused at the back, holding up one of the necklaces and blasting a hole through the wood.
Breaking the spell blocking the square off.
The guy yelled, pumping his fist in the air and blasting the chains off his legs.
So the square blocked any magic done inside it except by those gems?
Made sense.
The old man blasted his chains off, and he ran slowly to the edge of the square where the woman with the necklaces had gone.
He disappeared up the street.
AB and the guy hopped over the wood and she pointed to me and Grant.
“Thank you!” he said in perfectly generic American English. “We gotta run!”
Guards were coming out of the building he’d been marched from and we didn’t have to be told twice.
He took up the front, pushing through Fae and using magic here and there to get them outta the way.
AB was right behind him, then me and Grant.
The crowds didn’t try to stop us.
They didn’t like their leaders any more than anyone with a ruling class would.
They wouldn’t help us, but if we shoved through the crowd and got away, well, it wasn’t like the rulers could punish them all, right?
Some fear rubbed off on me as someone thought the rulers might randomly choose people from the crowd to punish.
Especially since a few were dead.
That wasn’t supposed to happen.
It’d happened so fast and with no warning, so we were able to get a good head start.
We broke through the crowd when we were halfway down another alleyway.
The guy turned on the speed.
We ran after him, my little legs getting tired way too fast.
My breaths came in ragged bursts as we followed him, plowing through different alleys, across the side of another square, and down another street so slim we had to run more carefully.
; He finally came to a stop in an empty alley with no doors on either side, bending at the waist and gasping for air.
Lookin’ like he was two seconds from passing out.
AB sat down hard next to him, leaning against the wall and gasping.
Eyes staring straight ahead.
I could almost hear her wondering what she’d just done.
She hadn’t thought.
Hadn’t planned.
Just saw what was about to happen and reacted.
She couldn’t let it happen to those people.
No matter how stupid it was.
Cuz she hadn’t thought.
And now, I didn’t need to be able to see into her head to know she was berating herself.
“You guys have any water or food?” the guy gasped. “They’ve had me for like three days. And they aren’t big on feeding prisoners here.”
I nodded, sitting down next to AB and pulling off my pack.
He took the bottle I offered him with a grim smile, and chugged it.
I held up a food bar, and he looked like he was about to cry as he took it.
“You guys are my saviors, really,” he said after his first big bite. “What are you doing here? Did my family send you to rescue me?”
We looked at each other and Grant finally said. “No. We saw what was about to happen, and she couldn’t leave it alone.” He nodded at AB.
“Thank you,” he said to AB, shooting Grant a glare. “So you were going to stand there and let me get raped?”
“We were outnumbered,” I said as Grant glared at him. “We didn’t want to let it happen, but we just blew our cover. Why do you speak English?”
“Oh, I was raised in America. My mom smuggled me out when I was a kid. That’s why I was arrested. We didn’t have permission to leave. My mom was captured a few years ago.”
He went white as his eyes flew wide.
“I… I tried breaking in here to save her back then, but I didn’t have the power. You don’t think…?”
He ran forward a few steps and fell to his knees, puking up water and bile.
My stomach lurched and I covered my ears.
With everything as raw as it was, I was two seconds from joinin’ him at just the sound of him throwing up.
He crawled back to us, gasping as his eyes filled with tears.
“What if they… did that to my mom?” he asked. “I figured she’d been put in jail, but this…”
“You didn’t know they did this?” AB asked, voice so light I worried she might be about to pass out.
He shook his head.
“How old were you when you left?”
“Five,” he said. “Too young to remember much about this place, except it sucked.” He looked between us.
Eyes finally settling on me.
“Can you get me back to Earth?” he asked me.
Oh, crap.
After this, we couldn’t leave him.
I nodded. “But we still have a fugitive to find. That’s why we’re here. Oh! I’m-”
“No names!” Grant and the guy snapped as one.
I jerked back.
“Names have power,” the guy said. “You don’t know who could be listening.”
I nodded. “Right. I knew that.”
“Can you get me out now?” he asked. “I get it, you’re here on a mission, but can you send me back? I can’t stand this place. It’s like my skin is crawling, and I’m sick from being so scared.”
His head jerked up like he’d heard something.
“Fuck!” he said. “We need to keep moving. Get out of the city before we try anything. They’re trying to find us.”
“Us, or you?” Grant asked.
He glared at Grant as he found his feet again. “Me, okay? They’ve got my magical scent, and they’re on it like fucking bloodhounds. But you guys saved me, so I’m guessing you don’t want them to get me again. Get me out of here, and they can’t track me. So they won’t be able to find you either.”
Grant looked like he was thinking some very deep thoughts.
“What is it, sir?” I asked mentally.
“How long would it take you to open a door back home?”
“No clue. I got us in here pretty easy.”
“But that was after we set up.”
“Good point. Took AB a while to set up with all the calculations. So, let’s say like twenty minutes to make sure everything’s set up correctly?”
“Asking or telling, Ryder?”
“Guessing.”
“We’re miles in.”
I nodded. “Yeah. They’re going to find us before we get out or set up.”
“How do you know?”
I shrugged. “Just know. We need to do somethin’, and I can’t think. I think I’m in shock.”
“Are you two talking?” the guy asked.
Oh, right, he and AB were still here.
AB was leaning against the building, eyes closed.
She was breathing hard.
“Um, can we say nicknames?” I asked.
“Those should be okay,” the guy said. “It’s real names that have power. And not just your name, but the way you say it, the pronunciation and all that crap.”
“Okay,” I said. “Then call me Ari. And that’s AB.”
“You can call me, er…” He paused. “I never really had a nickname. I guess we can use my middle name? Call me Ed.”
“Now that that’s settled,” I said, “AB, you okay?”
“Was there magic around those stockades?” AB asked slowly after a moment. “Is that why you guys didn’t come after me?”
“Yes,” Grant said.
AB didn’t move, but her breath rushed out. “Okay. I… I thought you’d come in behind me. I mean, I didn’t actually think, but once I started thinking… I realized you guys didn’t come after me.”
“We tried,” Grant said, keeping his voice soft.
“The woman broke the spell,” Ed said. “They were able to get through after that.”
“I didn’t even think,” AB whispered. “I’m so stupid. I can’t believe I did that.”
“You saved me,” Ed said. “You are a fucking warrior princess to me.”
AB didn’t so much as crack her eyes, let alone a smile.
“You saved them, AB,” I said. “And you were a fantastic shot.”
“Yeah. All those days at the shooting range paying off,” she said. “Guess Thomas was good for something.”
“Huh?” Ed and I asked at once.
“I hit the shooting range when he upset me. I got a lot of practice last year. I mean, at first we went together, but then, after everything fell apart, I went alone. It made me feel better.”
“What do we do?” I asked, looking around. “Only a matter of time before they find us.”
“I’m scrambling our signal,” Ed said, making a face. “At least, I think I am. Magic here’s a little weird.”
“Can you buy us twenty minutes?” I asked.
“No clue,” he said. “I’m not even sure we shouldn’t still be running right now.”
“I can’t run much more,” AB said.
“Me neither,” I said.
“Where’d you come in?” Ed asked.
“Main gates,” I said.
He gave me a look. “There’s a few of those around the island.”
“Oh. Ummmm.”
“That way,” Grant pointed behind us. “We came in by a garden. I can take us back the way we came to get out.”
“Magic breadcrumbs?” Ed scoffed.
Grant stared him down and Ed gulped.
“Photographic memory,” I said.
“What do I call you?” Ed asked, looking at the ground.
Grant looked at me. “General.”
I snorted.
That’d been my nickname for him.
Tears welled up and I slammed a hand over my mouth as I sobbed.
And suddenly I was sinking to the ground, cryin’ my eyes out.
“Ari!” AB slammed to her knees next to me and pulled me into a hug.
I cried.
Just needed a minute.
One minute to fall apart.
AB didn’t say anything, just stroked the top of my hair.
“I don’t even know why,” I said after a few deep breaths. “I just needed to.”
“It’s the stress,” AB said. “You can’t hold it together that well without falling apart at some point, letting some of the pressure out.”
“We need to move,” Grant said, his voice soft.
I sniffed, and AB pulled a packet of tissues outta her pocket and passed it to me.
I nodded my thanks, blew my nose, and gave the packet back. I put the tissue in one of my pack’s pockets and slid it on my back.
“Anyone else thinking getting out of here and saying forget this job would be a good idea?” AB asked.
I shook my head. “I was hired for a job. And… now that I’ve seen this place…”
“We can’t do anything, Ari,” Grant said.
My heart skipped a beat.
I liked that nickname coming from him.
“We have the bomb,” I said carefully.
AB gasped.
“Fuck yeah!” Ed said after a moment. “I like you guys! Blow up the palace. The people outside it wouldn’t be complaining. They might even take it as a sign and finally revolt.”
“How powerful is the bomb?” Grant asked.
I shrugged.
“Not big enough to take out a palace,” AB said. “Well, depends how big the palace is, but I’m guessing it’s big. But you put it next to a room during a meeting, like if they have some kind of Parliament or Congress, it’d do some damage.”
“Why?” Grant asked.
No inflection.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Why use the bomb?” he asked. “We track down our target, get him and Ed out, and leave. This isn’t our world.”
“And?” I asked. “Maybe if they have stuff goin’ on here, they’ll stop trying to invade our world. Or we’ll help the people here. The good ones, I mean.”
“It’s not that simple, Ari,” Grant said.
Pity shone from his eyes.
I shook my head.
“It’s not for us to decide how these people should run their country or live their lives. We kill in self-defense, that’s one thing, but we’re the invaders here. We came to their world and started killing.”
I raised my eyebrows. “So in this scenario, we’re the bad guys?”