The gorge is remarkably peaceful, the sound of rushing water and the call of wild animals our only companions, and for a while, I forget why we’re here as I take in the dramatic scenery, thinking about Polly and how much she would have loved it. I feel her presence everywhere, like she’s with me. Perhaps it’s just wishful thinking. I hope not. I like to think of her in a better place, not curled up in a ball in a bloodred room.
My reverie is quickly shattered when far in the distance a man howls, his cry echoing throughout the ravine and turning my blood to ice. It can only mean one thing.
The Lupines are coming.
19.
NATALIE
WE CUT ACROSS the river, wading across the cool water until we reach the other bank to try and throw them off our scent. My clothes are heavy with water, weighing me down, and it’s a struggle to keep up the pace with Ash. Only the knowledge that the Lupines are after us keeps me going, but every step feels like I’m dragging my body through mud.
“Ash, I need to stop,” I say after an hour, unable to take another step.
The Lupines howl again. The sound seems to be coming from both sides of the gorge this time.
“They’ve split up,” Ash says distractedly.
“That’s a good thing, right?” I say. “It means they’re having trouble tracking us?”
Ash doesn’t say anything. Instead he surveys our surroundings, then leads us into the shallow waters of a stream, I presume to cover our scent. We follow it through a crevice in the cliffs to our right, the water splashing around our boots. The light immediately dims as we enter the passageway.
The sandstone walls close in around us the farther we walk, making me feel claustrophobic. At one point, the passageway gets so narrow, we have to turn sideways to squeeze through the gap. Ash grunts as the stone scrapes at his chest, tearing a button from his jacket.
“Fragg,” Ash mutters, getting jammed.
I shove him with my shoulder, wincing as my arm collides with his hard body, and we burst through the other side of the passage. My eyes widen with surprise as we’re greeted by a natural pool inside a giant cavern. A large section of the cave’s roof has fallen in, so sunlight streams down on its glittering surface. Boulders and green thorny shrubs line the embankment, while silvery fish dart about underneath the jade waters.
We find a place to rest on the stony banks. I lay our coats on the ground while Ash removes his black headscarf, tucking it into his duffel bag.
“I’ll take the first watch,” Elijah says, walking to the water’s edge. He finds a boulder to sit on, and turns his back on us.
Ash and I lie down on the coat-bed, facing each other. Tingly sparks of electricity shoot through me, the way they always do when I’m close to him, because of our Blood Mate connection. He smiles softly at me as his fingers brush over my cheek, making my blood temperature turn up a notch. He closes the gap between us, and we gently kiss. This is all I need: him, me, like this. His hand slips under my top and lightly traces up my spine. I melt against him, my moan muffled against his lips.
“Ahem.”
The sound of Elijah’s exaggerated cough makes us both start. We stop kissing, and grin sheepishly at Elijah. He shakes his head, then turns around again. Ash holds me against him as we fall asleep.
In my dream I’m walking through the canyon, but it looks different: the skies are storm gray, the earth as black as cinder, the river rose-red with blood. The sight should repulse me, but instead I feel thirsty. Up ahead, Ash kneels by the water’s edge, drinking from the blood-river like the wild horses we saw earlier.
“Ash?” I call out.
He raises his head, and I gasp. His eyes are sickly yellow, his flesh rotting from his bones. He lifts his hand and points an accusing finger at me.
“You . . . did . . . this,” he says.
I shake my head.
“No, it wasn’t me,” I cry out.
“You . . . did . . . this,” he says again, then points to the river.
Confused, I glance down at my reflection in the glassy red water, wondering what he means. My scream echoes around the canyon as a monstrous Wrath stares back up at me—
I start awake, my chest heaving. I blink, trying to erase that image from my mind. The air is warmer than before, suggesting it’s close to noon. Have I really been asleep for a few hours? It felt like seconds. Ash’s arm is wrapped around my waist. His breathing is ragged, his eyes moving rapidly under his pale lids, clearly trapped in his own terrible nightmare.
“Stop, oh God . . . the flames . . . oh God, oh God . . . Natalie,” he says in his sleep, panic rising in his voice. “Natalie!”
“Sshh, it’s okay,” I whisper soothingly. “You’re safe. I’m here. It’s not real.”
Ash’s breathing immediately starts to slow. It breaks my heart that he has to relive his execution every night. I wait a few minutes until his breathing is back to normal, and then carefully move his arm, getting up. I walk over to the water’s edge, shading my eyes from the bright shafts of sunlight coming through the hole in the cavern roof. Elijah’s standing in the middle of the pool, deep in concentration. He’s taken off his shirt to reveal his lean, tanned torso, which glistens with water. I feel embarrassed seeing him half dressed like this, which is ridiculous, considering I’ve seen him completely naked before, when he was being held captive in Sentry headquarters back in Black City.
He’s bulked out a lot since then—which is hardly surprising now that he’s not being starved and tortured. His chest and arm muscles are firm and defined, his neck muscles thicker. The beautiful brown markings on his flanks continue down his narrow hips, darting below the waistband of his pants. If memory serves, those markings go all the way to his feet. I flush. Why did I put that image in my head?
He’s staring at the water with great intensity, his dark russet mane hanging around his face. His tail stirs the water around him in circular motions, coaxing the silvery fish to form a tight ball in front of him. All of a sudden, he thrusts his hand into the water and plucks out a fish. It flaps wildly in his hand, its mouth gaping. He bites its head, killing it, then tosses it onto the embankment by my feet, where another two fish are lying. Elijah wades out of the pool, his black pants slick against his thighs.
“What’s this?” I say, pointing toward the dead fish with the toe of my boot.
He grins. “Lunch.”
We sit on some flat rocks while he starts to gut the fish with a piece of flint, the sun beating off his back. Up close, his skin has a reddish hue, like the sandstone around us. It’s a stark contrast to Ash’s alabaster skin. They’re like winter and summer. While Ash is tall, Elijah is short. Ash’s face is long and angular; Elijah’s is square and strong. Even their lips are different—Ash’s pale and straight, Elijah’s scarlet and curved. I tear my eyes away, realizing I’m staring.
“I think the Lupines have lost our scent,” he says. “I haven’t heard them in over an hour.”
My shoulders relax. I hadn’t realized I’d been hunching them.
“I’ve never seen anyone catch fish with their bare hands before,” I say, nodding toward our lunch.
“My brother Acelot showed me how to do it. It’s usually the dad’s job, but . . .” He sighs, hurt flickering across his features. “He doesn’t have much time for me.”
I slide off the rock and sit beside him to help prepare lunch. I’m not keen to eat raw fish, but I’m too hungry to argue. My knee accidentally brushes up against his as I lean across him to pick up one of the fish, but he doesn’t make any attempt to move away. I squeamishly dig my fingers into the slit Elijah cut into the fish’s belly, pulling out its insides.
“You mentioned your mother was a geneticist?” I say, trying to keep my mind off the fish guts.
He nods. “Her work is mostly focused on xenotransplantation—”
“Xeno-what-now?”
“She transplants cells or organs from one species into another,” he explains. “Because there are so few Bastets left, organ donation among my people is almost unheard of these days, so she’s finding alternatives that we can use if we get sick.”
I think about the scar on my chest, from my own heart transplant when I was a kid. I would’ve died if Dr. Craven hadn’t ripped out Evangeline’s heart and given it to me.
“I like to help my mom around the laboratory. Well, I did before she . . .” He stares at his hands, which are covered in fish blood. “Do you think they’re torturing her, like they did with Polly?”
My heart stings, thinking about my sister. In all honesty, if the Sentry has Elijah’s mom, then I’m certain she’s being interrogated and tortured. It’s what they do. He doesn’t need to hear this, though.
“We’ll get her back,” I say, lightly touching his tanned arm.
He glances down at his arm where my fingers touch him, and a deep flush rises up his neck. He lifts his honeyed eyes and holds my gaze for a lingering moment, and suddenly I’m the one who feels too hot.
“You’re getting fish blood on your leg.”
I start at the sound of Ash’s voice. Flustered, I quickly drop my hand from Elijah’s arm. Ash is leaning against the cave wall, his thumb hooked in one of his belt loops. There’s a hard edge to his expression I’ve never seen before. I place the gutted fish on the rock.
“I thought you were asleep,” I say.
“Sorry to disappoint you,” Ash replies as Elijah puts on his shirt.
My cheeks burn. I’m not sure whether I’m furious at Ash for insinuating that something was going on between me and Elijah or embarrassed that maybe he was right, at least a little bit. Ash stalks over to the water’s edge. I go over to him.
“Nothing was going on,” I reassure him.
I try to take his hand, but he puts it in his pocket, preventing me.
“Why are you being like this?” I say.
“Sorry,” he mutters, finally taking my hand. “I guess it pisses me off when a half-naked guy flirts with my fiancée.”
“He wasn’t—”
Ash raises a brow.
“Even if he was, it doesn’t mean anything,” I say. “You know what he’s like.”
“Yeah,” Ash replies. “It’s you I’m confused about.”
I snatch my hand away from his, definitely angry now.
“You’re being ridiculous,” I snap. “Nothing happened. He was upset, and I was consoling him, that’s all. I—”
My words are cut off as we’re suddenly plunged into twilight. Confused, I peer up at the gap in the cavern roof just as the air around us starts to hum. My heart freezes as the Destroyer Ship slowly stalks across the sky.
They’ve found us.
We sprint away from the large hole in the cavern roof and slam our backs against the stone wall, trying to make ourselves invisible. The shadow of the Destroyer Ship blocks out most of the light, the aircraft’s engines making the surface of the water vibrate.
“Did they see us?” Elijah whispers.
“We’ll know soon enough,” I murmur, keeping my eyes fixed on the airship’s hatch. If they know we’re here, any moment now it’ll open up and a Transporter will come down to get us. We wait for second after agonizing second as the Destroyer Ship cruises by overhead. After what seems like an eternity, light floods back into the cavern, and the blue sky returns. It’s gone.
I exhale, my nerves shot.
“How many hours until nightfall?” Ash asks.
I check my watch. “Six.”
“We’ll leave as soon as it gets dark,” he says.
We sit down on the coats while Elijah finishes cleaning the fish. Tension bubbles between me and Ash, still upset from our fight. Elijah returns and offers some pieces of fish to me, but I’ve lost my appetite. Instead, I retrieve the portable digital screen from Ash’s bag and watch the news with the sound down low, not wanting to draw attention to our position on the off chance the Lupines are still in the area.
“I’m sorry,” Ash whispers to me.
“Me too,” I reply.
He loops his arm around me, all forgiven.
The three of us huddle around the digital screen. There’s been some fighting in Fire Rapids in the Black River State, plus three rebel strikes against munitions factories in Gallium. Roach, Beetle and Day are certainly sticking to their end of the deal by keeping the Sentry busy while we search for the Ora, but how much longer can they hold them off?
Eventually night falls and it’s time to leave. We gather our belongings, exit the cavern the same way we entered and wander along the river for a few hours, passing a herd of resting horses. I keep an eye out for any sign of the Destroyer Ship, but don’t see it anywhere.
Ash stops and points toward the cliff. “There’s a trail up ahead. We should follow it up to the top of the ravine.”
In the moonlight I can just make out the path snaking up the rock face.
“It looks very steep,” I say, concerned. “It could take all night to climb.”
“Why don’t we ride the horses?” Elijah gestures toward the herd of animals.
“You can’t be serious,” Ash says.
Elijah smirks. “You scared?”
“No,” Ash replies, then adds under his breath: “Good luck catching one.”
I watch, intrigued, as Elijah cautiously approaches one of the chestnut mares. The horse clambers to its feet, neighing loudly. He raises his hands.
“Whoa, girl,” he says in a strangely hypnotic voice. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
The horse scuffs its hoof against the ground, agitated.
“Maybe you should back off,” I say.
Elijah ignores me and holds the animal’s gaze. He gently places his hand on its nose, and the horse immediately calms down.
“How are you doing that?” I whisper as we approach him.
“It’s just a gift my people have,” he says.
I let out a panicked yelp when he lifts me onto the horse without warning. Elijah chuckles.
“That wasn’t funny,” I say.
“Your turn,” Elijah says to Ash, his eyes bright with amusement.
Ash clumsily slings his leg over the horse, somehow managing to clamber onto it behind me. The horse lets out a disgruntled snort, but thankfully doesn’t buck us. Ash slips an arm around my waist, taking the horse’s mane in his other hand. Elijah confidently mounts one of the other horses and rides off without another word. Ash nudges our horse with his heels. It jerks forward.
Riding a horse isn’t as scary as I thought it would be. In fact, it feels freeing, exciting, as the wind whips past my face. I squeeze my thighs around its flanks, getting a better grip. We carefully trek up the horse trail. This one is wider and better tended than the one we took to get down into the ravine, which is an encouraging sign. We must be near a settlement of some sort. All the way up, I keep glancing over my shoulder, expecting to see the Destroyer Ship coming for us, but it’s nowhere to be seen. Where are they?
The journey is much faster on horseback, and we reach the top within a few hours. By now the sky has turned from the deep blue of twilight to the empty black of night. Only the moon and stars offer any sort of light across the wild desert plains. The rocky landscape seems to roll on to infinity, and I start to worry we’ve made a mistake coming up here. Perhaps we should’ve stayed in the ravine.
“Which way should we go?” Elijah says.
“That way.” Ash indicates a spot on the horizon directly in front of us. “There’s something in the distance. It could be a town.”
I just pray to heaven that he’s right, because if we’re not out of the desert before the sun rises, we won’t survive long.
20.
NATALIE
I CLING
TO the horse’s mane as we gallop toward the buildings that Ash saw on the horizon. Elijah rides beside us, expertly steering around the rocks and brush jutting out of the arid earth, despite the poor light. He wasn’t exaggerating when he said he had a gift with horses. After several miles, Ash yanks on the mane, and the horse stops so suddenly, I have to fling my arms around its neck to prevent myself from sliding off.
“Are those what I think they are?” Elijah says.
“Yeah,” Ash replies flatly.
I look up to see what they’re talking about. Up ahead is the familiar ragged shape of Crimson Mountain, silhouetted against the bright, full moon. It’s a famous landmark of the Barren Lands, known commonly as the Devil’s Fork because of its three peaks, but I’m pretty sure Ash didn’t stop to admire it. Then I see what caught his eye. At the base of the mountain is a small town, and beside it is a forest of strange-looking trees. I blink, not understanding. A woodland in the desert? The shapes of the trees start to properly form as I continue to gaze at them: tall, narrow trunks, unnaturally straight branches. A gasp catches in my throat—they’re crosses. Hundreds upon hundreds of crosses.
We’ve inadvertently stumbled across the Barren Lands concentration camp, the place where thousands of Darklings were executed during the first war. My father described it to me only once, but there’s no mistaking what it is. He was responsible for sending the Darklings to the camp as part of the government’s “Voluntary Migration Scheme” at the start of the war, and the horrors he witnessed here eventually caused him to flip sides and work for the Darklings.
It’s one thing hearing about it, and altogether a different matter seeing it for myself. It makes me fully realize the true horror of the Tenth. That camp is large enough to imprison tens of millions of Darklings, humans and Bastets.
Ash nudges the horse forward. We’re all deathly silent as we ride through the forest of crosses. Goose bumps prickle my skin, but they aren’t just caused by the cold desert night. This place has the haunting feel of a graveyard, and I guess that’s what it is: a mass grave for thousands of Darklings. The wooden crosses are charred and covered in soot where the Darklings caught fire in the intense desert heat, just as Ash did during his crucifixion. They must have suffered terribly.
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