The Legend Trilogy Collection

by Lu, Marie

  Another explosion rocks the street behind me. The grenade must have come from one of the other Runners. Even though they won’t get the Elector to their planned location, they’re trying to block in the jeeps to make an attempt. Patriots must be running around everywhere. They’re literally going to kill me for what I did. Me and Tess have to reach the tunnel before they find us.

  I run up to June right as she reaches the Elector’s jeep. There’s a man inside with dark, wavy hair, and she’s shouting at him as she presses her hands against his window. Another explosion goes off somewhere, forcing June to her knees. I throw myself over her as debris and rubble rain down on us from every direction. A block of cement hits my shoulder, making me shudder in pain. The Patriots are definitely trying to make up for lost time, but the delay has already cost them dearly. If they get desperate, I know they’ll just forget about broadcasting an actual kill and blow up the Elector’s jeep instead. Republic soldiers are pouring into the street. I’m sure they’ve seen me by now too. I hope Tess is safe in the hideout.

  “June!” She looks dazed and bewildered, but then she recognizes me. No time for greetings now.

  A bullet zips overhead. I duck and shield June again; one of the soldiers near us gets shot in the leg. Please, for the love of— Please let Tess make it safely to the tunnel entrance. I whirl around and meet the Elector’s wide eyes through the window. So, this is the guy who kissed June—he’s tall and good-looking and rich, and he’s going to uphold all of his father’s laws. He’s the boy king who symbolizes everything the Republic is; the war with the Colonies that led to Eden’s illness, the laws that put my family in the slums and led to their deaths, the laws that sent me off to be executed because I’d failed some stupid goddy test when I was ten. This guy is the Republic. I should kill him right now.

  But then I think of June. If June knows a reason we should protect him from the Patriots, and believes it enough to risk her life—and mine—then I’m going to trust her. If I refused, I’d be breaking ties with her forever. Can I live with that? The thought of that chills me to the bone. I point down the street toward the explosion and do something I never thought I’d do in my whole life. I yell as loud as I can for the soldiers. “Back up the jeeps! Barricade the street! Protect the Elector!” Then, as other soldiers reach the Elector, I shout frantically at them, “Get the Elector out of this car! Get him away from here—they’re going to blow it up!”

  June yanks us down as another bullet hits the ground near us. “Come on,” I shout. She follows me. Behind us, dozens of Republic soldiers have arrived on the scene. We catch a quick glimpse of the Elector getting out of his jeep, then being hurried away behind the protection of his soldiers. Bullets fly. Did I just see one hit the Elector in the chest? No—just his upper arm. Then he disappears, lost behind a sea of soldiers.

  He’s saved. He’s going to make it. I can hardly breathe at the thought—I don’t know if I should be happy or furious. After all that buildup, the Elector’s assassination has failed because of me and June.

  What have I done?

  “That’s Day!” someone calls out. “He’s alive!” But I don’t dare turn around again. I squeeze June’s hand tighter and we dart around the rubble and smoke.

  We bump into our first Patriot. Baxter. He stops short for a second when he sees us, then seizes June’s arm. “You!” he spits out. She’s too quick for him, though. Before I can draw the gun at my waist, June’s slipped right out of his grasp. He grabs for us again—but someone else knocks him flat on his face before we can make another move. I meet Kaede’s burning eyes.

  She waves her hands furiously at us. “Get to safety!” she yells. “Before the others find you!” There’s deep shock on her face—is she stunned that the plan fell apart? Does she know we had anything to do with it? She must know. Why is she turning on the Patriots too? Then she runs away. I let my eyes follow her for an instant. Sure enough, Anden is nowhere to be seen and Republic soldiers have started firing back up at the roofs.

  Anden is nowhere to be seen, I think again. Has the assassination attempt officially failed?

  We keep running until we’re on the other side of the explosion. Suddenly there are Patriots everywhere; some are running toward the soldiers and looking for a way to shoot the Elector, and others are fleeing for the tunnel. Running after us.

  Another explosion shakes the street—someone has tried in vain to stop the Elector with another grenade. Maybe they finally managed to blow up his jeep. Where’s Razor? Is he out for our blood now? I picture his calm, fatherly face alight with rage.

  We finally reach the narrow alley that leads to the tunnel, barely ahead of the Patriots hot on our tail.

  Tess is there, huddled in the shadows against the wall. I want to scream. Why didn’t she jump down into the tunnel and head for the hideout? “Inside, now,” I say. “You weren’t supposed to wait for me.”

  But she doesn’t move. Instead she stands in front of us with her fists clenched, her eyes flickering back and forth between me and June. I rush over and grab her hand, then pull her along with us to one of the small metal gratings that line where the alley’s walls meet the ground. I can hear the first signs of Patriots behind us. Please, I beg silently. Please let us be the first ones to reach the hideout.

  “They’re coming,” June says, her eyes fixed on a spot down the alley.

  “Let them try to catch us.” I run my hands frantically across the metal grating, then pry it open.

  The Patriots are getting closer. Too close.

  I stand up. “Get out of the way,” I say to Tess and June. Then I pull a second grenade from my belt, yank out the pin, and toss it toward the alleyway’s opening. We throw ourselves to the ground and cover our heads with our hands.

  Boom! A deafening blast. It should slow the Patriots down some, but I can already see silhouettes coming through the debris and toward us.

  June runs to the open tunnel entrance by my side. I let her jump in first, then turn to Tess and extend my hand. “Come on, Tess,” I say. “We don’t have much time.”

  Tess looks at my open hand and takes a step back. In that instant, the world around us seems to freeze. She’s not going to come with us. There’s anger and shock and guilt and sadness all wrapped up in her thin little face.

  I try again. “Come on!” I shout. “Please, Tess—I can’t leave you here.”

  Tess’s eyes rip through me. “I’m sorry, Day,” she gasps. “But I can take care of myself. So don’t try to come after me.” Then she tears her eyes away from me and runs back toward the Patriots. She’s rejoining them? I watch her go, stunned into silence, my hand still outstretched. The Patriots are so close now.

  Baxter’s words. He’d warned Tess this whole time that I would betray them. And I did. I did exactly what Baxter said I’d do, and now Tess has to live with it. I’ve let her down so bad.

  June’s the one who saves me. “Day, jump!” she yells up at me, snapping me out of the moment.

  I force myself to turn away from Tess and jump into the hole. My boots splash into shallow, icy water right as I hear the first Patriot reach us. June grabs my hand. “Go!” she hisses.

  We sprint down the black tunnel. Behind us I hear someone else drop down and start running after us. Then another. They’re all coming.

  “Got any more grenades?” June shouts as we run.

  I reach down to my belt. “One.” I pull the last grenade out, then toss the pin. If we use this, there’s no going back. We could be stuck down here forever—but there’s no other choice, and June knows it.

  I shout a warning behind us, and throw the grenade. The closest Patriot sees me do it and scrambles to a stop. Then he starts yelling at the others to get back. We keep sprinting.

  The blast lifts us clear off our feet and sends us flying. I hit the ground hard, skidding through icy water and slush for several seconds before coming
to a stop. My head rings—I press my palms hard against my temples in an attempt to stop it. No luck, though. A headache bursts my mind wide open, drowning out all of my thoughts, and I squeeze my eyes shut at the blinding pain. One, two, three . . .

  Long seconds drag by. My head throbs with the impact of a thousand hammers. I struggle to breathe.

  Then, mercifully, it starts to fade. I open my eyes in the darkness—the ground has settled again, and even though I can still hear people talking behind us, they’re muffled, as if coming from the other side of a thick door. Gingerly I pull myself up into a sitting position. June’s leaning against the side of the tunnel, rubbing her arm. We’re both facing the space we’d come from.

  A hollow tunnel stood there just seconds ago, but now a pile of concrete and rubble have completely sealed off the entrance.

  We’ve made it. But all I feel is emptiness.

  WHEN I WAS FIVE YEARS OLD, METIAS TOOK ME TO SEE OUR parents’ graves. It was the first time he’d been to the site since the actual funeral. I don’t think he could stand being reminded of what had happened. Most of Los Angeles’s civilians—even a good number of the upper class—are assigned a one-square-foot slot in their local cemetery high-rise and a single opaque glass box in which to store a loved one’s ashes. But Metias paid off the cemetery officials and got a four-square-foot slot for Mom and Dad, along with engraved crystal headstones. We stood there in front of the headstones with our white clothes and white flowers. I spent the whole time staring at Metias. I can still remember his tight jaw, his neatly brushed hair, his cheeks damp and glistening. Most of all I remember his eyes, heavy with sadness, too old for a seventeen-year-old boy.

  Day looked that way when he learned about his brother John’s death. And now, as we make our way along the underground tunnel and out of Pierra, he has those eyes again.

  * * *

  We spend fifty-two minutes (or fifty-one? I’m not sure. My head feels feverish and light) jogging through the dark wetness of the tunnel. For a while we’d heard angry shouts coming from the other side of the mountain of twisted concrete that separates us from the Patriots and the Republic’s soldiers. But eventually those sounds faded to silence as we rushed deeper and deeper into the tunnel. The Patriots probably had to flee from the oncoming troops. Maybe the soldiers are trying to excavate the rubble out of the tunnel. We have no idea, so we keep going.

  It’s quiet now. The only sounds are our ragged breathing, our boots splashing into shallow, slushy puddles, and the drip, drip, drip of ice-cold water from the ceiling that runs down our necks. Day grips my hand tightly as we run. His fingers are cold and rubbery with wetness, but I still cling to them. It’s so dark down here that I can barely see Day’s outline in front of me.

  Did Anden survive the assault? I wonder. Or did the Patriots manage to assassinate him? The thought makes the blood rush in my ears. The last time I played the role of double agent, I’d gotten someone killed. Anden had put his faith in me, and because of that, he could’ve died today—maybe he did die. The price people seem to pay for crossing my path.

  This thought triggers another. Why didn’t Tess come down with us? I want to ask, but oddly enough, Day hasn’t said a word about her since we entered this tunnel. They’d had an argument, that much I know. I hope she’s okay. Had she chosen to stay with the Patriots?

  Finally, Day stops in front of a wall. I nearly collapse against him, and a sudden wave of relief and panic hits me. I should be able to run farther than this, but I’m exhausted. Is this a dead end? Has part of the tunnel collapsed on itself, and now we’re trapped from both sides?

  But Day puts his hand against the surface in the darkness. “We can rest here,” he whispers. They’re the first words he’s spoken since we got down here. “I stayed in one of these in Lamar.”

  Razor had mentioned the Patriots’ getaway tunnels once. Day runs his hand along the edge of the door where it meets the wall. Finally, he finds what he’s searching for, a small sliding lever sticking out from a thin twelve-inch slot. He pulls it from one end to the other. The door opens with a click.

  At first, we just step into a black hole. Although I can’t see anything, I listen closely to how our footsteps are echoing around the room and guess that there’s a low ceiling, probably only a few feet taller than the tunnel itself (ten, maybe eleven feet high), and when I put a hand along one wall I can tell it’s straight, not curved. A rectangular room.

  “Here it is,” Day mutters. I hear him press and release something, and artificial light floods the space. “Let’s hope it’s empty.”

  It’s not a large chamber, but it would be big enough to fit twenty or thirty people comfortably, even up to a hundred if they were crammed in. Against the back wall are two doors leading off into dark hallways. All the walls have monitors, thick and clunky along the edges, with clumsier design than the ones used in most Republic halls. I wonder if the Patriots installed these or if they’re old tech left over from when these tunnels were first built.

  While Day wanders through the first hall at the back of the main room, his gun drawn, I check the second one. There are two smaller rooms here, with five sets of bunk beds in each one, and at the far end of the hall is a small door that leads back into the dark, endless tunnel. I’m willing to bet that the hall Day is in also has a tunnel entrance. As I wander from bunk to bunk, I run my hand along the wall where people had scrawled their names and initials. This way to salvation. J. D. Edward, one says. The only way out is death. Maria Márques, says another.

  “All clear?” Day says from behind me.

  I nod at him. “Clear. I think we’re safe for now.”

  He sighs, lets his shoulders slump, then runs a hand wearily through his tangled hair. It’s only been a few days since the last time I saw him, but somehow it feels like so much longer. I walk over to him. His eyes wander across my face as if taking me in for the first time. He must have a million questions for me, but he just lifts a hand and pushes a lock of my hair into place. I’m not sure if I feel dizzy from illness or emotion. I’d almost forgotten how his touch makes me feel. I want to fall into the purity that is Day, soaking in his simple honesty, his heart that sits open and beating on his sleeve.

  “Hey,” he murmurs.

  I wrap my arms around him, and we hold each other tightly. I close my eyes, letting myself sink against Day’s body and the warmth of his breath on my neck. His hands brush through my hair and run down my back, holding on to me like he’s afraid to let go. He pulls away enough to meet my eyes. He leans forward as if to kiss me . . . but then, for some reason, he stops himself, and pulls me back into a hug. Holding him is comforting, but still.

  Something has changed.

  We make our way into the kitchen (two hundred twenty-five square feet, judging by the number of tiles on the square floor), dig up two cans of food and bottles of water, squeeze onto the counters, and settle in for a break. Day’s silent. I wait expectantly as we share a can of pasta drowning in tomato sauce, but he still doesn’t utter a word. He seems to be thinking. About the foiled plan? About Tess? Or perhaps he’s not thinking at all, but still stunned into silence. I stay quiet too. I would prefer not to put words in his mouth.

  “I saw your warning signal from one of the security cam videos,” he finally says after seventeen minutes have passed. “I didn’t know exactly what you wanted me to do, but I got the general idea.”

  I notice he doesn’t mention the kiss between Anden and me, even though I’m sure he saw it. “Thanks.” My vision darkens for a second and I blink rapidly to try to focus. Maybe I need more medicine. “I’m . . . sorry for forcing you into a tough spot. I’d tried to make the jeeps take a different route in Pierra, but it didn’t work out.”

  “That was the whole delay when you collapsed, right? I was afraid you might’ve gotten hurt.”

  I chew thoughtfully for a moment. Food should taste great right now,
but I’m not hungry at all. I should tell him about Eden’s freedom right away, but Day’s tone—somehow like a thunderstorm on the horizon—holds me back. Had the Patriots been able to hear all of my conversations with Anden? If so, then Day might already know. “Razor’s lying to us about why he wants the Elector dead. I don’t know why yet—but the things he’s told us just don’t add up.” I pause, wondering if Razor has already been detained by Republic officials. If not now, then soon. The Republic should know by the end of today that Razor specifically instructed the jeep drivers to stay on course, leading Anden right into the trap.

  Day shrugs and concentrates on the food. “Who knows what he and the Patriots are doing now?”

  I wonder if he says this because he’s thinking about Tess. The way she’d looked at him before we escaped into the tunnel . . . I decide not to ask about what might have happened between them. Still, my imagination conjures up a vision of them on the couch together, so comfortable and relaxed like they’d been when we first met the Patriots in Vegas, Day resting his head in Tess’s lap. Tess leaning down to brush her lips over his. My stomach tightens in discomfort. But she didn’t come, I remind myself. What happened between them? I picture Tess arguing with Day about me.

  “So,” he says in a monotone. “Tell me what you found out about the Elector that made you decide that we should betray the Patriots.”

  He doesn’t know about Eden, after all. I put down my water and purse my lips. “The Elector freed your brother.”

  Day’s fork stops in midair. “What?”

  “Anden let him go—on the day after I gave you the signal. Eden is under federal protection in Denver. Anden hates what the Republic did to your family . . . and he wants to win back our trust—yours and mine.” I reach over for Day’s hand, but he snatches it away. My breath escapes me in a disappointed sigh. I wasn’t sure how he’d take this news, but a part of me hoped that he would just be . . . happy.