Hostage

by Rachel Manija Brown

  “Hey!” Ross exclaimed. “Can you heal my other arm?”

  Luis put his fingers to the long scar inside Ross’s forearm, and Ross gritted his teeth as blood began to well up. Then Luis snatched his hand away and shook his head.

  “It doesn’t seem to work on old injuries.” Luis sounded disappointed. He peered down at Ross’s side. His fingerprints stung and bled above the pale track of the bounty hunter’s bullet. “Yeah, that scar didn’t get fixed either.”

  Ross sat back with a sigh. He’d have had a better chance if he could use both hands, but at least he had the use of his right back. “Don’t worry about it. What you did was plenty.”

  Luis brightened at that, but only for a moment. “I’d get you out if I could.”

  “I know.” Ross hastily planned his next move. Just being able to think again, without being overwhelmed by pain and despair, was cheering. He indicated the throbbing burn on his throat. “It looks like you did your job. Tell the guards I passed out. When they come for me, I’ll pretend I’m still hurt. But whatever happens, I won’t let them take me alive. They’ll never find out what you did for me.”

  And maybe I’ll get another chance at Voske.

  “All right. When you make your break for it, I’ll act as surprised as everyone. I hope you escape! Later on, I can ‘find out’ that my real power is healing. And then I can ‘figure out’ that I accidentally healed you, but you didn’t let on.” Luis straightened up, looking less glum. “There’s no one with healing powers in Gold Point. Maybe if I fix his arm, the king will find better things for me to do.”

  “I’m glad.” Ross meant it. It made him feel better to think that he’d helped Luis, even if he couldn’t help himself.

  Luis started toward the door, then turned back. “Ross, I’m really sorry.”

  Ross heard an echo of his own voice after Opportunity Day, and his answer was the same as Luis’s. “It’s okay.”

  Ross curled up on the floor, pulling his arms and legs in tight so he wouldn’t touch the walls. He heard Luis knock and get let out. With nothing to distract him, Ross could once again sense the walls and ceiling of the hell cell pressing in on him. Terror set his heart racing and his body trembling. His chest tightened painfully. He was encased in stone, already buried alive. He couldn’t breathe.

  No. He could breathe. Luis had healed him. There was the same amount of air in the cell that there had always been. Ross couldn’t stop his heart from pounding, but he could remind himself that he wasn’t suffocating. He was just afraid.

  He lay still, fighting off the panic, hanging on to the hope he now had. When they came for him at dawn, he had to be ready to fight.

  Chapter Forty-Eight. Gold Point.

  Kerry

  Kerry hid the backpacks in the garden tool shed, beneath an empty feed sack. “Kogatana, stay.”

  The rat obediently curled up behind a barrel.

  Kerry eyed the wall a few hundred paces away. Could she really haul Ross over it before the sentries spotted them? It looked as high as the palace roof.

  Well, she’d have to.

  She dashed through the trees to the royal path. Have to, she thought. She didn’t have to do anything. She could go back, eat the dinner Mom had ordered for her, get a good night’s sleep, and tell Santiago in the morning that it was all a joke, ha ha . . . and then she’d head to the royal pavilion to watch the execution.

  She’d just see how Ross was doing. Nothing would be irrevocable until she got him out of the cell. If he was half-dead, she could finish him off. Problem solved.

  Promise broken.

  At the hell cells, she waved to the night guards. “I’m here to talk to the prisoner.”

  “You might have to poke him awake,” a guard said, laughing. “Luis just left.”

  “Didn’t let us in to watch the fun, either,” said another.

  Kerry forced herself to laugh with them, cursing herself for not coming earlier. Whatever terrible shape Ross had been in before, it had to be twice as bad now.

  She gave the guard a cheery smile, and held up her hand. “I’ve got poking equipment right here. If he can talk, I’ll take him back to the palace so Father can observe my interrogation techniques. If not, I’ll leave him here.”

  The guard unlocked the door. “Have fun, Princess.”

  Kerry stifled a shudder. Neither the guards nor Father had any trouble believing that she would enjoy tormenting a wounded, helpless prisoner. A month ago, she wouldn’t have questioned it, either.

  She walked into the silent cell. Beyond the grating, Ross was curled up in a ball, utterly still, his face hidden. His black hair fanned out on the stone floor. She could hear him breathing, shallow and fast, or she’d have thought he was already dead.

  The words she’d spoken to Mia came back to her: a hawk in a cage.

  “It’s Kerry, Ross.”

  He didn’t move. She crouched down and reached through the grate to grip his shoulder. His bones stood out stark and hard. Had Father starved him? He was shivering, reminding her of when she’d first met him, locked in another room without windows.

  Kerry shook him lightly. “Look at me, Ross. I’m not going to hurt you.”

  He shifted a little, so she could see his face. At first he didn’t look too bad: bruises and cuts, but no worse than if he’d been in a fight. Then he turned his head, blinking up at her with his long lashes stuck together with dried blood, and his hair fell away from a huge seeping wound on his throat. His shirt was more red than white, and his scarred left arm cradled his right arm against his chest. Both his forearms bore bloody fingerprint burns. And those were only the injuries she could see. What she couldn’t see was probably even worse.

  Nausea clawed at Kerry’s throat. She stared hopelessly inside the cage. There was no way Ross could walk. She’d have to carry him over the wall, get him on a horse, tie him on . . . They’d never travel fast enough to escape pursuit, not even with an entire night’s head start.

  Santiago was right. Killing him would be a mercy. She couldn’t imagine the Ross that Mia had described, who had danced and fought and mended engines. It had been Kerry’s father who had taken him away from that life, tried to break his spirit and, when that failed, broken his body. And Kerry had come too late to save him.

  She materialized a dagger in her hand. One blow to the heart. If Ross knew her intention, he’d probably thank her for it. But she couldn’t bring herself to hurt him more than he’d been hurt already, unless she made absolutely sure that death would be welcome.

  Kerry let the dagger vanish and laid her palm back down on his shoulder. He flinched, and she jerked her hand away.

  “Listen to me, Ross. I came to get you out of here. I’ll tell the guards I’m taking you to my father for interrogation. Don’t believe it. I’ll take you to the wall and carry you over.” By the time she was done, her mouth had gone dry and her hands trembled. Every word carried her down this new road, into an unknown future.

  Ross’s eyelids flickered in surprise.

  This is it. “Ross? Do you understand?”

  “How did you get here?” His voice was pitched low, but stronger than she’d expected.

  “Mia, Jennie Riley, and Yuki Nakamura helped me escape, in exchange for letting you go.”

  “Letting me go,” he repeated flatly, clearly not believing it. “Why?”

  Kerry didn’t know where to start. Because she didn’t want to be her father? Because Ross had saved Santiago? “Because I promised Mia.”

  “You promised Mia?”

  Kerry was frustrated at the doubt in his voice. What did he have to lose? “Yeah. Actually, Mia said you might not trust me. She told me to tell you something that only you and she knew about, so you’d at least know that she trusted me. She said that the first time you met, she asked you to pick up a wrench. She specifically said in your left hand. Do you remember that?”

  Kerry hoped she’d remembered it right. It didn’t sound at all memorable.

&nb
sp; Ross met her gaze straight on. To Kerry’s amazement, he flashed a brief smile. “Yeah, I remember. Okay. Let’s go.”

  Kerry unlocked the grill. Ross didn’t move. She got her hands under his armpits and dragged him out, then braced her feet, bent her knees in the proper form, and hoisted him up onto her shoulders. He was lighter than she’d expected, but still a dead weight. This was going to be murder.

  Ross lay limp as she banged on the door. It popped open, revealing three guards with identically surprised expressions.

  “He’s awake enough for questioning,” she said.

  “You don’t have to carry him,” a guard said hastily. “I’ll take him.”

  Kerry gave her an icy glare. “Do I look weak?”

  Three heads shook violently.

  “You three stay at your post,” Kerry commanded, tossing one the grill key. “The prisoner will be returned when Father and I are done with him.”

  The guards leaped back to attention. She tried to look casual as she headed for the garrison gate, but any watching soldiers had to be wondering why the princess was lugging a body. She hoped no one would dare send a messenger to the palace to inquire.

  The gate guards saluted, and the gate clanged shut behind her. Kerry’s back hurt already. Ross stopped shivering, and his breathing slowed. He’d just been afraid, not dying of shock. Kerry tried to be glad, but it was hard to appreciate anything with her back and knees on fire. The path to the garden, usually a brief, pleasant walk, seemed a hundred miles.

  If she could barely carry him across level ground, how could she ever get him over a twenty-foot wall?

  Once she was hidden within the trees, she headed straight for the garden shed. She knelt down, grateful to get the strain off her knees, and tried not to dump Ross on top of Kogatana, who had scurried up to greet her.

  She laid him down as gently as she could, then dug into the medical supplies in her pack. “Where are you hurt?”

  “It’s not that bad.” Ross stood up and stretched, wincing as he tilted his neck from side to side.

  Kerry dropped a pressure bandage. “I carried you all the way here!”

  “Sorry.” He didn’t sound at all regretful. “I had to make sure this wasn’t one of your father’s tricks.”

  “Santiago made it sound like you were half-dead.”

  “It looked worse than it was. I do have some burns, though.” He indicated his neck. In the unlit shed, the bloody wound looked black.

  Kerry breathed a sigh of relief. She wouldn’t have to carry him over the wall! Not only that, but if Ross could walk under his own power, the entire plan had a far better chance of success.

  Kogatana squeaked, as if she agreed, and trotted up to nibble on Ross’s boots. “Yuki loaned you his rat?” he asked incredulously, petting her.

  Kerry pulled out a bottle of disinfecting alcohol. “Yes. Hold still.”

  He knelt down and held his hair out of the way, so Kerry could clean the burn. His fist clenched around a handful of black hair as she pressed an alcohol-soaked pad into his neck, then relaxed when she took it away. She started to wind a bandage around his neck, but Ross put up a hand to stop her.

  “Tape it on. I don’t want anything wrapped around my throat.”

  As Kerry taped on a pad, she realized that he’d been using both hands. “Santiago said they broke your arm.”

  “Just bruised.” Ross flexed his fingers for her inspection.

  Maybe it was the dim light, but his hand didn’t look half as swollen as it had in the hell cell. So much for the splint and sling she’d packed, not to mention the bottles and packets of witch hazel, goldenseal, comfrey, and willow bark. If Santiago hadn’t exaggerated so much, she’d only have taken an emergency medical kit, and she’d have had room for four or five books, and maybe her second favorite gown.

  Too late now.

  “You were using your left hand, too,” she said belatedly. “Do you really need the gauntlet?”

  He held up his left hand, fingers curled inward. “I can use my hand more than I let on. But I can’t grip with it. I only got the gauntlet recently, though. I can get to Las Anclas without it.”

  “You don’t have to. I got it for you.” Kerry slid his backpack toward him. “Your pack, too.”

  “Thanks.” Ross strapped on the gauntlet. “So what’s the plan?”

  “I was going to carry you over the wall, then bring the horses to you. But we can save time if you crawl through the Joshua Tree forest. I’ll meet you on the other side. Our only chance is to get as far as we can before Father realizes we’re gone.”

  “How are you getting out?” Ross asked.

  “I’m the crown princess. Nobody questions me.”

  Ross spoke softly, as if to himself. “That’s right. They don’t.” He rummaged in his pack. “Oh, good. You got this.” He brandished a slide rule. “I have a better idea.”

  Kerry gave him a skeptical look. “You have a better idea? And it involves your slide rule. You’re going to math us out of here?”

  “No.” Ross tapped the slide rule against his palm. “I’ve been planning this for a while. I thought I’d need an army, though. But we have something better than an army.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You,” Ross replied.

  “What are you talking about?” asked Kerry.

  “We’re going to blow up the dam.”

  Kerry gasped. “You’re out of your mind. It’s got an entire company guarding it. Plus the maintenance workers.”

  “You can order them all to leave.”

  “It’s four hours in the wrong direction.”

  Ross spoke with more confidence than she’d ever heard from him before. “If the dam goes, the river will flood the power station. The power goes out for the entire city. The armory is on higher ground, but the gunpowder is stored in the basement, and it’ll all be ruined. If we blow up the dam, there won’t be any pursuit. And Voske won’t be making war on anyone for a long time.”

  It was the longest speech Kerry had ever heard from Ross. He’d obviously thought it through, but she couldn’t imagine blowing up the dam. It had taken ten years to build. The power plant fed by the water from the dam had taken another ten years. And Ross was proposing destroying them both in a single night.

  “How would you even do that?”

  “Santiago said there’s a road under construction between this dam and the one they’re building in those mountains over there.” He pointed to the east. “I’ve been hearing explosions the whole time I’ve been here. If there’s explosions, there’s explosives. I’m a prospector. I know how to blow things up.”

  Kerry glanced at the slide rule again. Now it made sense. “If you flood the town, innocent people will drown.”

  “No one will drown,” Ross replied. “You’ll order everyone out of the power plant. Except for the garrison, your entire southern end is raised farmland. By the time the water hits the town itself, it’ll have spread out so much that it won’t be more than a few inches deep.”

  “You really have planned this,” she said, amazed.

  “It was a way . . .” He stopped, then said shortly, “It was a way to keep from going crazy. But I never figured out how to deal with the guards.”

  Kerry opened her mouth to make another objection, but she couldn’t think of one. It was disconcerting to have her helpless prisoner taking over her plan, and proposing a much bigger and more dangerous one. But she was also reluctant to damage Gold Point.

  I’m no longer the princess of Gold Point, she thought. If the dam breaks, the army will be too busy for pursuit. And Santiago won’t be ordered to come after me . . .

  “All right,” Kerry said. “You take the packs. I’ll get the horses.”

  Ross didn’t move. “If you’re bringing horses, I want you to get my burro, too.”

  “Your burro?”

  He nodded. “He got taken from me when . . . when I first came near Gold Point. He’s in the corral for the palace work ho
rses, with the other burros. You won’t have any trouble picking him out. He’s the smallest one.”

  It would be hard enough getting the horses out. Why would a princess have any need of a burro, let alone any particular one?

  “We don’t have time for that,” Kerry said impatiently. “Leave him. He’ll be fine. Work animals are treated well here.”

  “I know. But I want him back. I’ve had him my whole life.”

  The desperation in his tone reminded Kerry of Yuki’s half-threat, half-plea to her to send back Kogatana.

  Ross saved Santiago, she reminded herself. Several times over. I owe him.

  “Okay, fine,” said Kerry. “I’ll get your burro, and I’ll get rid of the guards by the dam and everyone at the power plant. Meet me there.”

  “Got it.” Ross slung both the packs over his back, checked for sentries, ran low to the wall, and swarmed up and over in the space of two breaths, leaving Kerry alone with Kogatana.

  What had Santiago been thinking, claiming Ross couldn’t walk? Then she remembered that Ross had escaped from the scouts while he was blind. He was clearly a whole lot tougher than he looked. Yeah, real weak, Father.

  But here was another nasty thought. Ross could decide to run for Las Anclas alone, leaving her with no head start, no supplies, and all her bridges burned behind her.

  Mia had trusted her to free Ross. Now she had to trust him.

  At the royal stable, everyone was asleep except the night guard and the head groom. Kerry gulped in a breath and marched into the office. They both leaped to attention.

  “I need horses saddled for a night ride,” she said imperiously. “Owen, Bridget, Fiona, and I are taking a moonlight ride to . . .” What would be scenic at night? “Saffron Hill, to see the bright-moths dance.”

  “I’ll saddle the princesses’ and prince’s horses,” said the groom.

  Kerry bit her lip. She did not want three fat, elderly horses suitable for little kids. “They want to ride like grownups. I want . . .”