Firstborn

by Tosca Lee

  He’s silent for a moment before he says, “I proved my loyalty ten years ago.”

  I hope he doesn’t see my shudder.

  “You said you volunteered to take out Luka after he turned traitor. What happened to ‘one mark, one hunter’?”

  He sighs. “A hunter has only five years to make a kill.”

  “I’ve heard.” Luka and I had three years left once. It was the reason we fought; he was willing to settle for the time we had left. I wasn’t.

  “If he fails, a more seasoned hunter may be brought in before that, depending on the value of the mark.”

  I didn’t know that detail. I wonder if Luka does.

  “I volunteered to prove myself of further service. It was my best chance of getting to you before anyone else could. You know my mission has always been about you. As far as I can tell, you’re the last surviving Firstborn female. Which makes you the most powerful of your line.”

  But I’m not the last. Which is why I had to erase every trace of Eva to hide her from both the Scions and power-hungry Progeny like Nikola. Why I’ll never be able to return for her as long as the Scions exist.

  By 5:45 A.M., we’ve driven to the outskirts of Neunkirchen, Austria, and parked along a side road in a copse of trees. My calm of last night thins with each passing moment.

  At 5:59, Rolan assembles the phone. The feed rings through ten seconds later.

  Luka, appearing tense in the same chair. This time, however, he’s not gagged. His eye, swollen shut for days, has opened. He stares at the camera, and I sense he’s memorizing my face.

  “The scar on my elbow. How’d I get it?” I say without preamble.

  Silence.

  “The scar on my elbow,” I start again. When he makes no sound, the camera tilts, drifts across the floor. A thud against flesh. A stifled grimace. The camera pans up, directly into his face at close range.

  He won’t answer. He’s refusing.

  He wants me to cut and run.

  “I know what the numbers mean,” I say suddenly. “The tattoo. I know what it is.”

  He blinks, inhales sharply.

  “Run, Audra! They’re going to kill you!” he shouts.

  “I’ll send instructions,” I say and click off.

  Rolan dismantles the phone.

  My next call is made on a new burner phone picked up in Graz.

  “I take it you are satisfied,” the voice says by way of answer.

  “You will transport Luka to Vienna by eight A.M.”

  “Impossible.”

  “Then the diary disappears. If Luka is not alive, the diary disappears. Vienna, eight A.M. I will call you with instructions.”

  I click off and pull apart the phone.

  “Find us a hardware store,” I say.

  We stop along the E59 just outside Vienna. At 7:36, Jester pings.

  There are 11 Vadasz trucks inside the city limits. 4 entered the city in the last half hour.

  I pull up a map of Vienna, but I’m really only familiar with one area of the city.

  That I remember, anyway.

  At 8:00 A.M., I call from a second burner phone.

  “Yes,” the voice on the other end says. The syllable is clipped, the indolent drawl gone.

  “The intersection of Auerspergstrasse and Josefsgasse, in fifteen minutes.”

  I hang up, count to sixty, and call Jester back.

  “Anything?”

  “A truck just pulled onto Donaufelder Strasse, across the river. It was the last one to enter the city.”

  “That’s got to be the one.”

  We leave the car, and I persuade the next large vehicle we see—some kind of produce truck—to pull over.

  Get out. You’re the one millionth driver to pass this stretch of road.

  The driver emerges from the truck, looking confused.

  How do you like your new Citroën?

  He takes the keys like he’s just won a showcase showdown, grabs me, and hugs me while jumping up and down.

  Sixty seconds later, we’re speeding toward Vienna.

  “Where’s the truck?” I ask Jester, the minute we enter the city.

  “Crossing the river. Arriving in twelve minutes. I’ve got them on street camera.”

  I glance at Rolan, pull my hat down lower on my head.

  We pull off the highway, and I grab the hardware store bag from the back before giving him a quick hug.

  “Thank you, Rolan. Sorry you’re dead. I’ll see you in a few.”

  “I hope,” he says.

  Positivity has never been one of his strong points.

  I get out of the truck and start down a side street, head lowered, phone held to my cheek.

  “I see you,” Jester says, her end on speakerphone.

  “Just in case any of this goes sideways, I love you guys,” I say.

  “Don’t say that.” Claudia, in the background.

  “I’m sorry for leaving you before, Claudia,” I add.

  “Shut up!” she says. “Don’t you dare say ‘good-bye.’ ”

  I smile slightly, and jog toward a man in a business suit getting into a VW station wagon.

  I need your keys.

  Only when I get in the car do I realize it’s a manual transmission.

  The clutch grinds, and I chug toward Highway 1.

  “What is that horrible sound?” Claudia says.

  “You have to push the clutch at the same time that you shift,” Piotrek says, voice ringing out from the phone on my passenger seat.

  “No kidding.”

  “Vadasz truck, turning left onto Landegerichtstrasse,” Jester says. I grimace in an effort to recall the map while shifting gears. Landegerichtstrasse turns into Auerspergstrasse in five blocks.

  “Rolan is thirty seconds out. Audra, accelerate.”

  “I’m hitting a red light—”

  “Run it.”

  A car narrowly misses me, careens into a vehicle to my right. I gun the engine, tachometer fluttering in the red, and hit greens for three blocks.

  A phone buzzes in the background on the other end. I hear Jester pick up the call, her swift flurry of French.

  “Audra,” she says a few seconds later. “Turn around!”

  “What?”

  “Turn around! Get out!”

  “I can’t just turn around!”

  “There are three gunmen on roofs at the intersection!”

  “I’ll take care of them.”

  “You can’t even see them!”

  “Just get me to the intersection!”

  “Audra.” Piotrek. “You cannot do this!”

  “Watch me.”

  I upshift, weaving past two and then three more cars.

  I throw the strongest persuasion I’ve got ahead of me, driving it forward like sound waves compacted in front of an ambulance.

  A wild oath from Jester. Claudia, shouting in the background.

  The cars in front of me drift lanes, and I accelerate.

  I can see the Vadasz truck with its bright yellow cab fifty yards ahead, ambling toward the intersection of Josefsgasse. I speed past three more cars and close the gap, unable to get around a black SUV. I brake fifteen yards out behind the SUV—just as Rolan’s produce truck barrels into the intersection, ramming into the side of the yellow Vadasz cab.

  The trailer jackknifes into the next lane, crashing into two vehicles.

  “Audra, get out of there!”

  I kill the clutch. Grab the bolt cutters from the passenger seat. Dash from the car, shedding the hardware store bag as I go.

  All around us traffic crashes or skids to a jammed halt. Pedestrians scatter from the sidewalk.

  Ahead of me, the SUV’s doors open. A man in a dark suit gets out on each side. Shades over their eyes, hair cropped close.

  Run!

  They do run—right toward me, guns raised.

  Stop them.

  Pffft! A shot whizzes from above. The first man’s leg buckles beneath him. He goes down with a
scream. The second man drops on the other side of the SUV. I run straight toward the first and swing the bolt cutters at his head. Kick the gun from his hand. It skitters into the curb.

  Glass shatters from the direction of the Vadasz truck cab as I reach the back of the trailer. My hands are shaking so hard I can barely get a grip on the cutter handles, but somehow I manage to clamp down. I drop them the minute the lock gives away. Shove the first bolt up, pulse pounding in my ears.

  For a minute, I think: What if he’s not here—if he’s already dead, gone?

  I tug the right side open, and there he is, gagged and bound to the same metal chair, blinking against the light.

  Luka.

  My heart stops, and it’s all I can do not to launch myself into the truck and run for him, wrap my arms around his neck.

  But he isn’t alone.

  The pallet jack from the video comes flying toward me. I whirl away, back against the other door. The jack veers and crashes into it with a boom that reverberates through my spine.

  I look wildly around, spot two guys running out of the café twenty yards away—a server and a beefy-looking cook, apron still on.

  You. Help me.

  The next instant they’re running straight for the back of the trailer, but I have another problem: a third suit emerging from the SUV.

  Luka’s captor comes charging out of the trailer. He’s tall and grizzled with thick shoulders. The cook grabs him around the neck and hauls him to the concrete. A shot shatters the SUV’s window.

  I grab the cutters, leap into the trailer. Hurry to Luka, clip through the zip ties—three at each wrist, five at each ankle.

  The instant Luka’s free he shoves up and rips off his gag.

  A metal hinge groans behind us. The light disappears.

  In the darkness, I feel more than hear Luka rush past me. He throws himself at the trailer door. It shudders and swings back open, hitting the figure behind it.

  I run after Luka as he leaps from the trailer, tackling the man below—the third suit from the SUV. They roll away. The suit lands a punch to Luka’s jaw. Dirty hair flies from his face.

  Luka grabs the man’s head and drives it into his own with a sickening crack. The man falls away, and Luka drags himself up onto a knee. He lifts his head and grins. His teeth are red. I have never seen this Luka: feral and uncaged.

  I stumble from the trailer. He starts to say something, but before I can make out the words, I scream as the man launches himself at Luka again. Together they crash into the curb. Fingers grapple for throats and eyes. Luka’s legs scissor, and then he’s on top of the man, fistfuls of the man’s shirt in his hands, fabric cinched tight around his throat. The man flails, claws at Luka’s hands, eyes bulging as his face turns purple.

  “Luka!”

  He looks up, murderous eyes glossed over as the form beneath him goes limp.

  Recognition transforms his face. He lets go. Staggers to his feet. The form twitches beneath him—alive, if not by much.

  “Audra.” His voice is a rasp. In three strides, he’s cupping my face. “You’re bleeding.” His thumb traces a wet smudge above my upper lip before he pulls me hard against him, breathing heavily.

  My arms wind tightly around him, not believing he’s here, with me. Alive.

  “My God, I thought I’d never see you again,” he murmurs against my hair before holding me away from him and shaking me by the shoulders. “What were you thinking? You should never have come!”

  Sirens in the distance.

  “Rolan,” I hear myself say. “We have to get Rolan.”

  Luka stiffens. “What?”

  I tear myself away, hurry to the produce truck buckled against the cab. There’s a form slumped over the wheel. The door is open; two men have freed him from his safety belt. From their gestures I’m pretty sure they’re saying something about not moving him.

  Get him out.

  The thought drives a spike between my eyes.

  “Get him!” I yell, sagging against the cab. Luka shoots me a glance and then pushes past the bystanders. Seconds later, Luka and another man are holding a groaning Rolan between them.

  And all I can think is, Get to the car.

  I stagger after them as they help Rolan past the shot-out SUV. The two suits who took hits earlier are gone. Dropping into the driver’s seat of the VW, I floor the clutch, fire the engine. Luka shoves Rolan into the back and slides in after him.

  “Go!” he shouts, slamming the door.

  I fumble us into reverse, back the length of a building, and then shift swiftly to neutral, yanking the steering wheel as far right as it’ll go. The front of the car slides around, spinning the other direction. I jolt into gear, pull up onto the sidewalk, bystanders scattering around us as I accelerate up a side street.

  “Audra!” Someone’s shouting from the phone, still live, on the floor. Luka climbs into the passenger seat and retrieves it as I take a sharp left, away from the onslaught of sirens.

  “I’ve got him,” I say, as my vision begins to blur.

  7

  * * *

  “Three gunmen. An SUV full of armed men . . .” I can practically hear Piotrek running his hand over his hair. Jester, all this time, has been silent.

  “You had no way of knowing those snipers weren’t hunters!” Claudia says.

  “I took a chance.” I had banked on the Scions not having time to assemble a handpicked squad.

  “A chance you couldn’t afford! You can’t persuade people you can’t see!” Claudia shouts.

  “But she did,” Jester says strangely, at last.

  “We’re alive, aren’t we? Just keep the police off of us.”

  I’ve forgotten how much I haven’t told them.

  “Audra,” Luka says quietly after we’ve hung up. “You’re bleeding again.”

  I’m more than bleeding. My vision isn’t right. I have to close one eye to not see two roads, like a drunk trying to get home.

  Rolan groans, says something in Romanian under his breath.

  “What about him?” Luka murmurs.

  “He’s coming with us.”

  “No, he’s not.”

  “He’s half the reason you’re alive!”

  Luka stares at me for a long moment, outrage and questions in his eyes.

  “Long story,” I mutter.

  “You should never have come for me,” Luka says, shaking his head.

  “You’re welcome.”

  “I mean it, Audra!” he insists, though I sense there’s much more he’d say if we were alone.

  Jester chimes back in.

  “Audra, turn around. There are blockades on every major roadway leaving the city and you’re all over the news.”

  “Turn around and go where?”

  “Find a place to hide until dark. It’s your only chance.”

  “No. If we stay in the city now we’ll never get out.” Blood drips from my nose to my lips.

  “Audra,” Luka says. “You can’t keep this up.”

  “I’m fine!” I say, spraying tiny droplets of red.

  “You’re not fine. You nearly blacked out back there!”

  “He’s right,” Rolan says.

  Luka holds the phone closer to his mouth. “Jester, do you know any Progeny in the city? Anyone who can hide her?”

  I don’t like the way he says her instead of us.

  Jester’s saying something, but I’m no longer paying attention. I spot a parking garage and swerve into the entrance, scraping the bumper. I swing the VW into an empty spot and kill the engine. Movement, between two rows of cars—a man walking toward his car. I reach over to the glove compartment, retrieve the folder inside it, and get out.

  Luka and Rolan spring out after me.

  “No,” Rolan says.

  “What do you mean, ‘no’? We can’t stay in that,” I say, flinging my arm toward the VW.

  “You can’t stay in that,” Rolan says, coming around to gently take the keys from my hand.

&n
bsp; It dawns on me, then, what he means to do. I hold the keys away.

  “No. Absolutely not.”

  “He’s right,” Luka says.

  I round on Luka. “He broke his cover to keep you alive! And you’re going to just let him drive off into their hands?”

  “Not for him,” Rolan says. “For you. Because you would never have fled without him. Now you have to get out of the city. They saw. They know what you are, if they didn’t before.”

  “What do you mean, ‘what she is’?” Luka says, eyes narrowed.

  “Get out of the city,” Rolan says. “Hide. Now that the Historian suspects you found something, she won’t stop until you’re dead.”

  “Wait—‘she’?” Luka says. And then his gaze drops to the folder in my hand. I clutch it tight to my chest. It’s cold, like hugging a gun.

  “Go,” Rolan says.

  “Not without you.”

  “I may have pledged my life to protect your bloodline, but, fortunately, I do not answer to you,” he says.

  “They know you helped me. They’ll kill you!”

  “They have to catch me first,” Rolan says and opens the VW door.

  “Wait.” I hurry toward the businessman getting into his car. A moment later, I lead the man to the VW and hand Rolan his keys.

  “At least take a different car,” I say.

  He nods, starts for the car. I go after him and wrap him in a tight hug.

  “Thank you,” I whisper.

  “Stay alive,” Rolan murmurs. A moment later, he’s speeding out the exit.

  I stand there and watch him drive away, followed by the man in our former VW.

  And all I can think is: What have I done?

  “Audra,” Luka says, somewhere behind me. I turn to him, stupefied.

  “I don’t know what you found or what the story is between you two . . . But right now, we have to get out of here.”

  We exit the garage on foot via the crosswalk into an office building, take the stairwell to the ground floor. We walk at a fast clip, his hand under my arm. Twice, my knees nearly buckle; there are far more people in the lobby than I expected. And our faces are playing on the news station in reception.

  Don’t see us.

  I look up once in time to see a woman stare blankly past me. Her shoulder brushes mine, and she glances back, startled as if she had run into a ghost.

  We exit the building, turn down the street. Luka guides me to the first alley we come to, where I collapse against the wall, clutching my head. The migraine that had subsided to flashing lights behind my eyes is back with the vengeance of an aneurysm.