The Sentry

by Lyssa Morasey

  “That’s amazing,” I breathe.

  Keira pulls me forward roughly. “No stopping,” she hisses. “Come on.”

  My foot slips; with a yelp I fall to my knees, my leg sliding out over the ice. As the girl skater whisks by, her skate rams into my shoe, and she falls face-down with a startled cry.

  Shit. Baz grabs me quickly from behind and helps me back onto my feet. The four of us wait, statue-still and dead silent, as the piano stops and the singing falters, and a collective gasp goes up from the crowd.

  For an awful moment, I think I’ve exposed us—but it’s the fallen skater everyone is focused on. Her partner pulls her back up again, and the music picks up right where it left off.

  I let out a silent breath. Thank God.

  We make it to the doors, waiting for a loud burst of applause from the audience before tiptoeing past the four door guards. We enter into a pristine marble hall just behind a raised platform with a gilded throne seat in its center, intricate patterns of wolves and snow etched into its back. The hall reaches up for dozens and dozens of feet, crisscrossed intermittently with overlooks spanning all the different floors. It’s enormous; our steps would be echoing all over the place if not for the amount of noise coming from just outside.

  Keira takes us into a little hallway off to the side. It’s dim, lit by little orbs of light built into its walls. If the Nixans have to use electricity, they’re going to use as little of it as possible.

  At the end of the hall stand two Sentry women guarding a heavy-looking white door, one not conveniently held open for us to pass through. Keira holds out her arms to stop us before we get too close. “They’re through there,” she whispers.

  I clench my teeth. Freya is right there. “How are we getting in? Old Magic?”

  “Too tricky,” Iraine murmurs. “Shade magic.” Her arm brushes mine as she extends it, and I hear her suck in a breath. The hall lights flicker out for a second, and suddenly there’s a crash and a clattering; when the light returns, the two guards are heaped in a pile in front of the door, their staffs rolling back towards us.

  “They’ll be asleep for about twenty minutes,” Iraine says. “I think.”

  “Let’s hope so.” We step over the bodies and shoulder open the door.

  Inside it is bright, bright white, eerie and artificial—they’re not sparing any electricity here. Screams and cries, almost inhuman, echo through the halls—Freya’s screams.

  I can’t help myself anymore. I take off with Baz’s footsteps right behind, turning at the end of the hall and nearly colliding with a thick glass wall. Behind it is a Nixan with a whip, a dustie boy splayed out and shaking on the tiles, and a man crouching beside a bloody, broken teenage girl. My sister.

  The man grabs her ears, snapping back her head. Through the wall I hear the sick crackling of electricity, and Freya lets out a screeching, mangled cry.

  I pull out my gun, but Baz is faster. Boom. The bullet pierces straight through the glass and the man crumples to the ground. The Nixan with the whip looks up, startled. Boom, boom. He falls too with a gasp, landing on top of the dustie boy. The boy snaps up, groaning and pulling himself out from under him.

  “Freya!” I scream, pounding on the glass.

  “Wes?” She looks around wildly, but she can’t see us.

  Keira and Iraine catch up to us, and suddenly my fists on the glass are visible and in flames. Freya screams and falls back, covering her mouth with a shaking hand.

  Keira yanks up her jacket sleeve and presses her Sentry mark to the glass wall. When she removes her arm, the wall begins to slide slowly down into the floor.

  Not wasting any time, I leap over the sinking wall and run to my sister, stumbling over the body of the fallen Nixan man. “Freya.” I grab her by the shoulders, feeling the bones poking out from underneath her frayed shirt. She shrieks and tries to push me away, but I hold tight. “It’s me, Freya. It’s Wes.”

  Freya shakes her head, her eyes clouded and unfocused. “You can’t be here,” she says hoarsely. “I’m hallucinating.”

  “I’m here,” I assure her. Gently I touch her chin—she jerks back instinctively, but lets me raise her head to meet my eyes. “I promised I’d get you out of here, didn’t I?”

  Freya studies me for a minute, stiff and still; then she lets out a wild, shaky laugh, and collapses against my chest. “God, Wes,” she breathes. I wrap my arms tightly around her and press my face into her hair. Freya. She begins to shake, sobbing into my shoulder. I feel tears well up in my eyes, and for once I don’t try to blink them back. Freya, Freya, Freya. I never thought I’d see her again.

  I hug and hug and hug her, both of us crying, never wanting to have to let go.

  6 October: Keira

  “Oh, my God,” Wes says into Freya’s hair. “I thought you were dead.” He’s shaking, but his sister is shaking harder, weak from shock and months of being tortured by Nixans. I exchange a glance with Iraine; we have to get moving, but I’m half-afraid Wes would turn his gun around on me if I suggested it.

  “I can’t believe I’m not,” Freya murmurs back. Then she pulls away, just a little, to look Wes in the face. They look very similar—his hair is a little curlier and she is half a foot shorter with a different nose, but it’s easy to believe they’re twins. “I told them about Ferignis, Wes,” she says. “Our second day here. I thought they were going to kill Quincey—it was before I realized they wanted both of us alive—so I had to tell them something.”

  “It’s okay,” Wes says, stroking her hair tenderly. “We don’t need it anyway. Just a fire-gun.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Part two of our plan,” Basil says. “You didn’t think we came all this way just for you, did you?”

  “Baz.” Freya whips around to see him. “Jesus, Baz, you’re here too?”

  “I wasn’t going to let Wes take all the credit.” He opens his arms, a sly half-smile on his face; Freya stumbles into them for a hug that ends in Baz lifting her off her feet and spinning her around in circles.

  “What about them?” I turn to find the little dustie boy I’d forgotten all about pointing at me and Iraine, his arm trembling. He has an eyepatch strapped around his head, and his one remaining eye is wide with an animal fear. “That’s a shifter.” Freya makes a gagging noise, wriggling her way out of Basil’s arms to face me.

  “Hi,” I say, waving a hand awkwardly.

  Freya clenches her fists, but Wes lays a hand on her shoulder to calm her. “She’s with us,” he promises. “She and Iraine are helping us get you out.”

  “Yes,” Iraine says; “and that would be a whole lot easier if we get out of here before the guards wake up.”

  Freya swallows and turns to the boy, who’s still trembling. “It’s okay, Quincey,” she says, squeezing his shoulders. “If Wes and Baz trust them, so can we.” He nods, a little bit of the fear leaving his eye.

  Wes hands the two of them spare rings he took from Feolan’s box of ice-glass jewelry. “These will hide your auras,” he explains. “Iraine will turn us invisible, and then we’ll be all set.”

  “Invisible? What do you mean?”

  In response, Iraine taps her ring, and the six of us flicker out of view. Freya yelps; I hear Baz’s surprised oof as she falls back against him. “It’s okay,” he assures her. “You’re still here. It’s just an illusion.”

  “An illusion,” Freya repeats, her voice wavering all over the place. “Holy shit, Baz. Holy shit.”

  Once she and Quincey have oriented themselves to invisibility, we grab hands and I lead the way back to the door out of the holding cell, moving much slower than we had before thanks to Freya and Quincey’s uneven steps.

  I open the door as quietly as I can: the Sentry guards are still fast asleep on the other side. I let out my breath and pull the others forward, stepping again over the bodies.

  Out in the dimly-lit hall, we have to take a moment to acclimate ourselves to something other than intense bri
ghtness. Iraine breathes an audible sigh of relief to be back in semi-darkness.

  “So,” she murmurs behind me, “where are we going to find Duke Fenris?”

  “I don’t know,” I say; “somewhere inside the castle. I can shift and fly around to find him.”

  “No shifting,” Wes insists. “We’re sticking together while we’re invisible.”

  “Fine,” I shrug. “We’ll find him the old-fashioned way, then.”

  We step out into the main entry hall, craning our heads to search for signs of life on the upper floors. A few shifter servants walk across the landings, but I don’t see any Nixans.

  “What’s going on outside?” Quincey whispers.

  “A skating show,” I say. “For Fenris’s daughter’s birthday.”

  “Are we going upstairs or not?” Baz asks.

  “Upstairs,” I confirm. “This way.” I lead everyone up a marble staircase to the second floor, and we begin tiptoeing around with our ears to the doors to listen for Nixans.

  “Is that music coming from outside too?” Quincey asks me after about five minutes of searching.

  “What music?” I ask.

  “The violin.”

  My head snaps up; I close my eyes, straining to listen. Quincey’s right—there are strains of violin coming from directly above us, a melody I recognize all too well.

  “Avasol’s Concerto,” I mutter.

  “What’s that?” Wes asks.

  “It’s Cass,” I tell him. “The duke’s daughter. She’s the one playing.”

  “Fenris is probably with her, then,” Iraine says. “Let’s check.” She pulls our group towards a half-open nearby door leading into a stairwell.

  “He’s never with her,” I protest, though I know he very well might be for her birthday. My blood goes cold at the thought of the Wardens shooting down Cass’s father right in front of her. Maybe this isn’t the best idea after all.

  “We should at least take a look,” Iraine insists. We squeeze through the door and wait for a shifter headed down the stairs to pass us before climbing up ourselves, stopping at the door opening onto the third floor. This one’s closed; Iraine listens to make sure no one is walking by on the other side, then pries it open and leads the way out.

  We follow the sound of the violin to the wide open gilded door of the castle temple. Inside I see Cass, standing on the landing at its far end in a beautiful white dress, playing the concerto with Rhody at her side. The temple pews are all full, the audience watching her in silence.

  We crouch in the doorway—I hear Basil cocking his gun. “Is the duke here?” he breathes.

  I stretch my neck to look inside. I know the important people will all be in the front pew: sure enough, I see Caphian’s golden hair peeking out from up front, and Asreil’s auburn. Beside them is the thinning white-blond hair of the duke, and next over is a man in a jeweled silver crown I’ve only seen before in pictures.

  I inhale sharply. “What?” Wes hisses.

  “The king’s here,” I whisper. “King Aknes, right next to the duke.”

  “The crown,” Basil says. “Yeah, I see him.”

  “Jesus Christ,” Wes breathes. “We can take them both out.”

  My heart lurches—this is starting to get a bit out of control. “Just the duke,” I insist under my breath.

  “No way,” Baz says. “When’s the last time a Warden’s had an opportunity like this to kill a Nixan king?” He shifts as he adjusts his weapon. “But not enough of his head is exposed. I’d just end up shooting off his crown.”

  “We need to get the Nixans to stand up somehow,” Iraine says from behind us.

  “I’ve got it,” Wes murmurs. He slides his gun in over my ear; I can feel the heat pulsating from its metal. “Move your head, Keira, or I’ll blow out your eardrum.” Confused, I follow his trajectory straight forward and find Cass at the other end of it.

  My stomach drops. “You can’t shoot her,” I say. “She’s innocent.”

  “She’s a Nixan,” Wes growls. “If I take her down, the duke and the king will get up to help her, and Baz will get his shot.”

  “Do it, Wes,” Iraine breathes. He cocks the gun, and I hear his fingers sliding over metal to find the trigger….

  I lunge for him, grabbing his wrist and yanking it back; the fire-gun goes off, sending a bullet flying through the window a foot above Cass’s head. She cries out, the violin slipping from her fingers and nearly falling on Rhody. Her audience gasps, and the king and duke leap up—but Basil doesn’t shoot, instead grabbing me and pulling me off of Wes.

  Evana the High Priestess stands, and with a flick of her wrist exposes our struggling group in the doorway. “Wardens,” she hisses.

  “Keira?” Cass drops her bow, too.

  “Get down!” Caphian yells, whipping out his gun. Everyone ducks below the pews, we drop to the floor, trying our best to roll out of the way, and Caph and Asreil begin to fire.

  Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Basil cries out, releasing his grip on me; behind us, Iraine lets out an ear-splitting screech. A bullet whizzes right over my head, close enough to take some of my hair with it.

  I lock eyes with Cass, still standing dumbfounded on the landing. “Help,” I mouth to her.

  Boom. Boom. Boom. Cass raises her arm, and a wall of ice sprouts from the ground, filling the doorway within a second. The shooting stops, and the castle goes dead silent.

  6 October: Cassatia

  Caphian and Asreil lower their guns; everyone in the pews turns from the blocked doorway to me. I lower my arm, shaking. What did I just do?

  “Cassatia,” Evana breathes.

  Regaining a bit of his composure, my father extends an arm to the ice, and it evaporates into thin air. The figures that had been behind it have disappeared—he sends Asreil after them with a silent gesture to the lieutenant.

  Then the attention of the room reverts to me. “You saved the Wardens’ lives,” King Aknes says, narrowing his eyes at me. Beside him Iven sits open-mouthed.

  “I saved Keira’s life,” I say, my voice hoarse. “I had to.”

  My father goes red, looking like he’d be more than happy to have me killed. “Your little Sentry friend snuck into the castle with a bunch of infidels who tried to kill you. You wanted to save her life?”

  “She’s my best friend,” I tell him, setting my jaw. Rhody nudges my leg, wondering what’s wrong.

  “This is disgusting,” King Aknes says. He looks to Fenris. “Your daughter has just committed treason against our kingdom, and you had her bonded to my son. We must have an annulment.”

  “The ceremony was conducted honestly in the eyes of Nixa,” Evana says. “Iven and Cassatia are joined for life.”

  “You tricked me into this,” the king growls to my father. “I should have known not to marry my only son to a Loraveire.” He points to me, refusing to look me in the eyes. “That girl will not bear my grandchildren, I swear to the Goddess.”

  “I don’t want to bear your grandchildren,” I say through my teeth. “I never asked for any of this. But I won’t let you kill Keira.”

  “She’ll be dead before the sun has set,” my father promises me, his lip curling.

  “I want her locked up,” King Aknes says to Caphian. “We can decide what to do with her later, but for now I want her locked up.”

  Caphian looks to my father; he nods. “Obey him, Caphian.”

  Grimly, Caph steps up onto the landing, grabbing me by the arm. He leads me back down the aisle, Rhody right behind. “Stay, Rhody,” I tell him. But he doesn’t listen—he follows us through the castle, past gangs of frantic Sentries with guns and fangs, and out the front doors, headed straight for the city prison.

  6 October: Westrey

  As soon as the ice-wall is up, I turn my attention to Basil, writhing and bleeding out on the floor. His shoulder’s been nicked, but what really worries me is the wound in his side that has already dyed half his shirt red. Rolling up the fabric and feeling around under
the blood, I realize that the bullet is still lodged somewhere near his hipbone. “Baz,” I murmur. “Oh, my God, Baz.”

  He winces, breathing through his teeth. “God damn it, Wes, it hurts.”

  “Wes,” Keira says, “we have to get out of here before the wall comes down.” I look up to find her holding a limp Iraine in her arms. “As in, we have to go now.”

  “I’m not going anywhere with you.”

  “You have to,” she insists. “Otherwise we’ll all die here.”

  “She’s right,” Basil groans. “And I really don’t want to die.”

  I grit my teeth. I sure as hell don’t want to do what Keira wants, but Baz won’t get any better lying outside a Nixan temple. I worm my arms under his body, bracing my knees, and stand with a deep grunt.

  Freya grabs my shirt to help pull her to her feet, then turns to help Quincey. They’re too weak to be running around the castle—both of them were leaning heavily on me the whole way here—but they’re going to have to. I look to Freya worriedly, but she nods off my concern. “We’ll be fine.”

  “Let’s go,” Keira insists. She leads the way, Iraine moaning in her arms, down the hall and towards the stairwell we came out of. But before we reach it a pack of silver-jacketed Sentries comes spewing out its door, guns at the ready.

  I look around frantically; the main staircases going from floor to floor are all crawling with armed Sentries, with countless more filing out of every stairwell on our landing and flying up from below to meet us. We’re trapped up here.

  “We’re screwed,” Freya breathes.

  I set Baz down at my feet. “Not quite yet.” This is not how I’m going to die.

  I let out a yell, and channel all my pent-up anger and fear and frustration into jets of fire that I shoot from my palms at the oncoming horde. I hear yells and yelps and a few bullets that land nowhere, but I can’t see anything over the brightness of my fire and the stars in my eyes. Freya goes back-to-back with me and does the same, her strength coming from God knows where. Keira stands as close to us as possible, clutching Iraine to her chest.