I take his hand.
“I want us fighting together again.”
“Me too.” He smiles at last. “Plus, I’m dying to finally meet your sister.”
It takes three weeks to cross the continent.
The great western desert is the cruelest part of the trip—baking heat in the day, chilly at night. No water except what we can carry. Sand in our teeth, our clothes, our food. The roar of lifting fans thrumming in our ears.
We reach the Rockies at last, and find rivers brimming with snowmelt—clean water to drink, fish to catch, and metal deposits for our magnetics to grab on to.
But it’s a cold climb into the mountains. Snow still blankets the slopes, and the air grows thinner by the hour. The Vic army has never ventured this far north before—our body armor is unheated. We don’t build fires, not daring to attract attention.
Col and I keep each other warm. Every night, I tell him again about watching the towers of Paz come down. About life in the ruins. About the sound of weeping in the night, the way the whole city grieved as one.
For the first time, I understand how much he must miss his home. Victoria had a thousand customs I never had the chance to learn, all flattened now by my father’s occupation. A disaster has struck Col’s city too, a slow-motion shattering of its soul.
He can’t escape that as easily as I ran away from Shreve.
Sometimes I still wonder if I should have stayed in captivity, giving the alliance of free cities good reason to kill my father. Maybe Victoria would be liberated sooner that way.
Or maybe the attempt would’ve only thrown the world into more chaos.
Descending from the Rockies, we hit the Great White Plains, where the weed is triumphant. The white flowers cover the fields here. They clog the rivers, strangling all but the oldest forests.
The Plains are where the weed began. A Rusty scientist, trying to make a rare orchid easier to grow, accidentally created the most relentless plant in history. Immune to drought, to storms, to poison—and, worst of all, to competition from other living things. Even the cities here exist in a state of siege, their farmlands covered by vast domes to protect them from the orchid’s spores.
The Plains pass beneath us, a thousand klicks of white. We’re blinded in the daylight, haunted at night by phantoms in our aching eyes.
It takes twenty days to reach the eastern mountains. Older than the Rockies, they roll slowly into being, ripples from the clashing continental plates.
Here in the east, the wounds of Rusty civilization run deep. Ancient rail beds scar the land, crumbling factories stain the rivers with rust. But nothing astonishes us like the strip mines—whole mountains cut down, their metal hearts ripped out by the Rusties’ unimaginable machines.
The wild has begun to reclaim the strip-mine craters, but their slopes are still streaked with unchecked erosion, their topsoil swarmed by invader species.
Col explains the broken biology of it all, a slow-burning anger in his voice.
“How the Rusties survived so long, I have no idea.”
“They used to die of sadness,” I say.
He just frowns, like that’s too much to believe.
Our first night in the eastern mountains, we camp in the belly of a strip mine.
We’re in the deep wild, far enough from any city to make a fire, so Zura and her Specials build it big. It sends thick smoke over the crater lip and into the night sky, a black elbow arcing west with the mountain breeze.
Basking in its warmth, I pull off my body armor.
Col glances at the rows of faces on my arm.
“Go ahead and ask,” I say.
A shrug. “Leyva says there’s one for love.”
“He means Cherish.” I hold out my wrist in the bonfire’s light, showing Col the beaming face with hearts for eyes.
“Okay. What does Cherish feel like?”
“An echo of the real thing—like looking at old pictures of my sister. Like missing you.”
He frowns. “You used a feel to miss me?”
“I used a feel because I missed you—like when you’re sad, you listen to a sad song to sharpen the emotion. But Cherish wasn’t really my thing.” I hold out my arm again. “Melancholy was better.”
He stares at the face, its closed eyes, a single tear. “Those two faces are the opposite. Do I make you happy or sad?”
“When you’re not around—both? Emotions aren’t supposed to make sense, Col. What matters is feeling something. All those days without you, in that cell, it was too easy to shut down. Maybe that sounds sense-missing.”
“No, it doesn’t.” Col looks away into the dark. “Sometimes I black out what happened to my family. Not deep down, but on the surface of my thoughts. I’ll wake up not thinking about it, and make it till noon, or maybe even nightfall, before I remember.”
He’s talking about the first day of the war. His mother, his grandmother—my father’s missile bearing down on their home.
“Even then, it’s like an echo. Like I’ve had that same sadness too many times to feel it anymore.” He reaches out, his fingers brushing my arm. “So which feel would you recommend for that?”
I point at Grief.
Col raises an eyebrow. “Looks like a littlie drew it.”
He’s right—those gushing tears, two rivers streaming down the round face, are silly compared to what they represent.
“No one knows where the pictures came from, except that they’re very old. Like the feelings themselves, I guess.”
He looks away. “I don’t cry in front of my soldiers, or even Teo. It’s hard enough keeping their morale up. But sometimes I wonder if that changes what’s going on inside me.”
“It does change you, Col. Take it from someone who hid her emotions her whole life.” I hold out my arm. “These help, even if I used them too much sometimes.”
He takes my arm gently.
“It’s easier for me when you’re with me, Frey. Everything is sharper, good and bad. I don’t want buttons on my arm—I want you.”
My breath hitches.
“You have me,” I say.
The crackle of the fire fills the crater, the steady east wind murmuring in the brush. There are a thousand more things I have to tell him, but something tugs at my awareness—something missing.
“Do you hear that?”
Col listens, then shakes his head.
I gesture for silence, then point at the little face with intense eyes—Focus. At my touch, it flows into me, that clarity, the night sharpening around us.
My ears tingle.
“The birds,” I whisper.
They’ve gone silent around us.
Almost imperceptibly, Col nods. He leans back, like he’s stretching. But his eyes scan the darkness. His gaze stops at a point above my head.
“Veron,” comes his whisper. “Gone.”
A flutter passes through my body.
Corporal Veron, our medic, was on watch on the crater lip behind me. And Specials don’t leave their post.
“Good night, Col,” I say aloud, and stand.
Pressing Calm, I walk, unhurried, to our tent at the edge of camp. Then I yawn hugely, open the flap, and slip into the camo shielding.
Inside, I move fast—tearing off the rest of my clothes. Sliding on my sneak suit, pulling the mask over my face and hands. Checking that the charge light on my knife is green.
A long touch of Vigilance to erase the Calm.
The back of the tent faces away from the bonfire, into the darkness. I slip it open, crawl through and up the slope, all but invisible in my suit.
Past the rim of the crater, the night is overcast, starless. I don’t rush, waiting for my vision implants to adjust. Whoever took out Veron must be using stealth tech too—you don’t just sneak up on a Special.
Or maybe a sniper got him from a distance …
I crawl down the crater’s outer slope, into the low trees. Then I make my way around to the east side, where Veron was stationed.<
br />
My ears strain for any sound. But here, away from camp, the night is dead silent.
My gloved hand brushes something—a bird, motionless, its body heat flickering in my infrared. A meter away, another glimmer of heat turns out to be a sleeping field mouse.
Knockout gas. But real this time.
I’m on the windward side, so the gas will be drifting into the crater. I have to warn the others—without tipping off our attackers.
I check the seal on my suit rebreather, then head up the slope, moving fast through the scrubby trees.
A moment later, three silhouettes block my way.
One lies there unmoving—Veron. The other two are seated, looking down at our camp. They’re not wearing sneak suits, just rebreather masks.
A tank of compressed gas sits between them, making the barest hissing sound.
The gas must be heavier than air, spilling down into camp, silent and invisible, slowly filling the crater.
I grip my knife, stealing closer. The brush is thinner here near the top. But the two silhouettes aren’t facing me.
I slink forward. Four meters away, three …
Then one turns—I freeze in the darkness.
She doesn’t see me, though. Her eyes are closed.
Her head tips back a little, like she’s scenting the air through her mask. Standing there, the wind at my back, in my sneak suit unwashed after three weeks of hard travel, I realize—
She smells me.
I bolt forward, pulse knife screaming to life.
She spins to face me, and I see the skins, the leather. They’re rebels.
I hesitate in midswing—her foot lashes out as I pass. It connects with my stomach, knocking the breath out of me.
Staggering past, I trip on the gas machine and stumble down the rocky slope. In a flash, both of them are on top of me, my knife hand held fast in someone’s grip. My other arm goes up to ward off blows, but they don’t hit me.
They pull my sneak suit mask off.
Before I can stop myself, I suck in half a breath.
The world starts spinning. I try to yell and warn the Vics, but there’s not enough air in my lungs—and if I breathe more, I’ll pass out.
Both of the rebels are staring down at my bare face, wide-eyed.
“Whoops,” one says, releasing me.
“Sorry, Boss,” the other says. “Didn’t know it was you.”
“So you aren’t the boss?” Sussy says. “You’re her fancy sister?”
“She’s my fancy sister,” I grumble, pressing Painless. My ribs are still pounding from the kick she landed.
“Rafia,” Col says in a warning tone. “Don’t be random.”
He’s right—I can’t blow my sister’s cover. I have to play my old game again.
But with my bruised ribs and shoulder, and this headache from the knockout gas, it’s hard to find the impersonation inside me. Every time the world allows me to be myself, going back gets trickier.
I touch Courage to get the voice right …
“I’m Rafia of Shreve. Take us to my sister.”
The two rebels look up from their food, uncertain.
We’re in the middle of camp, feeding our uninvited guests by the bonfire. Most of the Vics are unconscious around us. Col was smart enough to slip a mask on, and Zura was on watch at the far lip of the crater, too high for the gas to reach. Her cruel, pretty face is making the rebels nervous.
But they’re still managing to eat our last spagbol.
“Boss didn’t say anything about you coming to visit,” Dex says.
“This isn’t a family reunion,” Col says. “We’re here to help with the Iron Mountain.”
Both of them freeze.
Then Sussy tries to act casual. “Huh. Where’d you hear about that?”
“Straight from the Paz AI,” I say. “Then I told my close personal friend Boss X about it—and you heard it from him.”
Dex nods slowly, X’s name winning me some respect.
“Okay.” He turns to Col and Zura. “But who are they?”
Col looks annoyed—he’s not used to having to introduce himself.
Sussy elbows Dex. “That’s Col Palafox, the head Vic. Him and Boss Frey fought together at Shreve. He got captured.”
“Oh, right,” Dex says, but still looks a little confused. I’m guessing the rebels out here don’t watch the feeds a lot.
“Zura fought there too,” Col says. “We all did. We’re on your side.”
“Well, now you are,” Sussy says with a laugh. “But when you were tearing up Rusty cities for metal, you didn’t like us rebels much.”
Col just looks away, like he still doesn’t like rebels.
“If you had a choice,” she goes on, “you’d be back home in your mansion. Not out here with us.”
“My mansion is a bomb crater. And I do have a choice—I’ve been offered sanctuary in seventeen cities.” Col gestures disgustedly at her spagbol. “All with decent food. But here I am, out in the wild with you.”
Sussy looks down at her bowl. “Hey, I like spagbol.”
“We’re offering to help,” Col explains.
“Blood is one thing,” Dex says to him. “But Boss is always talking about how you Vics are useless. That’s why she ran away.”
Zura lets out a low growl. Col looks pleadingly at me.
I’m still not a hundred percent sure why Rafi’s out here. Srin’s theory, that she’s always wanted to become me, has never fully settled in my head. There must have been some tension between her and the Vics—Rafi doesn’t like any situation where she’s not in charge.
But she won’t say no to me.
“Listen,” I say. “You know how my sister changes her mind, right? And how she’s been asking for help from all over? If you get this wrong, she’s going to be mad.”
Sussy and Dex share a worried glance. Rafi may be pretending to be me, but it seems she hasn’t changed that much.
“So why not take us to Frey?” I say. “Let her decide.”
Dex gives this a thought, then looks at Sussy.
She sighs. “Guess that’s what bosses are for.”
The next morning, the two rebels take us all deeper into the mountains. The forest is thicker out here, with old snow lying heavy in the shadows.
More rebels join us along the way, coming to gawk at me, the boss’s rich sister. Soon we have a full-fledged escort. Half a dozen crews, all gathering here to take on the Iron Mountain.
Whatever that is.
These are the rebels of the deep wild. No pretty surge—their teeth aren’t even straight. Their boards are in dubious states of repair, and most of them aren’t wearing crash bracelets.
I really am the fancy one, with my body armor and military hoverboard. But the rebels are more envious of our Vic backpacks—fully waterproof, their magnetic lifters making them light as feathers as we ride.
I wonder how long these rebels have lived out here. Sussy and Dex knew enough woodcraft to sneak up on Veron without suits. They were adept with Col’s bow and arrow this morning, bringing down breakfast with a few shots.
Most runaways bring city tech with them—water purifiers, direction finders. But these rebels drink straight from streams and ponds, and navigate by the landmarks and the sun. A few have accents I haven’t heard before, some so thick that I have to translate for the Vics.
It’s logic-missing that Rafi joined a crew this far out in the wild.
How did she become their boss?
The sun is high when Sussy finally brings our party to a halt, halfway up a mountainside.
At first, I think we’re just stopping to eat and pee. But the rebels spring into action, scraping away scrub and pine branches to reveal an opening the rock. It’s four meters across, three high, and the rotted-away ties of an old railroad disappear into its depths.
It’s absolutely black inside.
“A mine shaft?” Col asks.
Sussy nods. “The Rusties didn’t just strip-min
e. They also dug tunnels like you wouldn’t believe.”
“How deep?” I ask. The air from the mine shaft smells damp and alien to me, like it comes from another universe.
“We haven’t got to the bottom yet,” Dex says. “Couple klicks, at least.”
A shudder goes through me. Two kilometers underground.
For a moment, I wonder if this really is my sister’s crew. What if it’s just a trap? A way to seal us city folk inside a mountain forever?
But that’s just my claustrophobia babbling in my head, like this mine shaft is a mountain-size version of Rafi’s broken elevator.
Or maybe I’m nervous about finding answers to all of the questions that have been buzzing in my head.
I reach for my wrist, just enough Calm to settle.
The rebels lead us inside. I expect them to use torches, but they just stride into the darkness. Zura switches on her body armor lights, revealing dozens of hoverboards lined up along the walls.
“Best let your eyes adjust,” Dex says.
When Zura turns her lights off again, it’s darker than any night in here. Even with my implants, there’s nothing in infrared but the bobbing shapes of body heat.
But as we go deeper, a cool greenish glow slowly builds around us.
The walls are covered with little squiggles of light. I stop to look closer at them. This has to be city tech, but I’ve never seen anything like it.
“What’s the power source?”
“Don’t know,” Dex says. “Whatever worms eat.”
“Glowworms?” Col says, leaning in beside me. “They look too bright to be natural.”
“Genetic engineering?” Dr. Leyva asks.
“They’ve always been here, far as we know,” Sussy says. “Come on. Boss Frey doesn’t like waiting.”
Boss Frey. Something starts to pulse through me, dizzy and joyful and nervous-making all at once.
She’s stolen my name and made me her heir. She’s run away from our fight against my father. She’s the closest person to me in the world, and I don’t know why she’s here or what she’s up to.
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