Summer Ruins

by Trisha Leigh

  But we still have to figure out how the primordial element sustains the Others, exactly how it gives them life. And we have no idea how to find out at the moment.

  I told Jas and Tommy that we have to leave but that they won’t be forgotten. I’m not sure how much good it will do, but I told Tommy to go to Emmy’s mom in Station Three for help if Jas gets bad again. I have no way of knowing whether or not she’s going to be any help, but it makes me feel better than leaving them with no options.

  It’s been almost a week now, and my nerves stretch more every minute. We’ve needed the time to learn all that we can from Rita, but I can’t stop thinking of the cabin getting infiltrated, of all those kids who trust us being annihilated in the process of the Others retrieving their Warden. The loss of Griffin and Greer would cripple our ability to maneuver going forward—not to mention the toll it would take on my heart.

  We’ve decided to leave tonight, and are busy saying good-bye. Emmy and Reese both hug me, Emmy in her stiff way and Reese quietly but determined, the way she does everything. Leah and I say our good-byes and I promise to find a way to come back for her.

  The way Pax is staring into her eyes, I know he would bring her along if he thought he could hold up an extra person for as far as we might have to fly. To my surprise, she pushes onto her tiptoes as far as she can go, then reaches her arms around Pax’s neck and plants a kiss right on his mouth.

  His eyebrows go up, and I know he’s as surprised as I am. Even though it’s kind of weird and rude, I have trouble looking away. Lucas chuckles beside me. “I guess she’s taking advantage of every minute.”

  “I guess I can’t blame her.” I give Lucas a sly look that’s full of all the things I’d like to not miss out on doing with him again. His cheeks bloom red like they did the first day I met him, and I laugh, raising his hand to my lips and pressing a kiss against his cool palm.

  It’s nice to see a genuine smile on Pax’s face, even if it is a bit bemused. He lifts Leah’s tiny frame against his chest, and his smile slips as he buries his face in her hair. I wish he’d had a chance to talk to Tommy, or say good-bye for real, but we never figured out how to do it and keep the kids safe.

  Our farewells are finished when it occurs to me that we’ve got less than two minutes before the furnicars lock and Wes hasn’t arrived. Worry slithers beneath my sorrow and into my blood, zapping paranoia through me. We’ll have to leave without seeing him. As I think that, the tent flaps burst open and seven Wardens, including Carrej, stomp inside.

  Eula slinks in behind them, her arms crossed against her drooping chest.

  The seven of us in the tent freeze. Uncertainty curls my hands into fists while the heat and flames grow inside me. Do we fight them? We could get the seven of us out of this tent and away from the Wardens, but it wouldn’t do any discernible good. They’ve seen us, and from the grim expression of satisfaction on Eula’s face, she’s already told them enough to make sure none of our friends will survive.

  But it would make me a feel a lot better to let loose some of my boiling anger.

  Carrej looks at me, giving a tight shake of his head. He might be trying to warn me that keeping my cool would be the way to go, though I’ve never felt any particular goodwill from him. Like I told him that first day, he didn’t try to kill me, so that gave him a reprieve.

  I suppose that applies to the Wardens crowding into our furnicar now.

  The light bulb blinks off, then back on. One minute.

  The Warden at the front, whose name I don’t know, steps forward. “Anyone who does not belong in this furnicar, please return to your own for the night.”

  No one moves. My heart swells with pride in these new friends of mine. Leah’s always been far tougher than she looks, and she’s not cowering now. Her hand is firmly inside Pax’s, her gray eyes stormy as she bores holes in Eula’s traitorous face. From the tightness in her upper arm, it looks like Pax is holding her back from leaping and scratching the Warden’s eyes out.

  But Emmy and Reese surprise me, each stoic and standing tall in the middle of the room. Emmy appears bored, if anything, her arms hanging loose at her sides. Reese plays with the ends of her blond hair, eyeing the Wardens warily but without fear.

  They’ve been prepared for this, maybe. Ever since they arrived here at the Harvest Site they’ve been keeping their heads down, waiting for something. For us? To die? Or for circumstances to change? There’s nothing to be gained from disobeying the Wardens, and if anyone is going to be punished it should be the three of us.

  Rita shrinks against the back wall of the furnicar, as far from the Wardens as possible. She’s muttering under her breath, the words indiscernible but her confusion and fear chilling my heart. Her face blanches paper white and tears course down her cheeks.

  We will all be punished for breaking the rules. But I have to try. “Go, you guys.”

  Three pairs of eyes slide from our uninvited guests to me. I nod. Emmy and Reese step around Lucas and me, then through the pack of Wardens, untouched. Rita seems frozen. Leah doesn’t move. I’m falling in love with that girl as much as Pax seems to be, I think, but it’s more than that. More than her bravery or her desire to see this thing through to the end.

  She’s witnessed what happens when we leave people behind, and she knows the fear of wondering whether or not she’ll ever see us again. She cares about me, I think, as a friend. She and Lucas have a past, and maybe in a different lifetime, she and Pax could have a future.

  Her eyes grab mine, holding a question, and nothing in me has the will to tell her again to go. She’s with us now, for better or worse. “So, what happens now?”

  “The Prime has been summoned to deal with your plotting and transgressions. We will escort you to him.” Carrej steps to my side, wrapping rough hands tight around my arm.

  I wince at the sharp pain of his grip but he only grins, ripping me from Lucas’s side and out of the tent. Rita’s sobs turn loud. Leah cries out; I imagine she’s enduring similar treatment. Neither of the boys utters a sound, but after another ten seconds we’re all together in the pathway.

  “Stop crying,” one of the Wardens barks at Rita, who’s being dragged a few paces in front of me.

  She can’t seem to make her feet work, and the Warden’s rough treatment elicits sobs that spike every couple of seconds into shrieks. He heaves a heavy sigh when she won’t—or can’t—obey his command to calm down.

  He wraps one arm around her neck, presses the other against her head, and jerks hard.

  Rita falls to the ground, her head at an unnatural angle, eyes wide open in surprise. Dead. One minute she’s alive, the next she’s gone, and none of us had time to make a move.

  The suddenness of it, that a life can disappear that way, stops my heart in my chest. I can’t walk; my legs feel like chunks of wood not connected to me.

  Carrej yanks me close to his side, propelling me forward against my will, lifting me so my feet barely touch the ground. “Keep moving or the second extra is next,” he growls above my head.

  It takes a moment, but when I realize he means Leah, I focus on putting one foot in front of the other, breathing in and out. My brain files Rita away with Mrs. Morgan and the rest of the people we’ve killed by asking for their help. Putting her away helps smother the shock and pain of the moment before.

  The Wardens continue toward the hatch at the front of the igloo. Concern for Leah, how she’ll get along outside in the elements, spikes my heart rate, but the Wardens clearly aren’t concerned at all. Maybe I can push my heat far enough to keep her warm.

  We step out into the bruising wind, pain like a million needles stinging every inch of me within seconds. The Warden at the front shoves Leah into the ice and snow, laughing at the cut that opens up on her cheek when her head hits. Blood spills down her neck and gushes from her nose, and clouds roll across her clear gray eyes as she struggles to keep them open.

  “You’ll stay out here, troublemaker.” The laughing Warden st
arts to walk away.

  Time slows down until we’re all moving as though underwater. Pax struggles to throw off his captor, but the wind he’s whipping up has little effect among the howling air already tearing at our clothes and hair. Lucas gets loose enough to knee his escort in the stomach, and when he doubles over, Lucas throws himself on the ground next to Leah, but he can’t do anything to help her, to protect her. He can only make her colder. She needs me, or Pax, who could at least warm her up to autumn temperatures.

  It’s as though I’m watching it from somewhere else, in a movie like the one Ko left for Deshi. I turn to Carrej, very calmly. “Let her stay with us.”

  “Why should we?”

  “We won’t go easily otherwise. She’s no threat to you. Let the Prime deal with her.” I raise my eyes to his and let him see the strength of my fury.

  Heat melts out of my center and through my skin. Carrej rips his hands from my arm, and the skin on his palms drips onto his tan uniform shirt. Carrej’s mouth falls open, his black eyes drowning in pain as he stares at me.

  The familiar ache pounds nails into my brain, but I don’t look away. Instead, I smile. When he doesn’t make a move, I turn to find Pax knocked to the ground, three of the Others kicking him in the midsection with their black polished shoes. Lucas fights with one, spinning him around and hitting him in the jaw. The one Lucas kneed is struggling to get back to his feet, and two more guard Leah, whose skin has turned a sickly blue. Her eyes are closed and the violent shudders wracking her body threaten to crack in my bones.

  “Stop.”

  No one listens to me.

  I cross calmly to the two guarding Leah and hold up my hands. I don’t ask, the way I did with Carrej, who is slumped on his knees gasping in agony. I simply push, and the two of them burst into balls of fire. They spin away and drop to the ground, skittering across the ice like flaming rolling pins.

  I drop beside Leah, pushing warmth out through my skin until it surrounds us like a pile of blankets. I gather her against my sweaty chest, cradling her like a child and letting heat pour off me in waves. Her eyes open after a moment, and she tries to smile at me through chattering teeth. Ice and snow melts in her springy black curls, and then Pax pulls her from my arms.

  He can keep her warm enough with autumn sunshine, now that she’s defrosted. The remaining four Wardens stare. One has a handful of Lucas’s curls tight in his hand, yanking every couple of seconds to keep his victim wincing in pain.

  I point a hand at him. “Let him go.”

  The Warden considers for about half a second, his eyes fluttering to the healing bodies of his charred buddies several feet away, then releases Lucas. He scurries to my side, the two of us blocking Leah and Pax. Carrej stands, pale and shaking with anger, and moves alongside his fellow Wardens.

  Pax, Leah, Lucas, and I form a straight line. Four of them, four of us. We could take them in a fight, and maybe make it to the portal in the Prime family’s tent and figure out how to use it.

  “Let’s get them out of our way,” I mutter loud enough for the boys to hear.

  We raise our hands in unison while fear and acceptance cross the Others’ faces. It’s then that I realize we’re missing one of them. Two are down; there should be five facing us now. The one Lucas kneed is missing, and right then, the sound of running boots meets my ears.

  The rest of the Wardens race from the hatch. I’d be inclined to dispatch these four and make a run for the Prime’s tent.

  If the ones heading our way weren’t dragging Emmy and Reese along with them.

  Chapter 22.

  I freeze, shutting down the seeping heat. The Wardens reach us in another thirty seconds and gather around the four we were facing previously.

  A Warden I don’t recognize speaks up. “It appears we’re at a standoff.”

  “No. We don’t want any trouble. We were willing to go along, but they tried to expose Leah and we asked them to let the Prime decide her fate, that’s all.” My voice cracks toward the end of the statement, revealing my bravado for what it is.

  We’re facing down at least fifty Wardens right now, with no leverage other than our lives. Even if we gave that up, it wouldn’t save our friends. There might not be anything that can save them now, after our fight angered and injured more Others.

  The Wardens appear undecided, however, and it’s probably because they don’t have any instructions on how to deal with us. At least until the one in charge falls back on his default setting, which for a Warden means cruelty and a disregard for human life.

  He shoves Emmy and Reese to the ground. When Emmy tries to stand up, he grabs a handful of hair and tosses her backward so hard she cracks her head on the ice and lays still. We’ve got less than ten minutes before she and Reese are dead from the cold.

  A figure moves across the frozen ground from what I think is the direction of the Prime family’s tent. As it separates from the shadows, Deshi’s face comes into view. His eyes rake my face, then Lucas and Pax, lingering on Leah for a moment before assessing the rest of the situation.

  “What is going on here?” he barks.

  The Wardens shift and cast glances at one another, all seeming unwilling to take the blame for the kerfuffle.

  Finally Carrej speaks up. “We had intelligence that the three Dissidents were gathering potential converts and planning subterfuge. They were going to leave tonight using one of their elemental powers.”

  They can’t know all that from Eula. She could only have tipped them off about our sneaking people from one Station to another. If they’re aware we had plans to leave, they must have grabbed Wes somehow—maybe on his way to our furnicar tonight.

  It chills my blood to wonder what else he told them. Or if he’s still alive.

  “And you were instructed to, what? Expose valuable dusters in the process of transporting Dissidents a thousand yards?” Deshi glares, his arms crossed over his chest. The air around him glimmers slightly green, pushing away the blackness of the night, and reveals that he’s keeping his skin a comfortable temperature in his own way.

  “No, but the girl—”

  “Silence. Chief waits in the Prime’s quarters, and he isn’t pleased at being kept waiting.” He points at Emmy and Reese. “Take them back to their furnicar and ensure they’re warmed properly. If they die, I’ll make sure to include your incompetence in my report.”

  He grabs Leah by the arm, far more gently than any of us were treated earlier, and motions at Carrej. “Do you suppose you can handle bringing up the rear?”

  Carrej nods tightly, looking unhappy at being snapped at, but falls in behind Lucas and me when we trail Deshi, Pax, and Leah. It takes another ten minutes to get to the Prime’s quarters, proving that the Wardens never intended Leah to make it alive.

  Deshi shoves Leah inside, protecting her from the cold, and levels Carrej with a heavy contemptuous gaze. “Stand guard.”

  The Warden nods, a muscle tightening in his jaw.

  The four of us, the only Dissidents on the planet, duck inside the Prime’s furnicar. I expect to see Zakej or the Prime, and maybe Kendaja, too, but the ornate furniture and rugs are unoccupied. The stale airs stinks of disuse, confirming that they probably haven’t returned since dropping us here a month or so ago.

  The calm, controlled mask of Deshi’s face falls away, revealing a glittering panic. “We have to go to the cabin right now. They’re on their way.”

  “What? Who’s on the way where? Where’s the Prime?” My questions tumble out unchecked, the frantic horror on Deshi’s face pushing my mind into overdrive.

  “He’s going to be here soon. He was delayed by the fact that they finally tracked Nat, and the Wardens are on their way to the cabin.”

  None of us speaks. It’s our worst nightmare, and for a few seconds, it freezes us in place.

  “Here.” Deshi draws a hand out of his pocket, holding it palm up in front of us.

  Our beautiful, Spritan-woven rainbow bracelets lay curled there, and
it doesn’t take long for me to snatch mine and toss one each to the boys. “You’re coming with us?”

  Deshi nods. “They’re my friends now, too. The Prime and Zak don’t know anyone else is there besides Nat. But they’ll kill them when they find out.”

  “Can we make it in time?” Leah’s determined voice reminds me she’s still here.

  “I don’t know if we can take you, Leah. We’ve never tried traveling with a human without a bracelet.”

  Pax and I managed it with Wolf, though, and that’s when we were only two.

  Deshi grabs one of Leah’s hands and one of mine. Lucas takes my opposite one, and Pax hangs on to Leah for dear life.

  “I’ve seen the Elements work together, you guys. I’m guessing there’s not a whole lot we can’t do now.” Deshi’s face sets in a determined line as his eyes drop closed.

  I follow suit, concentrating on the cabin as hard as I’ve ever concentrated on anything.

  The Prime family’s furnicar, the land covered with feet of ice, disappears. It’s not like traveling with help from the Spritans, or even with only Lucas, Pax, and I. With all four of us Dissidents locked together, traveling feels akin to what a feather looks like floating on a breeze. We manage with unbelievable ease.

  We’re at the Harvest Site, then we’re standing on lush green grass outside the cabin. The bright sun, the hot breeze, and the smell of juniper tickle my senses, but there isn’t time to marvel at the fact that it must be early summer.

  Wardens swarm the cabin—I’d guess at least fifty, but there might be more inside—and all I can hear is screaming. Kids bottleneck at the front door, trying to squeeze through four or five at a time without success. A few scatter on the ground past the front porch, blood soaking the green blades of grass a sticky red.

  No one has seen us yet. It could already be too late for Griffin and Greer, or Nat.

  “Lucas, you and I need to run into the hive and take down the barriers we built for Greer and Griffin. They’re helpless right now, and if they wake up maybe they can escape.”