by Everly Frost
Before Olander returned to his position on the podium, I noted the way Sarah’s mother stared ahead as if her mind was somewhere else, somewhere better than here.
Fear had started this. Fear kept it going.
But knowledge could end it.
I pressed against the glass, pushing both my hands against it. The bullets had weakened it and the cracks increased with the extra pressure. They’d built the tank to keep me in, but not to protect me. Olander was too busy posing for the crowd to notice.
I shoved against the glass. Once. Then twice. The cracks spread even further, but it wasn’t enough. I leaned back like I had when I’d hit my head against the tank the day before, leveraging my arms to the side. Then I thumped my feet against the wall as hard as I could.
The tank cracked even further. One more kick would do it.
Olander spun, but he was too late.
I kicked as hard as I could and the front of the tank shattered, glass and water rushing forward. I let it take me, rolling to the edge of the podium. Luckily, my suit was thick enough to protect me from the glass shards swirling in the water.
Olander shot forward, grasping at me. He was faster than I’d expected and I realized that the suits and ties he wore had fooled me into believing he was a leader by intellect only. The way he moved told me he was no stranger to physical battle.
I ripped the breathing apparatus from my mouth and jumped to my feet. He expected me to run so he didn’t anticipate that I’d turn and fight. His momentum gave my fist extra force, but the bruise on his face faded in the same moment that it appeared. I drew on every move my brothers had taught me—every attack and defense—deflecting his attempts to grab me, hitting back at every opportunity, knowing I had only moments.
Sarah’s mother had landed on her hands and knees in the wash, clinging to the edge of the podium. The other officials shouted for drones and tranquilizers—and screamed at the soldiers not to let anyone shoot me.
Finally with a kick and a twist, I succeeded in forcing Olander to the ground, immobilizing him for a sheer second so I could snatch his microphone. I screamed into it the only information that might matter.
“Your children are under the river! They’re in tunnels under the—”
The drones swarmed, tranquilizers hit me, an octopus tentacle slammed across my mouth, and further words were impossible.
Chapter Twelve
SOLDIERS DUMPED ME inside the high-speed transporter while I was still paralyzed from the tranquilizers. Olander himself slammed the door shut.
Mr. Bradley, Aaron, and Sarah waited for me inside the transporter as they’d promised, and as soon as Olander and the soldiers were gone, they pulled me up off the floor.
Aaron propped my head on his shoulder, his arm keeping me stable while the tranqs wore off. “That was incredibly stupid, Ava. You know they’ll just move the kids now.”
I couldn’t answer. They’d shot me with so many paralytics that not even my lips could move. But at least everyone knew where the cells were now. The location of the Basher’s perfect hiding place was out in the open.
Mr. Bradley explained that once we reached the northern coast, I’d travel to Seversand by boat because Olander couldn’t risk Starsgard using an EMP to disable an aircraft—and Seversand wouldn’t allow Evereacher aircraft to enter its airspace, let alone land on its soil.
Each day that followed, explosions rocked the transporter. I guessed it was Olander’s way of punishing me. Every time the soldiers changed the route, somebody leaked the coordinates. The attacks were so accurate, that after a while, I started to suspect it wasn’t civilians attacking at all, but Olander himself trying to keep me in a state of fear.
“How many of the people in that crowd were there because they hated me?” I asked Mr. Bradley. “And how many were actually there because they’re afraid of Olander?”
Mr. Bradley’s gaze shot to the ceiling where the invisible spy watched us. “An excellent question, Ava, but also a dangerous one.”
I barreled on. “How do I know that the people who shot at me were civilians—and not soldiers planted in the crowd? How much of this is real and how much is Olander creating an illusion? I won’t believe that there are so many people in Evereach who align their beliefs with the Bashers.”
Sarah opened her mouth, but shut it again, clamping her lips together. I knew she couldn’t say anything. What I wanted her to say was that her mom was fighting back. That while Olander and Alexander traveled with me to Seversand, she and others would turn the tide against them in Evereach.
It seemed like an impossible dream, but I had to cling to it.
I wasn’t surprised when, on the third day, explosions hit the transporter once more. This time I tuned the sounds out, slapping my hands over my ears and curling down over myself. Both Sarah and Aaron stood over me with tranquilizer guns ready, just in case. I imagined Michael’s arms around me, keeping me safe. I wouldn’t let Olander’s games get to me this time.
Aaron shouted. “Ava! Look out!”
I glanced up and was immediately blinded by a bright light streaming through the roof. Metal screamed and a hole was ripped in it. There was a thump. Someone landed inside the vehicle. I braced, knowing I had to defend myself, but the light was too bright to focus.
The person paused. A hand reached for me. His face came into focus.
That’s when I realized who it was. “Snowboy! But how?”
He grinned. He was naked to the waist as always, glowing like the brightest star. “Take my hand! Michael will catch you.”
Aaron lowered his tranquilizer gun. He must have recognized Snowboy from the fight in Starsgard because he urged Sarah toward Mr. Bradley at the front of the vehicle.
Michael’s father stood very still. He hadn’t seen Snowboy for ten years, but now wasn’t the time for a reunion.
“Go!” he shouted, and neither he nor Aaron tried to stop me.
Fear lanced through me as the explosions continued. I was suddenly terrified to take the hand that Snowboy offered me.
I shouted. “I’m mortal! I can’t fight like I could before.”
Snowboy gathered me up in his arms. “You were always more than that to us.”
His grip tightened and his legs bent. He pushed off and we soared through the hole in the roof into the maelstrom above us.
Bursts of fire rocked the air all around us. From that height, I could see there was a long convoy of vehicles weaving along the road. The firefight at the front was being waged almost single handedly by Blaze. He shot fireballs at the vehicles and had succeeded in creating a pile-up that stretched for a quarter of a mile ahead of us.
A silver streak beside the transporter snatched my attention. Michael raced alongside, his legs pumping, somehow moving as fast as us. As we lost velocity, Snowboy pitched me toward Michael and he leaped upward to catch me mid-air. “I’ve got you! Don’t be scared.”
He hit the ground with me in his arms and kept running without missing a beat. Heat radiated off him, striking me in waves. My eyes widened at the power in his arms, the speed of his stride, and the way he moved just like my brothers, dodging and zigzagging around the gunfire. His eyes … glowed. It was a strange silver glow like captured starlight.
I was suddenly transported back to another time—a safer time—when Michael was asked what it was like to kiss a mortal and he’d said it was like kissing starlight. My heart leaped. My fear was overtaken by joy at seeing him. “Michael?”
He grinned like Snowboy, speaking without puffing. “You know how I never took nectar before?”
I couldn’t do anything more than nod. I was sure my heart was going to burst inside my chest. The emotion of seeing him again was so strong.
“When that drone snatched you, I made your brothers give me nectar and guess what? I broke the grid. We got through. We’ve been heading south the last few days. I’m sorry it took us so long to locate you.”
I’d asked Ruth not to let them out of Starsgard,
but they were long gone before I made that request. Still, he’d broken the grid and that couldn’t be a good thing.
“Ruth is going to kill you. That grid was everything.”
“Don’t worry, the break was temporary. I kept it open only long enough for us to slip through.”
“What about Pip? Please tell me he’s not here.”
“We sent him south to let Ruth know what happened. Don’t worry, the bears carried him so he wasn’t alone.”
Behind us, a vehicle flipped into the air and I made out my biggest brother, Quake, swinging transporters like baseball bats, crashing through them, kicking them away as they plowed along the road.
Michael veered off to the side, heading into the trees while my brothers continued to create chaos behind us. As we crashed through the woods, the fight behind us changed. The soldiers abandoned their tranquilizer guns and fought back with nets, trying to capture my brothers. In the distance, drones zoomed toward the carnage, only moments away from reaching us. I knew they would be loaded with poison darts. My brothers could withstand tranquilizers, but not this. I needed to warn them.
“Michael, Evereach has poison that destroys the effects of nectar. We can’t leave the others behind. They’ll be captured.”
His eyes met mine. “I’m not leaving you, Ava.”
“Please, Michael. You don’t understand. I couldn’t stop him.”
“Who?”
“Alexander.”
Michael missed a beat for the first time. His voice rose. “Alexander’s the one who had you? This is worse than I thought…”
“I can’t stop him. He’s protected somehow. I tried, but I can’t beat him.”
“Don’t worry. The others won’t be far behind me. We’ll regroup and figure out a way home.”
At that moment, Rift dropped from a nearby tree and broke into a run, sprinting beside us.
Michael called out to him. “What did you see?”
“Drones! Too many of them. The others are splitting up to draw them away.”
My heart plummeted. Deep dread filled me. “You can’t do this for me.”
Neither boy listened. The whir of wasp and beetle drones filled the air behind us. They zipped through the trees on our tail, speeding at full tilt. Rift split into shadows that raced up the trees and leaped out, smashing the drones, thumping them away through the foliage. Still more drones took their place.
“Give me nectar!” I shouted. “Let me fight.”
Michael glanced at Rift.
“It’s all gone. We only had five pearls on us when we left Starsgard and we took the last of it for this.”
As Rift’s shadows dispatched another drone, there was a moment of silence behind us and for that moment, I thought maybe we’d be okay, that we’d get away.
But Rift frowned, glancing back the way we’d come. “What’s that sound? It’s like something sliding…”
My stomach sank. The invisible spy…
It was the creature Mr. Bradley had warned me about. The invisible guard. Rift must have been able to hear it slithering through the underbrush with his powerful hearing.
A moment later, Michael lurched as the unseen creature hit him from behind. He sprawled forward. I rolled and fell from his arms, spinning into the nearest tree. The wind knocked out of my lungs, but it wasn’t just the impact that stopped me still. A thick object slammed into me.
A thick, invisible object.
The object took shape and form above me, sliding around me as it did so. What looked like a thick tentacle the size of my arm wrapped tighter and tighter around my chest and legs, except that it wasn’t a tentacle, because its head lowered to mine and the outline of two fangs became clear.
It was a snake.
I screamed as the fangs pierced my shoulder, rupturing skin and sinew. Michael leaped on top of it seconds later, ripping its jaws away from me with his bare hands, pulling and pulling as the creature snapped at him, trying to bite.
While Michael wrestled with it, Rift hauled me to my feet.
“Take her!” Michael shouted. “Go!”
But the moment of delay was enough to give the drones time to catch up. Rift dropped to his knees in front of me, a dart sticking out of his arm. It was the same green poison that had brought me down from the cliffs of Starsgard. He doubled over in front of me, shouting in pain.
“No! Rift!”
At the same time, Michael ripped the snake’s jaws in two with a sickening crunch. The creature slid to the ground, finally dead. But one of the beetles latched onto his chest and another two attached to each of his arms, impaling him with their razor-sharp legs. They pinned his arms to his torso and shot silver darts—tranquilizers this time—across his chest.
Whoever was controlling them didn’t realize he’d taken nectar too. He ripped them off, tearing their tethers apart, making it within several feet of my position. I beat at the drones with my fists until I realized there was something on my back. I risked a glance to discover a beetle clinging there. I clawed at it moments before its tethers wrapped around me.
My arms were pinned within seconds.
A wasp sped up to Michael, and this time, a green dart met his skin. He shouted, but the beetles swarmed him, attaching to his chest and implanting their tethers into the ground on either side of him. As the steel tethers shortened, he was forced flat, still struggling beneath them.
“Michael! No!”
He stopped fighting and I knew that the poison had done its work. Within moments, the beetles had scooped both Michael and Rift upward, and carried us all back to the convoy.
Quake and Blaze were already there, sitting propped up against a vehicle, but Snowboy wasn’t anywhere to be seen. He alone was fast enough to have the chance to escape and I prayed that I wouldn’t see him dragged back any moment.
Alexander pounded up to me on the road, drawing back a fist and slamming it into my cheekbone. Pain exploded inside my head and I slumped downward as the beetles released me.
Nearby, Michael shouted as the beetles dropped him onto the pavement. He coughed and retched into the earth, clawing his way toward me. “Don’t touch her!”
A gleam entered Alexander’s eyes as he assessed Michael. He abandoned the kick he was about to land in my side and crossed the distance between them.
“Michael Bradley. I’ve been trying to get your attention for a long time now.” He gripped Michael’s jaw, making him wince. “You’re the future, Michael. You and I, we’re the strongest. You are your mother’s son. It’s time you realized that.”
He dropped Michael back to the ground and glared at my brothers. Tears sprang to my eyes at the sight of their faces, deathly pale, stricken with pain. But the determination in their eyes hadn’t lessened.
Mr. Bradley ran up to me then. He missed a beat when he saw my brothers, and I could see him counting. He knew about Snowboy, but Alexander didn’t seem to.
Mr. Bradley shouted orders at the nearby soldiers. “Anti-virals and medical lines! Now!”
Alexander grabbed him. “What do you think you’re doing? Let the males die.”
Robert Bradley pushed Alexander away. It was the first time I’d seen him hit back. “You may not care, but the President does.”
Alexander scratched his chin. “Why?”
“Ask him yourself.”
Olander plowed forward through the growing crowd of soldiers, his personal guard forcing a way through the throng. He appraised me and my brothers and lastly, Michael. Strangely, he seemed pleased.
He said, “Good. Now I have everything I need. Get them into a medical transport. Keep them separated but see to it that they survive. We’re taking them all to Seversand.”
Alexander had no hesitation getting in his way. “What are you playing at? I just want Michael and the girl.”
Olander responded by pointing at Rift. My brother stared back at Olander, frowning at being singled out.
Olander said, “You have no idea who that boy is, do you?”
Alexander scowled. “I don’t like secrets.”
“Well, then, be unhappy if you wish.” Olander turned on his heel, shouting orders at the soldiers to clear the road. “If the mortals die, you will spend the rest of your lives rotting in the cells. Now move!”
Aaron and Sarah appeared with medical gear and several other soldiers ran up pushing pallets and lines. Mr. Bradley set to work ordering them around and supervising the medical procedures. I couldn’t do much more than watch as my brothers were carried into waiting vehicles. Their eyes didn’t leave mine until they disappeared into the backs of the transporters.
I crawled over to Michael, my cheek burning from where Alexander had hit me and my shoulder bleeding from the snake bite. Michael reached for me, his hands shaking, but the look in his eyes when he saw my cheek made me shudder. He didn’t have to speak for me to know he would destroy Alexander if he could.
His dad returned from one of the vehicles and bent down to us. “The others are safe. They’ll be okay. I’ll make sure of it.”
He hesitated before he turned to Michael. “Are you all right, son? The effects will wear off much faster on you.”
Michael skipped a beat, his jaw ticked. “Hello, Dad.”
Mr. Bradley hovered over us. “I need to help Ava now. She took a nasty hit to her face and the wound on her shoulder will get infected if I don’t treat it. Will you let me do that?”
I realized then that Michael had wrapped his arms around me, keeping me close. His instinct was to protect me from his dad.
I said, “It’s okay, Michael. Your dad … can help us.”
As Mr. Bradley bent toward me, assisting me to stand, I whispered to him. “We don’t have to worry about that invisible spy anymore. Michael killed it.”