by Jenny Moyer
“Shhh,” Dram whispers. “There is nothing separating us, Rye. Nothing.” He presses kisses over my throat, like that cursed piece of tech isn’t there. His weapons belt drops to the floor, and I reach for the one holding his pants up. His breathing quickens.
“This isn’t what I came for,” he says, pulling away. “I mean—I love this, I want this—but it’s not the reason I came.” He grabs my questing hands and kisses my knuckles.
“What are you talking about?” My breath’s as ragged as his.
He grins and brushes his thumb over my kiss-swollen lips. “I brought you gifts.”
“I can’t have anything in here.”
“Just for tonight,” he says, reaching into the pack he brought. He tosses me a canteen.
“Rations,” I murmur, failing to hide my disappointment.
He laughs. “Not rations. Try it.”
I twist the lid and sip. “Oh, fire.” I take a longer drink. “Where did you get this?”
“Meredith keeps a hidden keg. Well, not so hidden, it turns out.” He toasts me with his own canteen of ale. “Ready to hear something more than the flash curtain singing in your head?” He draws a screencom from his pack, and music fills the Box.
“It’s like we’re in the outpost,” I say.
“Or the provinces.” He grasps my hands and twirls me into a dance. “Do you still hear the curtain?” I shake my head. For the first time in months, it’s drowned out by something louder, a melody born of laughter and hope and sacrifice and passion. The flash curtain calls to me so powerfully, I hear it inside myself. But now I know … love is louder.
The music changes. Something soft, quiet, not like we had in the outpost. “It’s Alaran,” he says. “I thought, even if you can’t go there, you could at least hear—”
“It’s lovely,” I say, and we sway to the sounds of instruments I can’t name. I can’t think about never seeing Alara, about this Box being a permanent part of my life, so I tighten my arms around his neck and lose myself to the sounds of a city I still dream about.
“Will you step in my steps, Orion Berrends?” he asks softly. Tears prick my eyes. I haven’t heard my name linked to his since we lived in the provinces.
“Always,” I whisper. He slips something over my wrist, where my bonding cuff used to be. Braided rope threads, wound in climbers’ knots.
“I figured this suited us.”
I touch the woven cords. “A figure-eight knot.”
“The strongest, most secure.”
I can’t speak right away, so I swallow hard and clasp his face in my hands. “Will you step in my steps, Dram Berrends?”
“For as long as this life allows.” He lifts his hand, and I see the rope band circling his wrist, an exact match to mine.
I launch myself at him, and he catches me against his chest, laughing even as our lips meet. This time, he doesn’t stop my hands, and they skim over his shoulders, his arms, pausing along the scars left by flash bats. I sweep my lips over his chest, all the places he was exposed to particle burn down nine.
“Remember the air cave?”
“No clear thoughts right now,” Dram breathes. But his eyes meet mine, and I can see the memories lingering there.
“I thought you’d die—”
“Fire, Rye, if we discuss all the times we thought we’d die, that’ll be a lot of talking.” He kisses me, hands skimming over my body, touching every scar, every injury he knows by heart. “Sit down and close your eyes,” he says. I raise a brow, and he smiles. “One last gift.”
I sit on the floor and press both hands over my eyes. My skin smells like Dram, and it intoxicates me more than the ale. I sneak a glance. Dram stands on my cot, a broken light stick in one hand, his other stretched above his head. He studies the cirium ceiling, then presses the metal with his fingertip.
“Stop peeking,” he calls without looking. I cover my eyes, trying to imagine what he’s doing. I hear the sounds of him dragging my cot across the floor, and clicking that sounds like another light stick. “All right,” he says. “You can look.”
I peer up at the dots of light. We sit in darkness, illuminated only by pinpricks of chemical he painted across the ceiling. I look at the patterns, trying to …
Stars.
He painted the night sky just as it looked from the provinces.
“I drew it in the sand when I was first captured,” he says. “And each day after that. So I wouldn’t forget.”
“Fire, I love you.” The music is turned low, so I know he hears me, and again, when I say it just beside his ear, where my lips brush the side of his face. Soon, there’s nothing of Congress between us—not my collar, our Radbands … not even this cirium prison. There’s just Dram and me, our skin glowing beneath the stars he’s given me.
He raises himself onto his arms, and his memorial pendants slide over me. We have this between us: life and death and all the ways we’ve fought to hold on to what matters.
He drops his forehead to mine, and our hands tangle.
Our bracelets press together, and I think how they’re like us—pieces of frayed rope, woven into something stronger than they were before.
TWENTY-SEVEN
7.2 km from flash curtain
MEREDITH DOES NOT abide noncompliant Delvers. Especially a former Brunt who stole Alaran treasures from under her nose, tapped the keg of outpost ale she’d been hoarding, and sneaked into the Box.
These are the conclusions I’m drawing as Dram and I lie light-headed on the floor, sipping air like we’re sharing a broken air tank again.
They cut off our air hours ago.
Dram’s fingers curl around mine, and I squeeze back, wishing it didn’t take so much effort. We stopped talking soon after the vent shut off in order to ration our oxygen, but neither of us imagined they’d leave us this long. I should have been let out by now.
As angry as Meredith is, she can’t risk harming us. I am, after all, our city-state’s last Ghost, and Dram, the only Delver strong enough to be my Prime. The flashfall is expanding, and there’s no time for pettiness or punishment.
Or so we thought.
Dram’s staving off claustrophobia. In all the plans he made to join me for my extended imprisonment, he didn’t consider how it might affect him, being in the Box with no way out. For once, we weren’t thinking about our circumstances; we had our minds on other things … at least until the air shut off.
We’ve used up all our light sources, so we look at the stars he painted, the chemicals deactivating so that our cirium sky grows dimmer, star by star.
“Sorry,” he breathes.
I twist onto my side and rest my forehead against his. “I can still taste that Alaran cake you brought me,” I say. He squeezes my hand. Music plays from the screencom, the soft Alaran tunes growing familiar to me. I turn it louder, so Dram will maybe think about that instead of the airless, dark Box we’re sealed into.
“What do you think Graham would tell us to do?” I ask.
Dram laughs. “He’d say, ‘What are you wasting time for, boyo—hurry up and kiss her!’” He turns, and though I can’t see him at all, I can imagine the corner of his mouth lifting, the dimple it puts in his cheek. “He was always saying that to me. We’d be down eight, orbies all around, I’d ask him what I should do, and he’d be like, ‘I’ll tell you what you should do, boyo. That scout, she’s something special…’”
“Graham was wise,” I say, my hands finding Dram in the darkness. We lean toward each other at the same time. Our lips meet, and I turn my head to bring him closer. Dram brought me gifts, but what I cherish most is having him back—seeing the smile that makes me feel breathless and invincible at the same time. I thought I had lost that part of him, that it was destroyed while he fought to survive as a Brunt.
“Are you crying?” Dram pulls back, and I swipe my hand beneath my eyes. I run my hands over his shorn hair, but it’s not a Brunt I’m holding in my arms—I’ve got my caver back.
My col
lar chimes, and the door grinds open. Cora stands with her arms crossed over her chest. “You’re still alive. Good.”
We scramble out and sprawl on the cavern floor, sucking in air.
“Three days’ rations, extra weapons, Oxinators,” Cora says, dropping packs beside us. “Meredith says don’t come up until your gauge shows you reached eludial depth.” I stare numbly as she tosses rope and a suspension tent onto the pile of gear. Three days.
“But the termits—”
“Are worth the risk. That passage is our best chance.” She opens a pack filled with metal disks I’ve only seen on a screencom, tech that’s supposed to map the eludial seam. “These will automatically engage once you reach the perimeter. They’re activated by the elements there.”
Dram and I fasten armor over our suits, then take turns strapping on gear, balancing the weight of it all between us. He takes the tent and rope. I take the mapping tech. Both of us load up with weapons.
“Before you go, seal me in.” Cora strides into the Box.
“What?”
“Did you think Meredith wouldn’t punish me for helping you?”
“How long?”
“Till you return.” I stare at her. It will take Dram and me three days of hard climbing to make it that distance and back. That’s if we’re lucky enough to find the eludial seam. “Three days … in the Box.”
“If that’s what it takes. Don’t look at me like that. I sneaked down an extra pack for myself. I’ve got food, light, books…” She gives me a wobbly smile.
“I’m sorry.” I catch her in a hug. “We’ll go as fast as we can.”
“Just find the seam,” she says. “Don’t get eaten by anything.” She squeezes me tighter. “Do whatever Ferrin would do.”
I can’t watch Dram seal her in. I jog the passage, telling myself the faster we go, the sooner we can free Cora.
The sooner we can free everyone.
* * *
Do whatever Ferrin would do.
Cora’s words slip through my mind in the darkest places—especially in the dangerous places. We pull ourselves onto a ledge, and I hand Dram a pulsating silver disk.
“What’s this?”
“High-frequency pulse transmitter. It deters the moles. Wear it inside your suit.”
He slips it beneath his armor. “Won’t it draw the other creatures?”
“Yes, so be ready to switch it off when we come across bats, gulls, or termits.”
“Maybe it’s not worth the risk? They’re just moles. So they conjure—we’ll find our way.”
I work to hold on to my patience. I remind myself that I had the same ignorant assumptions when I first delved these tunnels.
“This isn’t tunnel nine,” I say. “The moles are the worst thing down here. Worse than gulls, or bats, or orbies. Worse than termits. They’re fast—” I break, off, sighing. “Fast isn’t even the right word for it. They move quicker than the human eye can track them. They conjure defensively, that’s true—they’re not going to come after us—but you don’t understand how dangerous their defenses are. They’ve conjured the ground out from beneath me. I watched one conjure a branch through Cora’s hand—and the rest of the tree through Fern.”
Dram nods. “Transmitter. Got it.”
“Any new routes we delve will also need to be preserved with the transmitters—every hundred meters.”
“Fine. Tell me again about the other things—the termits. Not as bad as the moles?”
“Termits are bad.” I turn down another passage, following the map laid out in my mind. “Do you remember Ennis telling us stories about animals that used to exist? Remember ‘lions’?”
“Yeah. Hairy mane. King of the jungle.”
“Well, termits don’t have manes, and they’re smaller, but otherwise—lion. Except they can climb rock faces. Really well. They have semi-opposable thumbs and retractable claws.”
“Climbing lions,” Dram murmurs.
“That has one of the strongest bites of any creature, ever.”
“Like flash bats.”
“Except their molars work like scissors.” He blinks at me behind his goggles. “They have self-camouflaging fur that helps them blend into cavern walls and water. I’m talking invisible, Dram.”
“Not with these.” He taps his goggles.
“They prefer to fight standing up, supporting their bodies with their tails, so they can use their hands and feet to attack—Fire, Dram, why are you smiling?”
“Because I would rather fight one of these demon creatures with you at my back than be alone as a Brunt. Any day.” He smiles again, and something inside my heart fractures. “Today is a good day, even if I have to face a termit’s semi-opposable thumb claw.”
I drop my goggles over my eyes. “Semi-opposable retractable thumb claw,” I mutter, sliding past him.
His laughter fills my earpiece and I think, Today is a good day.
* * *
We suspend our tent so that it forms a triangle stretched across the water. At each of its three points of contact, a transmitter gives off high-frequency emissions we can’t hear. That will keep the moles from conjuring over us, or through us, while we sleep. The other creatures we had to get more creative about.
“I have to say, I didn’t see this day ending with me holding a pile of poo.”
I smile, despite my exhaustion. I have missed this Dram—the boy who can find humor in a desperate survival situation. I smear termit scat beside the tent anchor.
“What about glowing poo?” I ask.
“Nope. Before today, I didn’t even know that was a thing.” He finishes spreading it beside his anchor and tosses the branch he was using into the water. “It’s from the fish they eat?”
“Yeah, something to do with their bioluminescence.”
“And this will keep the gulls away?”
“Well … if I’m right. It’s sort of a theory-in-progress.”
“Ah. And we’ll know if you’re right by whether or not we are attacked in our sleep by tunnel gulls?”
“Pretty much.”
Dram slides into the tent beside me. We leave our armor on, even our headlamps. Both of us hold weapons.
“Dad taught me to look for scientific solutions to problems,” I say. Dad. My heart squeezes thinking about him. I may share someone else’s genes, but I can’t think of him as anyone other than Dad.
“When I was trying to win Fortune,” I continue, “I captured a tunnel gull so I could use it to find my way back out of the gorge. It refused to eat the ghost fish I caught for it. It ate earthworms fine. So, I think there’s something in that fish they don’t like. Maybe it makes them sick or something.”
Dram blinks. “You captured a tunnel gull.”
“Yes.”
“Then you fed it. Willingly.”
“Well, yes. I wanted her to have enough strength to fly back to her nest.” Dram’s eyebrows creep toward his hairline. “But only after I covered her feathers in glow chem—so I could follow her. Then I had to break through a mole’s conjured rock so she could reach her younglings on the other side.”
“Fire, Rye.”
I smile. It’s exactly the way I imagined him absorbing the story. “Is today still a good day for you, Dram?”
“Yes.”
“Then I won’t tell you.”
“Tell me what?”
“Your hand is glowing.” He looks down at it, and I can tell he’s trying to think of what he might’ve touched that would leave bioluminescent residue. I bite my lip to hold back a laugh. “It’s where you were holding on to that branch—”
“Fire,” he curses.
I hide my grin and roll onto my side.
* * *
We give ourselves four hours of rest. Then we hydrate and eat our rations, and I show Dram how to dig for earthworms. Since the passage is protected by pulse transmitters to repel the moles, the ground here is filled with fat, wriggling worms.
“This is how we know we’re on
the right path,” I explain, holding one up. “Their skin is slightly translucent, and you can see if they’ve been consuming dirt with trace elements of eludial soil. They glimmer a bit.”
“Glimmering worms,” Dram says, dropping a handful into his ore pouch. “Better than light markers. And this will help us with the termits?”
“I hope so.”
We pack our tent and our gear, and take the passages at a run—something we could rarely do down the tunnels at Outpost Five. These have been carved over decades, by Conjies. The passages are smooth stone, just the right size for humans to traverse, with stone bridges and steps, even a bioluminescent lighting system. Some Conjies took the time to embellish the walls with patterns carved into the stone. Our headlamps reflect over them, and I wonder about these artist Forgers, who made something beautiful out of their prison. We stop at the place the words for freedom are carved, where I added my own writing when I wrote Fern’s name.
“This is the most dangerous part,” I say, muting my lights as we near the termit den. “If we make it past, we should find a passage to the eludial seam. At least, that was my mom’s theory.”
“That was years ago,” Dram says. “Why hasn’t anyone tried this route?”
“They have. No one’s made it past.”
“Great,” Dram mutters. “So, on a scale of flash bat cavern to gull’s nest, how bad is this?”
“Let’s focus on the positives,” I say, adjusting my goggles. “Termits can’t fly. They can’t conjure. They’re usually solitary creatures—so you usually only have to take them on one at a time.”
“Unless you walk through their den—”
“Or encounter a place where there’s a major food source. Like the eludial seam, where their favorite meal—moles—will be concentrated.”
“This isn’t positive.”
“Right, well, let’s hope my idea works.”
“Fire,” Dram mutters.
We approach the den, silent, our transmitters switched off. We smeared our flash blankets with termit scat, and we wear them draped over our packs. We reek of termit, so that we will reek less of human. Dram’s idea.