The Dark Sky Collection: The Dark Sky Collection

by Amy Braun

  You’ve done this before, I reminded myself. You did this with Garnet’s electron-cell, which is just as dangerous. You–

  “Claire, how much more time do you need?”

  I glanced over my shoulder at Gemma. She was bending her knees and holding a knife and a flintlock tightly, preparing for a fight. That was when I noticed the lights flickering in the main tunnel, and when I heard the angry echoes coming from the crowd.

  “A couple minutes–” I told her.

  Gemma swung out of the tunnel and drove her knee up. I heard a pained yelp, and saw her sweep out the legs of someone else. The scuffle continued out of my sight, but soon she was back, and looking furious.

  “Find a way to speed it up,” she snapped.

  I tried to tell her it didn’t work that way, that I couldn’t force the electricity to travel faster without seriously injuring myself, that this much power was probably going to blow the circuit breaker anyway and kill any generators the Stray Dogs had running, but Gemma wasn’t listening. She was dragging the unconscious body of a man almost twice her size into the room, steadily patting him down and stealing weapons and coin from them.

  Giving the Volt one more look to make sure it wouldn’t overload or detonate, I hurried to help her with the body. He had a large lump on his head, but seemed to be alive. I scurried to the entrance of the cave and looked out. The lights hanging on the ceiling flickered aggressively, drawing more shouts from the angry crowd. I started to see shadows moving our way.

  The harsh whirring noise behind me caught my attention. The Volt was reaching capacity, sparks flying out of the opening between the disks. I ran for the Volt, dodging a table and nearly tripping on a discarded hammer. The arrows on the electric meters moved back and forth in a blur. One of the light bulbs outside popped and shattered, then another, and another–

  I took a deep breath and pushed the Volt together. Defiant sparks still spat out of the open edges, but the compression lessened the danger. I pulled the wires free of the plugs with a hard yank, quickly uncurling them from the bases of the Volt. Irate and confused shouts came from down the hall.

  “Can you work the plan alone?” Gemma asked.

  I looked at her, stuffing the Volt into its pouch on my belt. I dropped the wire strippers and took off the gloves, but kept the screwdriver.

  “Maybe, why?”

  “There are four guys heading this way. I’m going to head them off and buy time.” She looked at me seriously. “Save them.”

  Before I could shout a warning or tell her to stop, Gemma sprinted down the hall. I pressed my back to the wall and watched four outraged Dogs chase after her. My heart screamed at me to chase her, but her words came back to me. Begging me to save the man she loved and the two men I was torn between. Something she would never have done if she hadn’t trusted and believed in me completely.

  Reminding myself that Gemma was excessively armed and capable of fighting, I jogged to the entrance of the cave and peered out. No one else seemed to be coming down the tunnel, so I left the electric room and followed the chorus of voices. They grumbled in the distance, then started shouting again.

  Following the shouts were the screeches, the ear piercing wails that made me want to curl in a dark corner and hide. There was no mistaking the sound, nor did I know if my friends were alive. Their voices were lost in the thrilled shouts of the crowd.

  I ran as fast as I could, refusing to slow down until I made the right turn that led me to the Crater.

  This cavern was much, much larger, and packed to the walls with Stray Dogs and their Runt slaves. All of them had their backs to me, shaking their fists and chanting down at something I couldn’t see. The Hellion shrieks were clearer than ever now.

  There was no way for me to get through the dense crowd without the Dogs noticing me, so I took my chances on the sides. I pressed my back to the wall and shifted along, sucking in my stomach and doing my best to avoid loose elbows flying at my head. A couple of them batted at my belly, but I winced and kept moving.

  A painful shout came from the middle of the crowd. They spectators groaned and booed. After another shriek and an agonized cry, they cheered. My heart squeezed with fear.

  I slowed down next to a large mechanical pulley system. A rusted metal gear acted as a ratchet to unwind thick chain instead of rope. The ends of the chain had a large hook on them, likely to lift and lower one of the thick, wire cages sprawled against the far wall. As the crowd jostled around me, I noticed one of the cages hadn’t been emptied yet.

  Smashing back and forth against the bars of its cage was a trapped Hellion. Even from this distance, I could see it was disturbingly thin. Black hair had fallen out of its head in clumps. Bruises marred its pasty skin. It had been captured somehow, and tortured into a monster worse than anything we faced aboveground. I knew it was a powerful, berserk animal that would shred anything in sight with its bare claws.

  Another screech erupted from the Crater, quickly followed by a painful scream. The voice sounded too much like Sawyer’s.

  I almost gave up on my plan. I was desperate to see them, to make sure they were all alive and not incapacitated by fatal wounds. I didn’t know what I would see if I took the chance to shoulder through the crowd and look down into the Crater.

  It was a chance I couldn’t take, either. Not if I wanted to save their lives.

  Closing my eyes and praying Sawyer, Nash, and Riley could hang on just a little longer, I continued to weave through the bloodthirsty crowd.

  I spotted Ryland perched on an empty metal cage on my left. His gaze was fixed on the fight, a cruel smirk plastered on his face. It made me hate him even more, but I knew I wouldn’t kill him. I didn’t have it in me to kill anyone, no matter how evil they were.

  But if my plan went the way I hoped it would, no one would have to die. At least not by my hand.

  I ran back to the pulley and took the Volt from my belt. Someone shouted behind me, but I ignored them. I grabbed the hand crank on the side of the pulley and slammed it down, shooting the chain into the Crater so Sawyer, Riley, and Nash had something to climb up with. I slapped the Volt onto the side of the pulley, feeling the magnetized hold would keep it in place–

  A hand grabbed my hair and pulled. I yelped unwillingly. The fist continued to drag me backward until I dug my heels in. I tilted my head forward and loosened the man’s grip. He hunched over me, in perfect range for my elbow. I beat his ribs a couple times, then spun on my heel and threw a punch into his jaw. He wasn’t a very big man–looked like one of the Runts–so he staggered to the side.

  By then, all eyes were on me. Ryland shot up from his seat, the smirk gone from his face. I didn’t stop to look at him or think about the other thugs rushing for me. I ran back to the Volt, recovering the short steps I’d lost to the Runt, trying not to lose focus when I heard my friends screaming in the Crater.

  I turned to the pulley, and bashed my fist against the button on the top of the Volt.

  The disk whirred angrily for two seconds, giving me almost no time to drop onto the ground and cover my head. In the next second, the world exploded.

  Grown men shrieked in terror as sharp, cracking electricity jumped out of the Volt, stabbing out like jagged knives at anyone who got too close. I lifted my head to see the bolts plunge into the men nearest me, watched them arch their backs as they wailed, tortured by the voltage. Even Ryland stood in shock. The Volt continued to shoot out lightning, but it was still locked in its metal container. Punching the button on it would create a lethal force, but to unleash its full power, the button needed to be held down. I had distracted the Dogs, and I had seconds left before some brave, foolish soul tried to shut it off.

  Dragging myself to the fallen man closest to me, I patted him down and stole his weapons. Two flintlocks and a knife. Good enough. I glanced over my shoulder, hearing the chain from the pulley groan sharply. The Volt’s charge wrecked havoc on the gear, setting it into a wild spin that dropped the chain into the Cra
ter. I carried the guns through the opening the crowd made as it shuffled away from my device. I prayed my friends were paying attention, then threw the weapons into the Crater. The chain went taut, jerked to a halt when it reached its end. I prayed it would be long enough for Sawyer, Riley, and Nash to get out.

  Scrambling to my feet, I took the screwdriver from my belt and rushed Ryland. I don’t know what came over me, if it was adrenaline, anger, desperation, or stupidity. It must have been a combination of all of them, because I thought he wouldn’t see me coming.

  Just as I raised my arm to put the screwdriver against his neck for a threat, he jerked his head in my direction. I skidded at the same time his fist swung at me. Between the abrupt stop and the punch to my face, I staggered and landed on the dirt. Ryland grabbed my hair with both hands and lifted me off the ground. I cried out and kicked back before he could throw me, my heel jarring his knee. Ryland dropped me and I jabbed the tip of the screwdriver at his neck. He growled and lunged at me. I pushed back, digging the tool deeper into his throat. He must have seen something wild in my eyes, because he didn’t try to attack me again.

  Around me, men screamed in fear. Guns fired below me, and Hellions howled.

  “Turn it off,” Ryland growled, low enough so only I could hear him.

  “No,” I snapped back. “Not until you get them out of there, and show me where the Capital Meridian is.”

  “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

  “Yes, you do, and you’re going to show me.”

  Ryland smirked. “You trying to threaten me, little girl? You’re not the type.”

  “It’s not my friends being electrocuted out there.”

  He laughed. “Might want to redefine your idea of ‘friends.’ Besides, you won’t last much longer. You can’t stand their screams, can you? Knowing it’s your fault?” His smile grew, and my blood turned cold. “I imagine your parents felt the same way.”

  I held back my shock as much as I could. Ryland was definitely old enough to have been alive when my parents were, but had he really seen them? Had all of Westraven seen them? Or did they just hear rumors and remember failures?

  The worst part was that he was right. I couldn’t keep up this act much longer. Not with the terrible sound around me. So much pain, all of it being caused by me. I couldn’t let it go on.

  “A true Abernathy,” he condescended. “I should have known it from your looks, but this?” He chuckled. “This proves it.”

  A bloodcurdling scream nearby startled me. My hand slipped away from Ryland’s neck, dragging a small line along his throat. He grunted once, then batted my hand down and slapped me with an open hand. Stars exploded behind my eyes, and a dark shape blurred into motion in front of me. Ryland’s hand clamped around my throat and squeezed tightly. Pain pierced the bite wounds, and I let out a choked cry before the shrieking whirr of the Volt stopped. Someone else had reached it. Gunfire exploded nearby, and Ryland roared. He let me go and clapped one hand over his ear.

  I coughed and stepped back, bumping into someone whose arms went around my waist. I jumped and tried to break free, but the arms tightened.

  “Calm down, Claire, it’s me.”

  Riley’s smooth, warm voice calmed my nerves almost instantly. My heart still thumped with adrenaline, but for the first time in hours, I felt as though I might be safe.

  Ryland snapped his head in my direction, but his eyes were fixed on someone else. Just then, Sawyer stalked into view, standing in front of me and pointing one of the flintlocks at Ryland’s head.

  “What did I tell you?” Sawyer’s voice froze the entire room. It was like a corpse had risen from the ground, and was swearing revenge on its murderer.

  “I said if you touched her, I would kill you.”

  Sawyer thumbed back the hammer on the flintlock, his arm perfectly straight as he prepared to fire. Blood poured down the side of Ryland’s head from where half his ear was blown off. Murder swelled through his eyes.

  “Sawyer!” shouted Riley. “Don’t! Look at me!”

  He didn’t. I saw his muscles tighten as he started to squeeze the trigger.

  “Sawyer,” I croaked.

  The gun remained silent. His head turned ever so slightly, just enough to see me from the corner of his eye.

  “Don’t,” I echoed Riley, then added, “We need him. Please.”

  Compared to the noise that filled the cavern earlier, it was deathly silent. All that could be heard were the low moans and whimpers of pain from the men who had been struck by the Volt’s lightning. For a single, tense minute, Sawyer refused to move. I began to think he wouldn’t listen to me. After everything Ryland put him through, could I really stop him from wanting to kill him? Did I have the right?

  Sawyer turned back to Ryland, who hadn’t moved an inch, but still seethed with rage. He lowered the flintlock, and amazingly didn’t attack.

  “Let me give you some advice, old man,” Sawyer bit out. “Do as she says. What you saw was just a fraction of what she’s capable of. And she just saved your worthless life.”

  Ryland’s fury was like a volcano, hatred bubbling and boiling under his skin, looking for the chance to break free.

  “I’m not her damn lapdog. Not like you.”

  Sawyer didn’t react to the jab. “Make a deal if it makes you feel tough again. But she won’t stop me the next time you try to attack me or anyone on my crew. Now take us to the damn ship.”

  “In exchange for what?”

  “Being allowed to still breathe is pretty generous.”

  Ryland sneered. “You know it doesn’t work like that, boy. You’re outnumbered. I give the word, and that gun and her little machine aren’t going to save you. I can take you to the ship, but you won’t leave it alive. Not unless you give me something worth keeping.”

  The Dog’s eyes immediately went to me. Riley tightened his arms around my torso, locking me close to him.

  “No,” Sawyer said. He didn’t turn around, but I could hear the barely restrained anger in his voice. “You don’t get her. You get the Dauntless.”

  Even Ryland seemed stunned at the offer. He blinked rapidly while Nash drew in a breath behind me.

  “You’d give up your father’s ship, the most famous pirate vessel in all of Westraven, for a girl?” The sneer returned. “I doubt he would be proud of you.”

  “Doesn’t matter what he thinks. He’s dead. The ship is mine. I can do whatever I want with it. You won’t settle for less, so what’s the point in trying to argue? We have a deal or not?”

  I wanted Sawyer to say no, to ask for something else, to change his mind. I would do anything I could, make Ryland whatever he wanted, if it meant Sawyer could keep his ship. He was lying about what the Dauntless Wanderer meant to him. It was his life. Every time he looked at his family’s ship, pride filled his eyes. When he put his hands on the wheel, he was calm and controlled. The Dauntless was his anchor, the one thing in the world he could turn to and find hope in. He couldn’t give it away for something as small as this.

  But he had.

  Ryland laughed heartily. Sawyer didn’t move. He held out his hand. “You have a deal, boy.”

  The young captain reluctantly took the old pirate’s hand and shook it roughly.

  “You understand I’ll need to keep your friends here while you get your ship for me?” he said, squeezing Sawyer’s hand tightly. “As insurance.”

  “Just take us to the damn Meridian. I’ll keep my word.”

  Ryland smirked and let go of Sawyer. A muffled shout came from behind us. I turned around Riley to see Gemma appear in the cavern. A couple of red marks dotted her face and her hair was a mess, but she looked all right. The Dogs crowded together, hiding her.