The Hunt

by Megan Shepherd

  Sometimes just surviving isn’t enough, his granddad had said.

  He put the gun away quickly and closed the panel door. At the time, he had thought of killing the animals as a cruel sort of kindness. One that he’d like to avoid at all costs, if possible. Hopefully he’d find another way to save them. Maybe if Cora did beat the Gauntlet, he’d be granted more authority, and could take the animals away from the menagerie and care for them properly. But in case the worst happened, he’d rather put every single animal out of its misery with his own hand than force them to continue this sick cycle of pain. As for the other kids, well, they could each make up their own minds. If it got bad enough, or if someone was wounded very badly . . . a quick and painless option could be good for them too.

  He felt through the darkness for the door, and then was back in the cell block—moving faster now, glancing at the clock—and into his cell. He pulled the door all the way closed. The lightlock clicked on, casting a glow over the crumpled journal pages in his hand. He slid them into his journal and sank to the floor.

  Someone was still snoring, but now Lucky knew it was probably just an act. All these nights while he had lain awake, the others probably had too.

  He kept his eyes going between the hallway and the clock.

  Cora didn’t have much time.

  The fox nudged against the bars again. He petted it, a little hard, but the fox didn’t seem to mind, or to notice just how feverishly, in that moment, he hated himself for what he one day might have to do to it.

  His mind raced, and he knew there’d be no sleep for him. He grabbed up the journal and the pencil nub, and started writing to get it out of his head.

  The others know. All this time, they’ve been protecting us. . . .

  His pencil paused. He caught a glimpse in the faint light of the markings on his hand; coding that designated him as a human only suitable for menagerie work.

  Maybe Cora is right about what happens after the Gauntlet. It isn’t fair to ask people who have already been through so much to give up a chance of going home. And god, I think about what it would be like, if we did get back. I’d walk into a grocery store and fill up three shopping carts with bacon and Pop-Tarts and soda. I wouldn’t join the army. I’d take over the farm—just me and the horses and the stars. And Cora—if she’d come.

  He flipped a page.

  But then—and here’s what I can’t shake—why does going home feel so wrong? And it does. It makes me sick to my stomach. The animals, the humans: we’re all marked the same way, might as well be brothers in captivity. I can’t picture a world where we’re free and they’re not. If it comes to it, I’ll do what I have to. But I hope it doesn’t. I hope Cora beats the Gauntlet. I hope she decides to stay.

  I hope she decides to build a life here, where we’re needed.

  Where I’ll be.

  34

  Cora

  “OKAY,” CORA SAID, AS soon as she and Leon reached the end of a service tunnel. “Ready?”

  “Do I have a choice?”

  She reached up and brushed a drop of his sweat from his forehead. “It’ll be okay. Put the shackles on me so I look like a prisoner.”

  They listened for footsteps on the other side of the tunnel door, and when it was evident that the hall was empty, Leon looked out. “It’s clear.”

  “Hold my arm,” Cora whispered. “Like you’re leading me.”

  The foyer where menagerie doors split off was even creepier at night. The podiums to the menageries weren’t staffed, the hosts and hostesses off duty. Cora adjusted her hands in the shackles, trying to wear a mix of defiance and fear in case there were any Kindred guards. It wasn’t hard. All she had to do was think about the first time Cassian had taken her down this same dank hallway.

  They’d only walked about twenty feet when Leon mumbled a low curse. “Trouble. Two o’clock.”

  A shadow was approaching from the far end of the foyer. A female guard, patrolling the hall slowly in their direction.

  “We’re almost there,” Cora whispered, nodding toward a doorway on the right. “That’s the entrance to the Temple. Just act natural.”

  With the lights so low, Leon looked perfectly believable as a Kindred. She saw the guard’s head cock, curious, but then Leon swiveled Cora toward the Temple doorway.

  “Open it quick,” he muttered. “She’s eyeing us.”

  Cora focused on the blue sensor above the door. Her heart was racing, but this was second nature to her now. All she had to do was ignore the splinter of pain in the back of her head. As they stepped inside, she saw the female guard turn to inspect a different node but throw one last look over her shoulder.

  The door closed, and Cora sighed in relief. “That was easier than I thought.”

  “Yeah,” Leon said darkly. “Too easy. She’s probably calling for reinforcements.”

  “Then let’s hurry.”

  In the dark, the Temple’s ornate columns weren’t visible, and the cells loomed like a prison. “I don’t think there’s anyone observing behind the black panel,” she whispered. “But just in case, manhandle me a little.”

  Leon grabbed her shoulder, saying some sharp words. In his disguise he looked terrifying, and it wasn’t hard to shrink back. He led her down the hall to the last cell, and there was Anya, sitting on the throne, staring at the fire. Cora wondered if the girl ever slept, or if the consciousness-reducing drugs rendered sleep obsolete.

  “Stand, girl,” Leon commanded, trying to make his voice flat like the Kindred. “The medical officer has requested an inspection.”

  Anya’s head slowly turned from the fire, but her eyes settled on Cora instead. In a drugged sort of way, she smiled. “Hi, little rabbit.”

  Cora glanced at Leon, but he clearly hadn’t heard anything.

  “Right,” Cora said. “Anya, if you can hear me, we’re friends of Mali’s. She’s sent us to get you out of here. We need for you to teach me to control minds.”

  But Anya didn’t seem to hear. Instead, her cold gaze raked over Leon’s Kindred uniform and Kindred face.

  “Are you guys talking psychic stuff?” Leon whispered. “Did you tell her I’m human?”

  “I can hear her voice in my head,” Cora whispered back. “But she never makes much sense when she’s drugged.”

  “Well, read her mind and see if she’s going to strangle us as soon as we get her out of there.”

  Taking a deep breath, Cora faced Anya. Every time she’d tried to read minds—first with Lucky, then with Leon—it had come a little easier. Now she tried to reach out her thoughts like she did for levitation, but instead of dice, it was thoughts she was trying to influence.

  Images flickered at the edge of her mind.

  Blood.

  Lots of it.

  And Leon’s face with its Kindred disguise.

  “Did it work?” Leon asked.

  Cora blinked out of her concentration. “Um, a little. She’s not thinking polite thoughts about you, that’s for sure. I can’t tell if she knows you’re human.”

  “No way in hell I’m reviving this little psycho,” Leon said. “If she can do even half the ninja shit Mali can, I’ll be dead in thirty seconds.”

  “How are we supposed to get her out of here if we don’t revive her?”

  “I’ll carry her. We have the removal pass, if that guard stops us. Come on, just open her cell with your mind or whatever. This place gives me the creeps.”

  Cora concentrated on the lightlock set into the wall above Anya’s cell. It was slightly different from the ones in their cell block, but after a few minutes she figured it out and the door swung open with her thoughts.

  Anya turned back to the fire, uninterested.

  Leon started to take a step inside her cell but hesitated, like he was reaching for a live cobra that was going to strike if he moved too fast. He paced to the left, then to the right, rubbing the back of his neck.

  “Just grab her,” Cora hissed. “She’s drugged. She can’t hur
t you.”

  “Famous last words,” he muttered, then took a deep breath like he was diving underwater, and threw Anya over his shoulder. Her head pitched back, lolling; her eyes were glassy.

  “We’ll sail to a different world,” she said into Cora’s head.

  Leon fumbled to snap the shackles on Anya’s hands, as much for show as to protect themselves from her. “Let’s get out of here.”

  They hurried back to the entrance. Cora wondered how sane Anya really was beneath the drugs. That tear in her own mind felt suddenly more painful. She pressed a hand to her nose, trying to stave off the blood, as she focused on the blue sensor to open the door.

  It slid open—and the female guard was on the other side.

  She blocked the exit, as though she had been waiting for them. Her face was a mask of passivity as she slowly cocked her head, eyes focused on Anya.

  Leon had been right—it had been too easy before.

  Luckily, he didn’t break character now. With his free hand, he held out the removal pass.

  The guard took the pass, studying it closely, and then scanned it to log the visit. It seemed to satisfy her, and she stepped back to allow them to enter the hallway. Cora closed the door behind them, keeping her face calm, so the guard would think Leon had done it. As they walked away, she could feel success with every step. Ahead, just around that corner, they’d slip back into the walls and be safe.

  Then the guard said something in Kindred.

  Cora froze. Leon did too.

  Cora frantically tried to probe the guard’s mind. When she’d read Cassian’s thoughts before, it hadn’t mattered what language they’d been in. But all she came up with now was a cold, suspicious feeling. Panic started to seep into her, but Leon remained calm. He gave a noncommittal grunt like she had heard the Kindred do, and started walking again with authority.

  One step.

  One more.

  The guard spoke again, sharper. Out of the corner of her eye, Cora glanced at Leon, wondering if they should run for it. The Kindred were so fast that it would take a miracle to get to the drecktube in time. There was the gun, but that was only a bluff.

  They turned slowly. The guard was facing them, and she didn’t look pleased. She wore an intercom on her wrist—she could have twenty more guards there in seconds.

  The guard took a step closer, head moving in measured jerks between Leon and Cora. There was nothing they could do; there were no words to answer her. Cora glanced at Leon; sweat was trickling down his face. At the same moment, the guard noticed.

  Leon broke character. “We’re screwed!”

  The guard reached for her wrist intercom. Time seemed to slow. Cora twisted the shackles, but it was useless. There was no stick to drive through her eye. She spun on Leon. “Run, now! Take Anya—I’ll hold her off.”

  “Like hell,” he said.

  Cora was about to throw herself at the guard when a blast of sound fractured through the hallway. She cried out, and Leon cringed. A gunshot? She twisted around to see Leon’s holster—empty. Where was the gun? Another shot rang out, and the Kindred doubled over. Cora looked around frantically. Her hands were empty. So were Leon’s. So were Anya’s; she was still slung over his shoulder, delirious.

  Who was firing the gun?

  And then she saw it. Hovering in the air four feet off the ground. Still aimed in the direction of the guard, who had collapsed.

  Cora jerked around to face Anya, with her drug-laced smile.

  “Anya’s doing this,” Cora choked. “She’s doing it with her mind!”

  The floating gun started to aim at the crouching guard again, but Cora reached out and plucked it from the air. The smile on Anya’s face fell.

  “That’s enough,” Cora said. “Leon, move!”

  They raced down the hallway. The gun felt warm in Cora’s hand. She’d never imagined power like that. Levitation. Even making it shoot—that was so far beyond her own abilities that she’d thought it impossible.

  They raced around the corner to the drecktube. Leon climbed in and dragged Anya in like she weighed nothing.

  Cora stuffed the gun in the strap of her dress.

  “Someone’s going to find that guard,” Leon said.

  “Yeah,” Cora answered, still shaking, “But not until morning. We’ll be long gone by then.”

  They started crawling. Leon seemed to know where he was going, which was good, because Cora couldn’t focus on anything. That tear in the back of her head was throbbing. Cassian had said Anya had fractured her mind beyond repair. But could a fractured mind do what she had just done?

  Eventually, they saw the tube that led back to the Hunt; Leon had marked it with chalk. Cora tried not to think about the wounded guard.

  They had Anya.

  Cassian was on her side.

  Once they had Nok and Rolf safe, she would be ready for the Gauntlet. She ignored that itch in her mind that said there was more to the Gauntlet than Cassian was letting on.

  35

  Cora

  CORA SLAMMED THE DOOR of her cell closed.

  She mussed her hair to make it look as if she’d slept, and kicked around her blanket, seconds before the morning lights flickered on. The clock above the doorway clicked onto Morning Prep.

  She sank against the bars, chest rising and falling hard. She had made it. They had made it. It was all she could do, once the lights flickered all the way on, not to laugh out loud in joy. She pressed a hand over her mouth and whirled toward Lucky’s cell.

  But the joy on her face died.

  He looked awful. Dark circles around his eyes, hair tangled, like he hadn’t slept at all. As soon as the lightlocks clicked off, she pushed open the door. The other kids all tumbled out of their cells, trying to beat one another to the feed room. Cora bided her time until they cleared.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked Lucky.

  He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck and glanced at the fox. Their argument from the night before flooded back to her, his assertions that he’d do anything—even stay behind—to protect the animals, and that it was her responsibility to do the same for the kids.

  “The others know,” he said.

  She jerked back in surprise. “How much?”

  “Not everything, but enough. They’ve been protecting us.” He glanced toward the medical room, tucking a few torn-out journal pages into his pocket. There was handwriting on them, but it wasn’t his. “Did you get Anya?”

  “Yeah. She’s safe, but . . .” She remembered the gun floating in the air. “I’m not sure anyone around her is. She’s delirious. She isn’t going to be able to train me like that.”

  “It must be the drugs,” Lucky said. “They’ll have to leave her system before she can tell you how to control minds.”

  The clock clicked over to Showtime, and Cora’s stomach grumbled, but she ignored it. Lucky rubbed his shoulder uneasily as he watched the backstage kids tumble out of the feed room, Shoukry and Christopher arguing over half a breakfast cake. His fingers fumbled again with the torn-out pages.

  “What are those?” she asked.

  He didn’t answer. She was tempted to probe inside his mind and see what was bothering him. She went so far as to send her thoughts just to the edge of his, but flinched when she saw images of guns, darts, dead animals—all surrounded by an overwhelming feeling of sadness.

  “Don’t worry about it.” When he met her eyes, he blinked and his weariness vanished. He gave her half a smile. “We’re getting close. You’re going to beat this thing, I know it.”

  His words bolstered her hope.

  That morning, she raced through her songs as if she’d chugged ten cups of coffee. Her limbs felt light and jittery. Arrowal and the Council members hadn’t come today. Roshian was rotting where no one would ever find him. For the first time in days, Cora let herself revel in a sense of hope, as she pulled Shoukry onstage and they belted out the refrain together.

  “I haven’t thought of that song in years!
” Shoukry said with a laugh. “We used to listen to it at the roller-skating rink. It played at my fifth birthday party.”

  Cora squeezed his hand, beaming.

  Shoukry leaned in close. “Whatever you’re planning,” he whispered, “we’re with you.”

  Shocked, Cora couldn’t form words to answer until Shoukry was already stepping off the stage, and by then, the front door was opening.

  Cassian entered, and any words vanished in her mind.

  His eyes met hers and he stopped. Suddenly she was back in his quarters, and it made goose bumps erupt on her arms. They were in this together now. No more secrets. No more lies.

  He nodded toward the alcove.

  Once they were in the solitude behind the wooden screen, she thought her racing heart would slow, but it only beat faster.

  “We freed Anya,” she said.

  “Where is she?”

  “With the Mosca.” Cora picked up one of the cards on the table, the queen of diamonds, turning it anxiously between her fingers.

  “It will take a while for the drugs to clear her system,” Cassian said. “A full day, perhaps longer. The Gauntlet arrives tomorrow, and the tests begin the day after that. That does not leave us much time. How much progress have you made teaching yourself to read minds?”

  A thump sounded from beyond the alcove. The music outside stopped halfway through a song. Cora glanced at the slats, but dismissed it. Makayla must be taking her break early.

  “I can see images sometimes in people’s heads, sense the feelings that go with them.”

  “I don’t know how Anya goes about controlling minds, but my guess is you’ll need more than that. You’ll need to extract specific words, as a starting point. It isn’t like levitating dice, because there are no amplifiers built into the mind. You must probe beneath consciousness, like reaching into a murky pond and finding a stone at the bottom.” He took her hands, and she flinched at the sudden contact. He placed her palms on either side of his head, just above his ears. “Tell me what I am thinking.”

  He closed his eyes.

  She scanned his face, looking for any tells or clues that might give away his thoughts. The scar Mali had given him. The bump in his nose.