Chapter 14
By the time we’re cleared to leave, it’s late. They don’t let me ride back with Callum—he’s hustled away first into a sleek
jet. They let me wait for another hovercar, which should scare me. But I can’t find the energy to do anything but follow the
hands pressing me on board, pushing my head down between my legs. They taught us this position during bomb drills at school.
Brace.
When I finally stumble in the door to my new bedroom, all I want to do is fall into my bed, but a feeling of wrongness jolts
through me. I turn the light on, trying to place the feeling, knowing that someone has been in my room, someone has done something.
It’s only as I approach the bed that I notice the cream-colored duvet has been curled up in one corner, revealing the white
belly of silken sheets.
The book.
My heart sinks as my hand shoots out and flips my pillow over. The Lord of the Rings is gone.
Someone found it. The best-case scenario is that they know I have contraband. The worst-case scenario is that they know about
Lyceum.
A knock sounds at my door, and I yank it open without taking my eyes off the bed, like I can get answers from it if I stare
long enough.
Becka leans on the doorframe, her eyes glittering with something I can’t place.
“We need to go,” she says, looking over my shoulder like she needs to confirm I’m alone.
“Go where?”
She pushes off the doorframe and cocks her head as she strides off down the hallway. “Cute that you think I’m going to tell
you.” When I don’t follow right away, she cuts me a glare over her shoulder. “Now, Hart.”
The bed beckons. Safety, security.
But I was almost killed today. I want answers. So I follow Becka to the end of the hall, down a set of unfamiliar looping
steps, and into the back of a black hovercar waiting in the shadows behind the White House.
“Don’t worry about your little boyfriend,” Becka says.
“But if he stops by—”
She raises a brow. “For a sleepover?” When my cheeks burn, she laughs, low. “He’s been in briefings ever since your little stunt.” She says it like we wanted to be almost blown up. “He’ll be with the president until dawn. You won’t be missed.”
It’s not exactly a comforting thought as we dart through the streets of New Washington.
I should be following the turns, but my head feels like it’s been crammed with cotton. Finally, we come to a rocking stop
and Becka leads me out into a pitch-black stretch of road. You won’t be missed. My toe impacts metal and I almost fall, tripping over the loose manhole cover. Becka glares as she latches me into some sort
of belaying getup and shoves me into the darkness.
I should be scared, but my body seems to have run out of adrenaline. It’s a slow descent into blackness, and then Becka lands
behind me, light on her feet like a cat, as lights click on, bathing the tunnel in a warm glow.
“Well, well. Out of my sight for a few days and you’re getting married and blown up.”
I look up, feeling my face crumpling as I recognize the voice.
Nef.
She rushes to me as I hold out my arms. Her hug feels like home. A lump rises in my throat.
“I’m so sorry,” Nef whispers. “Uri said I couldn’t say anything about it. I didn’t know they were just going to take you.”
Nef knew.
I wish I could control how my body reacts to the words, but I stiffen automatically. This whole time, I assumed Nef was as much in the dark as I was. We’re best friends, after all. I thought we told each other everything.
“Ripley?” Nef asks, her arms rigid around me in response.
“I get it,” I lie. I don’t. I don’t get it at all, but that’s a hurt to examine later.
She squeezes back, gusting out a sigh. “You ready for this?”
“Ready for what?”
When we pull back, light races down the tunnel as safety lamps illuminate above. How had I not heard them before? The tunnel
is packed with teenagers, all of them shouting and talking over each other. There’s a break in the crowd down the middle where
the third rail would be, and Becka motions for Nef and me to follow her. We walk a rickety ladder onto a makeshift scaffold
that raises us above the crowd.
A hush falls over the crowd as I step out onto the wooden plank, keeping my eyes locked on my feet. The scaffold is about
five feet wide and seven feet up; the ground seems to swim. On one side, Uri and Lena each stand with their arms across their
chest. Uri has the decency to look embarrassed, as he should. Lena is expressionless, and it stings. I didn’t think we were
friends, but I thought we were allies, at least. Members of the same cause. And they sold me out without a second thought.
On the other side, closer to where the end of the scaffold stretches up into three more levels—sits Hux, lounging against
the V of the metal. The sight of him, so relaxed, so at ease, sends my blood pumping. At my glare, he shoves himself to his
feet, and I can see every muscle tense under the all-black uniform I’ve come to recognize as his, like a cat ready to spring.
His expression is thunderous. And locked on me.
I have to look away.
Even the crowd, so many faces blurring together, is a respite from that hatred. I see familiar faces, faces from home, faces
from when this used to be home. I see many, many unfamiliar faces. But through it all, the crowd parts into distinct sides.
Some are Lyceum, others Machs. I turn to Becka and Nef, waiting for someone to say something.
Becka looks to the crowd. “We’re here to do something unusual,” she says, raising her voice so that it echoes down the tunnel.
“I know we don’t always see eye to eye––”
“—you’re terrorists!” someone from the Lyceum side shouts.
Uriah steps up to the edge of the scaffolding and holds up a hand.
“Next person to interrupt this meeting with an outburst like that is done in Lyceum. We are sitting ducks down here, but there is no other way to figure this out, so we’re risking it.
Shut up and speak when necessary.” When the crowd falls silent, Uriah motions for Becka to continue.
“But,” Becka says with a new bite in her voice, “we have to come together now. We have unconfirmed reports that there is going
to be a vote happening at the Union Conference. We can’t confirm what kind of vote, but we know that it is important enough to warrant the presence of every member of the House and the Senate. Something
that big is probably not good.”
Becka turns to Uriah, who steps closer to the edge.
“That, along with the recent assassination attempt on one of Lyceum’s own.” Uriah gestures to me, but I bite the inside of
my cheek. Is that what I am? They need me, but they didn’t ask me about any of this.
I’m not a member. I’m a tool.
Uriah steps off the platform, stepping into the crowd as he tries to reach them with his words. “That warrants an emergency
meeting. Not just with our own allies, but with the enemies of our enemies.” He’s throwing the Machs a bone, using their own
philosophy. The crowd titters and I feel my brows draw together. “We have to figure out what the vote is and how to stop it,
in addition to figuring out who is trying to take out Callum Graves and Ripley Hart.”
I clench my teeth. My back burns with the memory of that flash of fire.
“Ordinarily, we would make assumptions about who bombed that motorcade,” Lena chimes in.
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Hux murmurs. He’s leaning against the metal arm of the scaffolding, his arms tightly
crossed over his chest. He doesn’t raise his voice, because he doesn’t have to, but the implicit violence in his tone is so
obvious that it sends a shiver down my spine. “But Machs didn’t do this.”
My head whips over to him.
“You didn’t?” I press. I know we’re speaking in front of a crowd of hundreds, but I don’t care.
Hux goes rigid, straightening from his lounging. His arms even snap to his sides; a scowl twists his face. “No.” The word
lands like an anvil.
“You’re sure?” I shoot back, turning to face him full on.
“Ripley,” comes Uriah’s ever-patient voice. “Huxley Finn is one of the generals in the Machs. If he says they didn’t do it . . .
they didn’t do it.”
My eyes must reveal my shock, because a small smirk appears on Hux’s face. I want to slap it off.
A general?
“There is a target on Callum’s back that wasn’t put there by any of us,” Hux says, thrusting his hands into his pockets. “Which
is why I’ve decided that Ripley Hart should be removed from her assignment until we figure out what other players we’re dealing
with.”
I open my mouth, but Uriah speaks up before I can: “Ripley’s post is not your decision.”
I bristle, searching for words as Hux grabs hold of the pole above his perch and gently vaults down, his inertia taking him
easily across the subway rail and up into Uriah’s face before I can even suck in a surprised breath.
“Ripley’s post is more complicated than you librarians seem to understand,” Hux croons, and I see Uriah’s spine straighten.
I jump down, landing with much less grace, and step between them.
“Enough,” I call. They’re not listening. Nef grabs Uriah’s arm as Becka comes up alongside Hux, trying to convince him to
step back.
Around us, the crowd murmurs, anger simmering.
“Funny how Callum Graves wasn’t in any danger until the head of the Machs broke his own council’s orders and infiltrated Graves’s
personal security detail,” Lena bites out, and Hux’s grin turns feral.
I stop, my mind reeling. Hux wasn’t ordered to come to the White House? Why was he there, then?
This time when Hux surges toward the members of Lyceum, my hand presses against his hard chest. His heartbeat thunders under
my palm, but I don’t dare look up and meet his eyes.
“We shouldn’t fight,” Uriah says evenly.
“Oh,” Hux says with a humorless laugh, “what were you going to do, quote the Dewey Decimal system at me until I fell asleep?” And then the fake grin falls from his face and his green eyes sear into Uriah’s even stare.
“Ripley is done.”
“She’s not,” Uriah pushes back.
That’s it. Something inside of me snaps, and it’s a long time coming.
I am done, but not in the way that either of them think.