Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
Though he’d spoken no more than six words, I immediately recognize the gravelly voice and subtle scent of smoky bergamot. And against my better judgement, I relax a little.
“No,” I try to mumble against his palm.
The man huffs a bemused breath, like he’s unconvinced, then asks, “If I put you down, do you promise to stop screaming?”
His grip on my mouth loosens enough for me to answer. “Sure, but only if you promise to help me.”
“Help you how?” He lowers his hand from my face, but instead of setting me down, readjusts his free arm to brace across my shoulders.
“My friend, Gem. She was hit by the falling rubble. Her pulse is steady, but she’s bleeding and non-responsive. I need to get her to someone that can help, and I’m not strong enough to carry her on my own.” The admission has me biting the inside of my lip.
“I can’t—” he starts.
“Please. I’ll owe you a favor.” Desperation heightens my pitch. “Anything you need.”
Offering an open-ended favor is a gamble, but there are two things I’ve gleaned about this man: he’s clearly up to something, yet he was good-natured enough to give me an unprompted hand with that boulder.
Plus, little does he know I have an impending expiration on my time as a human.
He won’t have long to cash in that favor.
The scruff along his jaw brushes against the side of my head as he asks, “Anything? No conditions? No questions?”
“Anything,” I agree, praying to the shadows that I’ve gambled correctly.
He releases me instantly.
I stumble a little, unprepared to bear weight again on my limp legs. Once I stabilize, I return to Gem with the stranger in tow. He frowns when he sees her lying in the puddle of blood, then delicately slips a hand beneath her neck.
I lower into a shaky squat. “You get her head. I’ll get her legs.”
Lifting a single angular brow, he blinks pointedly at me before bracing his other hand beneath Gem’s knee and raising her off the ground. I catch her torn satchel as it slips off, frowning at the unexpected heaviness of it.
The man readjusts his grip on Gem, cradling her in one arm while lifting the other in offering. “I’ll take it.”
“You sure?”
He responds by grabbing the strap and tugging it onto his shoulder with a scowl.
“Is it too heavy?”
“Not for me,” he says.
I wince at the implication. How can someone be so simultaneously rude and so generous?
I mean, he isn’t wrong; the satchel would significantly slow me down if he hadn’t offered to carry it.
But wouldn’t most people keep that deduction to themselves?
I glance at the stranger, whose arms are full with Gem’s prone body and her bag, then shake my head.
Most people wouldn’t have bothered to help.
“Where to?” he asks.
My head twists to the side. There’s a metal mile marker a few feet down the wall with two lines of text.
The first denotes a distance of three and a half miles between this check point and Caligo.
The second shows four and a half miles to reach Deor.
Blood rushes to my cheeks at the realization that we hadn’t even made it halfway.
Wishing I didn’t have to make this decision alone, I point to the east, towards Caligo.
Gem’s going to be pissed when she wakes and discovers we backtracked, but I won’t prolong her receiving medical care for the sake of escaping the Hunt. She has so much more potential, more value, than I’ll ever have. If it’s her life or mine, I’ll choose hers. Every time.
We carry on in silence, and I try to keep up.
Even with the added weight of a grown woman, the stranger’s stride doesn’t falter.
If only I could say the same for myself.
By the time the first mile marker returns to view, I’ve long since given up on matching pace.
Instead, I busy myself with staring at the gruesome scars cutting along the left side of his back and disappearing around his rib cage.
Perhaps I was wrong to assume he’s not a guard, though I’ve seen the unclothed backs of several guardsmen and not once have I seen wounds so grim.
Despite their role as primary protectors of Caligo, the Guards of the Gate rarely see battle.
Thanks to their dependence on direct sunlight and wariness of the underground, Sols seem to reserve their attacks for the Hunt, when their prey is more easily available.
So, where did this stranger earn such a fierce wound, and how did he survive?
Distant voices break our wordless progression.
We rush to push our backs into the wall.
The guards must finally be coming to inspect the commotion.
It’s a miracle it took them this long, but it seems our good fortune is running out.
I lean further into the wall, my arm pressing into the chilled, metal sign denoting we’re a mile from the transport tunnel’s main entrance, which means . . .
“There’s a utility stairwell a quarter mile down from here on our right.” My words are barely louder than a breath. “If we hurry, maybe we can get to it before the guards.”
Problem is, hurrying means no more being quiet on our feet.
We’ll need to run.
“Don’t wait for me,” I urge, knowing there’s a chance I won’t be fast enough. “Even if they catch me, go down the stairwell. Look for the doorway marked R1. Hook a right and follow the bend. There’s a cabin with three constellations painted on the front door. Knock six times.”
There’s more I want to tell him, but the voices grow louder, so I shove the stranger’s arm with the unspoken plea to move.
He bolts.
I follow, clutching my stomach and begging in vain for my useless legs to go faster. But I’ve already pushed my body well past its usual limit. The adrenaline from the earthquake abates, allowing my prior fatigue to come barreling back, more prominent than before.
The guards shout something, no doubt alerted by our rapid footfalls. But I keep moving, eyes fixed on the fading figure ahead. The stranger soon disappears into the alcove of the utility stairwell entrance, and a hopeful smile tugs at my lips.
Gem’s going to make it. He’s going to get her to Taur, and she’ll make sure Gem gets the medical attention she needs. Maybe I will, too. A few more seconds and I’ll be ducking into the doorway before the guards get close enough to spot me.
I nearly convince myself it’s true when three guards round the corner, jogging in my direction. They’re on the opposite path, across the rail lines. They’ll have to cross the trench to catch me. A small mercy—one I can’t let go to waste.
I dive forward, swinging my arms back and forth more aggressively, as if that’ll increase my speed.
“Is that a lady?!” one guard calls as they jump into the trench.
“Ma’am!” They break into a sprint, and another yells, “Stop right where you are!”
The first is already at the ledge when he warns, “In the name of the chancellor, stop or we will arrest—”
The door to the utility stairwell clicks into place behind my back, and I’ve never been so happy to be greeted by the scent of mold.
Without pausing to savor it, I dash down a flight of steps and barge through the doorway marked P1 for the first level of the water purification system.
I won’t make it to the secondary utility stairwell on the opposite side of the five-hundred-acre reservoir.
Instead, I aim directly for the bridge that divides the two basins, eyes wildly scanning the steel ledge until I find it—the ladder I once followed a boy down what feels like a lifetime ago.
I tighten the straps on my satchel before grabbing onto the ladder’s slick rail.
Cool water chases off some of the escalating fatigue as I partially submerge into the reservoir.
Using the ladder to keep from plummeting the twenty-foot depth, I tuck myself behind the bridge’s support beams. A purple sheen from the suspended tube lights glistens off the water’s lapping surface while I fix my attention on the door and wait.
One . . .
Two . . .
Three hurried breaths later, the door slams open.
I squint through the perforated platform and hold as still as possible to avoid disturbing the reservoir’s natural current.
It’s a small relief to see that the guard is by himself. They must’ve taken the divide-and-conquer approach. But a second look at his brawny frame tamps that relief.
He won’t need the helping hands of his fellow guardsmen if I’m caught.
The guard stomps forward, twisting his head right to left. He checks behind the row of groundwater pumps lining the reservoir’s edge first before moving onto two mixing tanks at the nearest corner of the chamber, and I’m grateful I didn’t go for the more obvious hiding spots.
His boots clang against the steel bridge, and my pulse grows so loud it’s practically shouting.
Clamping my lips together, I hold my breath until the guard is several feet past the ladder. Once there are nearly two dozen feet between us, I relax into the support beam.
Something yanks on the shawl. The tear in the fabric has snagged on a protruding screw jutting from the ladder’s steel rung, unraveling most of my makeshift cast. Though my glowing fingers are still covered, one good nudge from the reservoir’s current might be enough to change that.
Slowly, I tug on the damp wool, hoping to unhook it from the screw.
It doesn’t budge. I try again, giving it a better yank.
The stitch relents, releasing the shawl—but the motion casts a ripple along the surface.
I tense, attention flicking back to the guard, who’s halfway across the bridge.
Unless he turns around, he won’t notice a couple tiny ripples.
The door swings wide a second time.
“No sign of her in the archive,” the newcomer calls across the chamber. “And the dayshift janitor swears she hasn’t seen anyone come through. Boss is heading to R1 to do a head count on the feeders, see if anyone’s missing from their cabin.”
My teeth grind at the mention of feeders.
Feeders. Rats. Bait. Nicknames given to those of us unfortunate enough to call the first residential level home.
“Maybe she’s in the greenhou . . .” The first guard trails off, his gaze homing in on the space to my left, where the dwindling ripples ebb across the water.
I squeeze my eyes shut.
Not for any good reason, really; it’s not like my inability to see the guard will prevent him from seeing me.
But I’d rather not lock eyes with the man who’s about to drag me off to a cell in the Abyss, which is rumored to be kept in total blackness.
Not even the dim bioluminescent sconces are allowed.
Perhaps it’ll feel like floating. Or like a thick blanket.
Or maybe, like the feeder rat that I am, I’ll develop enhanced night vision.
A rumble vibrates across the chamber, stirring up countless more ripples across the reservoir’s expanse and interrupting my feeble attempts at persuading myself that a life of imprisonment might not be as bad as it sounds. I brace for a repeat earthquake.
Though the aquifer above the reservoir groans, it holds steady against the tremors.
“Aftershock?” the second guard questions as the trembling subsides.
“Must be,” the first mumbles, then lifts his gaze from the water.
A minute later, I’m alone again. It’s another five before I dare to move. I lean my head back into the water and release my hold on the support beam. My legs rise to the surface as I sprawl out, eager to release the burden of my aching body and weighty worries.
Twelve years have passed since I last felt the chilled embrace of the reservoir cushioning my back. We were newlyweds, drunk on declarations of love and the endless possibilities of our future.
I’d wanted to stay in our cabin that night, but he’d insisted on sneaking up here.
“How perfect would it be if we conceived our firstborn son in the same spot I proposed?”
“Or daughter.” I’d smacked my palms against his chest. “And you’re not playing fair.”
He’d given me a dimpled smirk. “Life’s not fair, Elle. But you certainly are.”
Water trickles down my throat as my fingertips follow the phantom trail of kisses he’d once traced down my neck.
Kisses that had crumbled my shaky resolve on more than one occasion.
Kisses from a man I’d given everything to—my heart, my body, even my last name—only to be cast out like a shredded rag for the one thing I couldn’t give him: an heir.
I spin onto my stomach and sink beneath the reservoir’s surface, letting the current carry away the chafing memories of his haunting touch.
When I come back up, my ex-husband’s name is long gone from my mind. And when I ascend back onto the steel bridge, I don’t recall the time he gripped my waist and yanked me back into the water with a hungry gleam in his midnight-blue eyes.
The last of the soot stain drips from my drenched locks onto the steel bridge as I aim for the secondary utility stairwell.
I shouldn’t go home, not when I have no way of knowing how fast the mutation will spread through my veins.
My very presence could put Taurance and Gem in danger.
But I have to check on Gem. And I’m so damn tired.
So, I resign myself to getting some rest in our cabin before saying goodbye.
By the time I arrive at our dented steel door, it’s all I can do to lift my arm and knock.
Taurance grabs me by my sopping chambray shift, and I vaguely register her mentioning something about a half-naked man carrying her half-dead sister before I collapse in her arms.