Reckoning (31 page)

My stomach is screeching in pain, my head feels dizzy, but I roll to the side as his bat crashes into the ground mere centimetres away from me with a force I never would have guessed Imrin had in him.

‘Remember what we said!' I say, but I am scrambling to my feet, not sure Imrin hears me. My eyes flash from the bat on the floor to him as I back away quickly, my arms out wide in submission. ‘Imrin, do you remember?'

‘Yes.'

I glance over my shoulder but the Kingsmen are close and I know I cannot move much further. Imrin slows his pace, knowing I am cornered as the buzz grows around us. I hear a girl's voice that could be Pietra's, but I can't be sure.

Imrin arches back with the bat but I have been fighting with Opie for far too long not to know an opportunity when I see one. Springing off my heels, I jolt forward and crash into his legs, using his weight against him as he topples backwards. His bat clatters across the floor as I try to get to my feet but he is holding onto my injured shoulder. I squeal in pain and, even though he releases me, the damage is done as the fire screams through me.

I hit the ground shoulder-first and the whole side of my body goes numb, my vision clouded with grey stars that spring from the bright lights. I try to stand but the effort feels too much as I hear Imrin scrambling. Moments later he is standing above me, bat in hand.

It is as if the whole arena shrinks down to one person as I hear the King cackling and applauding, my ears blocking everyone else out. I hear his words perfectly: ‘Finish her.'

My breathing is heavy, my chest tight and my fingers unresponsive as Imrin's silhouette takes a step closer, blocking the light until all I can see is the outline of his arms raised high, ready to strike.

34

Suddenly I hear what I have been waiting for. The King's cheers and demands fade until they are a slur of words that merge into one. I hear confusion all around and scramble onto my front, peering up to the King's box as he sinks into the seat. Half of his face has slumped, drool dripping from his paralysed lips, his eye hanging lazily. There are screams everywhere as the Minister Prime clambers over a barrier and leaps into the royal box, calling for help.

I hear the clatter of Imrin's bat hitting the floor and then his hand heaves me up by my good arm. There are pins and needles in my other and I am exhausted but the adrenaline is now starting to flow and my vision is clear.

‘I thought you'd forgotten the routine,' I say.

‘I didn't think we were going to need it after last night. I wondered why you kept going on about me remembering. I thought it was just for show.'

Imrin pulls me close and kisses me quickly but we both know it's time to move.

Hart staggers to his feet, as Rush takes the Kingsman next to him by surprise, spearing him with his own sword. Four of the other boys are by the door, joined by a wild and kicking Faith, where another Kingsman lies bleeding on the ground. His sword is wielded by the largest of the remaining male Offerings, as the group surrounds the only other guard on the ground. Above us, the Minister Prime and the final Kingsman are too concerned with the King to notice what is going on below.

I yell to Pietra, who is racing towards me from the far bench, hand in hand with Jela. She presses something on her thinkwatch and then there is a click and a hum before the lights die. In a fraction of a second, the main doors are open. Imrin leads the way as I wait for Jela and Pietra. Just behind us, Rush is helping Hart, with Faith at the back, bellowing at everyone else to move. More Offerings pile through the door, before Pietra throws me our piece of stolen borodron. I swipe it on the scanner next to the door, sending it fizzing closed behind me. Perfectly in sync, Rush uses his stolen sword to smash the sensor. From the other side of the door, we hear hammering and shouting. We know at best it will only take thirty seconds for any conscious Kingsmen to scramble through the dark into the kitchens and exit that way.

If Imrin is wrong about the number of Kingsmen at the castle we've got no chance – but the corridors are empty. It was a gamble but we were living without hope anyway. Imrin is terrific, trying to calm a couple of the edgier Offerings before he sets off along the corridor towards the stairs. Hart isn't in a good way and is in the middle of another coughing fit but Rush has one hand hooked around his waist and is practically dragging him up the stairs in the direction Imrin has gone.

‘Are you all right?' Pietra asks, placing a hand on my bad arm and then apologising when I wince.

I know we don't have time to be chatting but she seems so worried that I end up replying as we run. ‘Some of the lads from the barracks rigged the weapons just in case the King called for them. It's amazing what we figured out when we all started talking to each other.'

Faith tears past us as we hear a crash and the sound of raised voices. Boots are thundering along in the distance, which seems to speed everyone up. Pietra and Jela are surprisingly quick and Imrin is long gone. I try to help a few of the stragglers towards the back but as the echo of the heavy footsteps increases, I am forced to turn and run.

I dash up a set of steps but whoever is after me is not far behind and I almost run into Rush, who is standing at the top. My heart is racing and I can barely speak as my stomach and chest burn with a mixture of hunger and exhaustion. My shoulder is still hurting too.

‘Go,' Rush bellows at me as I begin to ask what he's doing.

‘Where's Hart?' I say instead.

‘The girls have him, now go.'

I want to argue but he is holding the sword across his body aggressively and has both eyes on the exit of the stairwell, his mind already made up. I mumble a ‘thanks', which I know will never be enough, and then carry on running until I reach a fork in the corridor. I stand in the centre and turn to watch as the Minister Prime and five other people burst from the top of the steps. One of the Kingsmen is a regular guard, but the other four are wearing the senior uniform. Porter isn't there and I don't recognise any of them.

Rush starts backing towards the direction I went in, the sword still across him defensively as the Minister Prime bellows, asking where we have gone. In a second, he spots me over Rush's shoulder and shrieks in rage. I want to keep running but something makes me stop for long enough to see Rush lunge dangerously towards one of the Kingsmen. Another retaliates immediately, thrusting a dagger under Rush's ribs. His cry ripples through the passages as I set off running again.

I can see Imrin's map perfectly in my mind and dart the long way around the floor until reaching the second set of stairs that lead to the dormitories. As I dash, the shooting, stabbing pains running up and down my arm increase, blending with the emptiness in my stomach, making me feel sick. When I reach the top of the steps and head towards the girls' dormitory, I see coloured stars around the edges of my vision. Bright pinks and yellows that make the corridors feel luminous. Behind me, the Minister Prime is close. I can hear him panting, taunting and calling.

He knows he has me.

I clench my teeth tightly and an anguished wail of agony falls from my lips as I sprint past the dorm, make two quick zigzag turns and then reach the final corridor. It is the place where Imrin and I first introduced ourselves to each other; where we spent hours plotting and planning, talking about the patterns of the fog drifting through the distant trees, laughing, smiling, and living a life that was stolen from us.

The moon illuminates the stone walls with a beautiful white angelic glow. I stop halfway along, the huge window behind me, and turn to face the Minister Prime. His eyes flicker towards the glass, knowing he has me in a dead end, as his lips angle into a cruel, thin smile. Behind him, two of the Head Kingsmen remain. They are both out of breath and one of them has blood running across his arm. They wait against the far wall as the Minister Prime takes one small, slow step towards me.

He speaks slowly and menacingly, each syllable spat with a barely contained fury. ‘Where are the others, Miss Blackthorn?'

‘Gone.'

‘Gone where?'

‘Gone through your train tunnel and out the other end.'

His eyes narrow slightly. ‘We both know that's not true.'

I smile and nod, taking a step backwards away from him. ‘I have no idea then. I guess I got a little lost…'

He replies with a lick of his lips. ‘Perhaps I will pull your fingers off one by one until you tell me?'

‘That sounds painful,
Bathix.
' I try to smile but a fire is flooding through my shoulder now I have stopped moving.

I hear him stumble slightly at the mention of the name I am not supposed to know but he corrects himself instantly with a forced cough. ‘So how did you do it all? The animal cages opened in my zoo, so I had to send my Kingsmen to sort it out. The poisoning of the King? The lights going out? I'll find out from you soon enough, but if you tell me now, perhaps I'll be a little more lenient with you?'

He almost sounds genuine but we both know the types of thing he will do to me. I try to test my arm, to see if I can lift it, but I cannot move it at all. I want to laugh, to tell him he isn't fooling me, but the stars in my eyes are beginning to grow larger.

‘I was in the dungeon,' I say. ‘I didn't even have my thinkwatch. What do you think I could do on my own?'

He nods a snipped acceptance. ‘Men are on their way to arrest your mother and your brother right now. They will be here tomorrow and I will make sure you watch me skin them alive before I even lay a finger on you. I'll make sure they know it's your fault; that you brought it upon them.'

‘You'll have to find them first.'

The Minister Prime's brow ripples and I can almost see the thoughts colliding in his mind as he realises exactly why the door to his office was open. He is trying to figure out how Hart and I might have been working together; why I wanted to end up in the dungeon; and any number of other things he hadn't thought of, simply because he was incapable of thinking we could work with, instead of against, each other.

‘Whatever you've done will be for nothing, you do know that? If your friends have somehow escaped, we will get them back, or we'll kill them. If your families are hiding somewhere, we will find them – and we'll kill them.'

By now, the blur in my eyes is so large that he is simply a hazy black shape. It makes his words sound more vicious; I have no doubt that is exactly what he intends to do.

‘You forgot one thing.' I am surprised at how calm my voice sounds.

‘What?'

‘When you were listing the things you say I'm responsible for, you missed the biggest one. The tan fruit juice in the King's wine, the escape, the zoo cages being opened, the lights, all of those were just sideshows to stop you seeing the obvious.'

I take a step backwards as I hear the Minister Prime stepping forward. ‘What did you do?'

‘All of the people at home should have had an unexpected broadcast on their screens tonight, courtesy of the cameras around the hall. It's a shame you didn't notice the blinking red lights.'

It wasn't even that hard. On our screen at home, we have seen images from the castle before, so I knew there had to be some way to make the cameras broadcast outside the walls. I can see him trying to roll back in his mind what they will have seen: the King taunting Hart and myself with the meat, forcing Imrin and me to fight, the drunkenness, the ungainly baying for blood, the chaos. It's not the way subjects should see their King.

He sounds panicked, unable to understand what happened. ‘How?'

‘There are lots of useful frequency codes on your thinkpad. How to override the communication block on our thinkwatches, how to broadcast on the one frequency which everyone gets, lists of every Offering. All sorts. Perhaps you should close your door in future?'

The truth is exactly as Imrin explained to me when we started laying out our final plan. The Minister Prime knew it was possible for someone to walk into his office and use their borodron armour – or a stolen scrap – to access his thinkpad. He knew it could happen – but he was filled with the absolute arrogance that no one would dare. When you have that level of delusion, it's no wonder you don't do something as simple as closing a door. All I did was use his broadcasting codes to reprogram the cameras through the system in Porter's office and then Pietra used my thinkwatch to start them off.

It takes a second to sink in but my final remark is what tips him over the edge. He roars in anger and then I see his dark, hulking shape coming towards me. One half of my body feels like it has given up, but I turn and run in the only direction I can – towards the window. The Minister Prime is a step behind but it makes no difference as I angle my already-numb shoulder towards the dead end and with a grunt of hope, anguish and final exhilaration, I jump through the glass and begin plummeting to the ground.

35

On my thirteenth birthday, Opie and I ventured further into the woods than we ever had before. We had always hung around the edges, making swords out of sticks and playing hide and seek behind the branches and bushes, but the excitement of being that one year older spurred us into going out to the gully to see what lay around the edges.

At first it was thrilling but it wasn't long before I began to feel that sting of fear, a paranoid terror of being lost and not being able to find our way back. Opie laughed it off but I think he was more frightened than me. He lifted me onto his shoulders, allowing me to reach up and grab the lowest branch of a huge oak tree. I climbed, my fingers fumbling along the rough bark as the knife-like stumps scratched and scraped at my bare legs, my sturdy little arms clambering from one tree limb to the next. Eventually I was high enough to see over the tops of the smaller plants. In one direction I saw the crater that was once the lake; in the other was Martindale, peaceful and safe. I was so taken with the beauty of seeing it from the top of the tree that I forgot where I was. I tried to get a better view but in the fraction of a second it took my foot to slide across the dewy leaves, I lost my balance. Something snapped against the back of my head but the one thing I felt before Opie caught me was the incredible, unmatched freedom of falling.