The Fearless (35 page)

I twist my blankets in the fingers of my good hand (the other is still strapped up, although it’s healing well). ‘I wish I’d never told Colonel Brett about the bunker!’ I say.

‘I’m sorry, Cass,’ Nadine says. ‘I’ve done everything I can. Maybe you should go and talk to him, make the most of the time you have left.’

We don’t have any time
, I think.
It’s over.

Nadine gets up and touches my arm lightly. ‘I’ll let you know before he has it done. I’ll make sure you can say goodbye. Look after the dog, OK? Make sure he doesn’t get in anyone’s way.’

She leaves me with Lochie, who places his head in my lap. I stroke his ears, wondering if he can sense what’s about to happen to his master.

‘When are we going home?’ Jori asks me that night after dinner. I spend as much time in the evenings with him as I can; the others still want to talk about Sol and what happened at the bunker, and all I want to do is forget it.

‘I don’t know, Jor,’ I say, while Lochie rolls over to let my brother tickle his stomach. The first time Lochie met Jori, they clicked, even though the dog is almost as tall as he is. As soon as Jori saw the dog, he marched up to him, ignoring my warning to be careful, and Lochie immediately washed his face, his tail thumping from side to side.

‘We must be going
soon
,’ Jori says as Lochie, still lying on his back, bats at him with one gigantic paw in an attempt to get another belly-rub.

I just shrug. I haven’t the heart to tell my brother that we’re probably
never
going back to Hope. I need to get me, him, Myo and Lochie away from the camp. It’s the only way I’ll save Myo. But how? The gate is heavily guarded. And we’d need to steal horses, because Myo can’t walk.

When it’s time for Jori to go to bed, I walk him to his cabin, which is near to the Fearless compound. The boy with the dark hair who Sol punched is standing by the fence with a gun, his collar turned up and his shoulders hunched. I watch him for a moment, until he sees me and sneers, ‘What you looking at?’ Then I walk away. But not in the direction of my tent. Instead, I head towards the makeshift stable where the Magpies keep their horses, halfway between the cabins and the hospital tent. A Magpie is checking their straw and water before turning in for the night, but there’s no one guarding them.

An idea begins to form inside my head.

This is crazy
, I tell myself as I lie in my bunk an hour or so later, fully clothed beneath my blankets, waiting for the camp to quieten down.
What if it goes wrong? What if you get caught?

Outside, the lights go out. At night, everything is powered down except for the fence.

I get out of bed, put my boots on and whisper, ‘Come on,’ to Lochie.

The boy with dark hair is still guarding the compound. I stride up to him, trying to appear confident, even though, inside, I’m shaking.

‘Colonel Brett wants to see you,’ I say as the Fearless thump the cabin walls.

He looks at me and Lochie as if we’ve both got three heads. ‘What,
now
?’

I shrug. ‘Just passing on the message. I’ve got to guard the cabin while you go. Can you leave me your gun, please?’

He’ll never fall for it
, I think, but he passes me his gun. ‘Not that way!’ I say as he starts to walk over to Colonel Brett’s cabin. ‘He’s at the mess tent.’

The boy gives me another funny look, shakes his head and walks away.

I count to twenty.

Then I walk across to the alarm and yank the lever down.

The siren is earsplittingly loud. I pull the gun’s strap over my head and run with Lochie to Jori’s cabin. ‘Help!’ I yell, hammering on the door. ‘A Fearless is loose!’

As the Magpie adult who stays with the children at night opens the door, lights start to come on all over the camp. She hustles the kids out of the cabin. While she’s looking the other way, I grab Jori’s arm. ‘This way,’ I say in his ear. ‘I’ll explain later. Can you run?’

He nods, his eyes huge, and before the Magpie can turn around and see us, we sprint in the direction of the stables, the scream of the siren following us. Shaking with nerves, I put bridles and saddles on two of the horses, who are spooked and snorting. I help Jori up one-handed, climbing on behind him and telling him to hang on no matter what. Then, clinging onto the second horse’s reins with my good hand, gripping its sides with my knees, I canter through the camp to the hospital tent. ‘Get to the training field! This isn’t a drill!’ I yell as I go. Any second, I’m expecting to be stopped and questioned, but people see the horses, and the gun strapped across my chest, and flee towards the field.

When I ride into the hospital tent, Nadine is bending over Myo, unfastening the straps around his arms and legs. She’s on her own; the other occupants have already been moved out. She whirls, looking startled. ‘Cass? What the—’

‘Help me get Myo onto this horse,’ I say, jumping off as Myo blinks groggily at me. I know I have only minutes now before someone discovers the Fearless are still secure inside their compound. And I still have no idea how we’re going to get out of the camp.

‘But what are you going to do?’

‘Get us out of here.’

‘
How?
’

‘I—’ Suddenly, inspiration strikes. ‘Give me your coat and your cap.
Please
, Nadine.’

She looks at me a moment longer. Then she takes them off and hands them to me. I thrust them at Myo. ‘Put these on.’ He looks puzzled, but does as I say. I pull the collar of the coat up to hide his face.

‘This is crazy,’ Nadine says as she helps me lift him onto the horse and Myo bites his lip, his face white, his eyes shining with pain. ‘You have no food, no tents,
nothing
.’

‘We’ll be OK,’ I say, grabbing a blanket to cover Myo’s splinted legs and hopping back up onto my horse.

‘Wait!’ Nadine turns and grabs something off the top of the locker by Myo’s bed. She thrusts a handful of blister packs at me. ‘These are painkillers. Two every four hours, up to eight a day. No more.’

I nod, and turn my horse towards the exit.

‘And Cass—’

I look back at her.

‘Good luck. And take care.’

‘You too,’ I say. ‘Thank you.’ I look at Myo. ‘We have to gallop to the gates. Can you manage it?’

‘Aye,’ he says, although under the brim of Nadine’s cap, his face is still white. Outside, the siren is still wailing. How long until it stops?

I squeeze my knees into my horse’s sides, and we take off through the rows of tents. People are still streaming towards the field; they scatter out of our way. In front of me, Jori has his hands buried in the horse’s mane, clinging on for dear life.

‘Let us through!’ I yell to the two guards at the gate, waving the gun. ‘Colonel Brett’s orders!’ As they catch sight of Jori and Lochie, who thankfully hasn’t started barking yet, confusion passes over their faces and I think,
that’s it, I’ve blown it, we’re not going to get out of here
.

And for a second – just a second – I consider firing at them.

They open the gates.

The siren stops.

‘
GO!
’ I yell, and we plunge forward.

As we thunder away from the camp, Myo and Lochie right beside me, I hear shouts, but we don’t slow down or look back. Only when the camp is far behind us do we stop, steering the horses under a stand of trees. Their sides are heaving. I lean over and press my forehead against Myo’s. ‘Are you OK?’

He nods, although I can feel him trembling. ‘Aye.’

‘What about your legs?’

‘Give us some of those pills.’ He swallows them dry.

‘I’m sorry I never came to see you,’ I say.

‘It’s OK. Nadine explained. I understand.’

My heart is still pounding, my mouth dry and metallic-tasting. I keep expecting to hear shouts or gunshots behind us, but the valley is silent and still. ‘So. Where to?’

He adjusts his cap. ‘We should head back up north, I guess. Find out where Ben, Gina and the others have gone.’

‘Who are Ben and Gina?’ Jori says.

‘Friends of mine,’ Myo tells him. ‘I’m Myo, by the way.’

‘Hi, Myo,’ Jori says.

‘And don’t forget Mara,’ I say.

Myo glances at me. Then one side of his mouth lifts in a small smile. ‘Aye. Don’t forget Mara.’

Lochie wags his tail.

‘We’d better get going, then,’ I say. ‘We need to find water, and food, and somewhere to rest up for a bit.’

Myo makes a soft clicking sound to get his horse moving. I do the same, and we ride on up the valley, the darkness folding over us like a veil.

Writing a book can be a lonely process, not to mention daunting, especially when it’s your second novel and there’s a little voice nagging away in the back of your head saying,
You do know it was all a fluke the first time round, right? Do you really think you’re capable of doing this again?
If it wasn’t for the following people, that little voice might have got the better of me many times.

So, heartfelt thanks go to:

My parents, sister and aunt, for always being there to cheer me on and share my excitement over the smallest of things.

Pat and Graham, for being the best in-laws I could ever wish for.

My wonderful agent, Carolyn, for her wisdom and guidance, and for making me a better writer.

My amazing editor, Nat, for her hard work, insight, enthusiasm and kindness.

Everyone else at Random House Children’s Publishing who’s helped turn
The Fearless
from a collection of typed pages to a real, live book, in particular Laura for her amazing design work and Larry Rostant for finding the perfect ‘Cass’, and everyone on the publicity team who’s helped get the word out there about my books.

Kate Ormand, beta reader extraordinare, for being at the other end of an email at all hours of the day. I’m so excited that people will get to read
your
books soon, too!

Lydia Kang and Lexx Clarke for medical advice – any errors are definitely mine, not theirs.

James Law, for telling me how to ventilate an underground bunker.

Geoff Allen, for telling me which guns to give the Patrol, and how they’d use them.

All my friends and colleagues who’ve cheered me on and supported me on this crazy ride so far.

All my writer buddies in the Author Allsorts, Lucky 13s and YA Think – you keep me sane!

All the bloggers and readers who’ve supported my writing and made me feel like there’s nothing else I’d rather be doing.

G-Dog, for repeatedly dropping tennis balls and soggy toys onto my laptop keyboard and reminding me that there’s a real world out there, and shouldn’t we be going for a walk now?

And last, but most definitely not least, Duncan: for all those brainstorming sessions; for reading the same pages over and over again; for helping restore my confidence in this novel and convincing me Cass and Myo’s story was worth sharing with the world; for saying ‘I told you so’ in the nicest way possible, and for making that little voice whispering doubts in my ear shut the hell up. I love you, and I couldn’t do any of this without you. Thank you.

Emma Pass has been making up stories for as long as she can remember. ACID was her first novel, and her second is THE FEARLESS. By day, she works as a library assistant and lives with her husband and dog in the North East Midlands.

THE FEARLESS
AN RHCP DIGITAL EBOOK 978 1 448 11992 9

Published in Great Britain by RHCP Digital,
an imprint of Random House Children’s Publishers UK
A Random House Group Company

This ebook edition published 2014

Text copyright © Emma Pass, 2014

First published in Great Britain by Corgi, 2014

The right of Emma Pass to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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