The Forsaken (31 page)

Finally, I see a break in the forest ahead, where the trees inexplicably thin out into nothingness.

“Look!” I yell, my words loud in the silence. The others see it too. Everyone starts walking faster.

“Are we there?” Rika asks, sounding a little dazed.

I reach the opening in the trees and stumble cautiously out of the forest, right behind Markus and David.

For a moment, I’m speechless. Then I feel a wave of dizziness, and I crouch to my knees, wanting to sob. Markus is cursing angrily. David looks confused. The others step out behind us.

This can’t be possible!

My hopes of finding the city and the aircrafts anytime soon have been obliterated.

We’ve been following all of Markus’s directions, not to mention the arrow that my father drew. But they’ve taken us to an unexpected place.

We stand at the edge of a huge frozen lake that sits in glacial silence. The surface is perfectly smooth, like a sheet of treacherous glass.

The lake is so massive, it stretches out on either side as far as I can see. There’s no way to walk around it, unless we want to add twenty or thirty miles to our journey—miles that we wouldn’t survive in these temperatures.

On the other side of the lake, which looks about half a mile away at most, I can see the forest resume. That means the only way to get past this lake is to walk across the ice—an incredibly risky move that will leave us exposed to anyone watching.

“I’m guessing this wasn’t part of the plan,” I mutter.

Markus shakes his head grimly.

“We’re lost?” Rika dares to ask in a small voice. “For real?” No one answers.

For once even the Monk isn’t chuckling. It looks like he can barely move. His thin, twisted fingers have curled into icy gloved claws that grip the robed shoulders of his drone.

“Markus, we need answers,” Gadya prompts.

“I don’t think we’re lost,” Markus begins. “But this frozen lake doesn’t make any sense. The directions I memorized didn’t take us to any lake. The other landmarks match up perfectly. Just not this one.”

“How is that possible?” Sinxen asks, sounding panicked.

“Maybe it’s man-made. Maybe it’s been flooded since this area was scouted,” Markus offers.

“Now I wish I were a spy, so I could help us all out,” David begins. “I thought you guys knew the way.”

Markus glares at him. I just stare across the lake in despair.

It’s then that I finally notice something in the trees on the other side. It’s an odd shimmering of the light that almost looks like a mirage. It rises up above the tree line by about fifty feet or more.

Gadya notices it too. “What the hell is that?”

We all squint, but it’s impossible to make out what we’re seeing. It almost looks like there’s another translucent barrier on the other side of the lake. A barely visible one, flickering in the forest.
Without fireworks we won’t be able to get through it.

“We’re not lost,” the Monk suddenly rasps, catching us by surprise.

“I thought you didn’t know how to get where we’re going!” Gadya says. “I thought that’s what you needed us for.”

“I don’t know the way, but I do know what we’re looking for.” His mask has patches of frost on it. “What you’re seeing across the lake is an illusion . . . created by a system of cameras, projecting images of the sky and forest onto a gossamer screen. Designed to fool anyone who gets this far. Behind it lies the city . . . and a way off the wheel.”

“Is he lying?” Gadya asks Markus.

“Probably.” Markus gazes around. “Only one way to find out, though.”

“This ice better be thick, or we’re all gonna drown,” Sinxen points out.

I glance up at the sky. I wonder if it’s going to start snowing; the air has that strange expectant feeling. How is it possible that just a few hours ago, on the other side of the barrier, it was eighty degrees?

“We’re gonna die if we stop moving,” I say, hoisting my pack with freezing arms.

“So we’re just gonna walk across the ice?” Rika asks, repressed hysteria in her voice. “What if it does crack? I can’t swim.”

“Why didn’t Liam say anything about this lake?” Sinxen broods uneasily. “He was here too, right? He gave Veidman info about the gray zone.” His question raises another one that is left unspoken.
What if Liam was a spy?

Gadya stares at him. “Maybe Liam took a different route.”

“Or maybe there wasn’t any water in this lake when he came through,” I point out. “I mean, if it’s man-made. We don’t know how anything works in this zone.”

Markus looks at David. “You sure there’s nothing you want to tell us?”

He shakes his head. “I’m as clueless as you guys.”

Gadya takes a step closer to the icy surface, so I walk up next to her. “We’ll have to spread out,” she says. “Distribute our weight.”

I watch as Markus steps onto the ice. It creaks, but it holds.

“Pretty thick.” He taps his foot. The ice doesn’t splinter. It just groans a little more.

I start walking forward. If the ice is this thick all the way across, then we’ll be able to make it to the other side without much of a problem. I exhale with relief as I edge my way onto the surface, shivering.

I know we have to cross this lake quickly. If the temperature is low enough to freeze ice this thick, it must be far below zero out here now. How long will we last in our shabby coats, hats, and boots? I can see that there’s a hole in one of Sinxen’s gloves. He’s probably going to get frostbite on his hand.

But none of us are in as bad a shape as the Monk. He doesn’t scare me so much anymore. In fact, there’s something pathetic about him, like a broken old man. All his megalomaniacal plans of conquering the wheel and enslaving kids with his lies have brought him to this place—an icy, barren wilderness far from his sectors. Here, he has no one except his drone. Here, in the barren cold, he will soon succumb to the Suffering and the elements.

The others fan out behind me. I peer over at Markus, who is pointing the way forward, still trying to guard David.

As a scattered group, we begin to walk and slide across the icy surface of the lake. It’s slippery, but all of us move cautiously, and none of us fall, not even the drone carrying the Monk.

The ice is thick enough that it feels like I’m walking on solid earth, but I know we can’t risk congregating on it. Our combined weight might shatter the ice and send us all plunging into the water. So we continue to keep our distance from one another.

The farther we go, the more frigid the air becomes. I can’t feel my toes, and I can barely feel my fingers. My nose and cheeks are numb. I tell myself that everything will feel better when we’re off the ice and back in the forest. Maybe we can risk starting a fire then.

We’re right in the middle of the lake when I hear the first faint buzzing noise.

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

My heart seizes up in panic. The sound is so soft, and the place is so silent that it almost seems like it’s coming from inside my own ears. But I know it’s not.

“Gadya!” I whisper. She doesn’t hear me, so I wave my arms. “Do you hear that?”

Gadya looks over at me, just as Rika stops walking. I can tell she has heard it too.

I look up. I don’t see anything, but the noise is growing louder. I know exactly what’s headed our way.

“We’ve been spotted!”
I yell.
“It’s a feeler!”

Everyone stops walking instantly.

“We better run!” Rika yells.

“There’s no time!” Markus screams back.

He’s right. We’re in the center of the lake. The feeler is going to get here much faster than we can reach the other side. We all look back and forth at one another with panicked, desperate eyes.

“We have to fight it here!” Gadya yells.

“It’s going to take one of us!” Rika replies. The noise of the feeler is becoming even louder, a whining sound far above the clouds. Based on the other feeler attacks, I’m guessing it’s only sixty seconds away from us now. And I know that more feelers will probably follow in its wake. We’re going to be forced to take a stand on the ice.

Sinxen turns to the Monk. “Any bright ideas?”

The Monk shakes his masked head.

“Let’s fight it!” Gadya yells again. “I’d rather die in battle than get picked off helplessly, like a bug!”

I wish Liam were here, because he’d know what to do. And I wish Veidman were here too.
But they’re not—it’s just us.

I look at David.

“What if we each grab one of the feeler’s tentacles?” I yell, trying to think of a strategy. “Maybe we could outweigh it and bring it down.”

“I don’t know if the ice will hold!” David yells back.

Gadya’s eyes burn with the expectation of battle. “No, it’s a good idea!”

“I’ve never seen a feeler take more than one person at a time,” Sinxen calls out. “Maybe we’d be heavy enough to crash it. Then we could run, before the other feelers come. At least we’d have a chance.”

The rotor sounds get even louder, as though the feeler is directly above us now, hidden in the clouds. Heads snap up, and we stare at the gray sky.
Why can’t we see it yet?

We draw even closer, and for the first time I hear the ice creak loudly under our feet, making ominous sounds like it’s about to give way. For a second, I’m afraid it will start cracking. But it holds.

I feel a hand on my shoulder. It’s David.

“You found the rocks, didn’t you?” he whispers beneath the noise of the rotors. “I could tell from your face earlier.”

“Maybe.”

“Then you know I’m telling the truth. You gotta help me deal with Markus, and you have to trust me, Alenna. It’s been you and me from the start, and we—”

“Look sharp!” Markus barks, knocking David’s hand off my shoulder. “Here it comes!”

Rika starts crying. She’s shaking uncontrollably, from fear and from the cold. I hear the Monk’s labored breathing behind his mask.

“Hand-to-hand combat,” Gadya is saying to Sinxen. “It’s the only way.”

I tilt my head back again, eyes glued to the sky. I’m terrified. I wonder if all warriors feel this fear, if Liam ever felt it. Maybe real warriors don’t get scared like this. It’s a stomach-clenching, breath-stealing fear. The kind that comes from facing down your worst nightmares.

“Almost here,” I whisper, clenching my frozen hands into fists inside my gloves. I’ve never fought with my bare hands before, but now I’m going to be fighting those metal tentacles with everything I have.

The noise of the rotors becomes a screaming roar, and a stiff wind kicks up on the ice. “Let’s grab this thing and kill it!” Gadya screams, as the first three metal tentacles shoot down toward us from the feeler with frightening velocity.

I don’t know which one of us the feeler is going after. Tentacles crack down on the ice all around me like gunshots.

I explode into action, racing forward, trying to grab the nearest tentacle. The others do the same.

I see the Monk’s drone step forward, with the Monk still hanging on to his back. A long metal blade suddenly extends from the drone’s wrist, a hidden sword under his robes.
So this is what the Monk had in store for us.
But now he’ll never have a chance to use it. As all of us clutch at the tentacles, even Rika, the drone attacks the feeler with the sword, sparks flying as metal hits metal.

Then a tentacle curls down right in front of my face. Instead of fleeing from it, I go straight for it, getting both of my gloved hands around its circumference. My right hand catches on some sort of hydraulic nozzle, and the tentacle starts curling around my wrist.

Then I hear a wailing scream from the drone. A tentacle has whipped the blade right out of his hand and sent him crashing down, headfirst. The Monk has toppled off him and is lying unprotected on the ice.

More tentacles zoom down at us from the feeler hovering in the clouds.

“Keep fighting!” Gadya yells. The ice is creaking so loudly, I can tell it’s going to splinter soon. Then it’ll all be over. We’ll die, just like everyone else.

I tear at the tentacle, ripping my gloves and bloodying my hands. I try to pull it around my arm, like a coil of rope, but it resists. It is a cold, dead thing. Designed to take lives and keep us from ever getting off the wheel. I hate it passionately. But I know it doesn’t hate me, even though it’s probably going to kill me. It feels nothing.
I refuse to let it win.

I glance around in a terrified haze. I can’t see the Monk or his drone anymore. But I see that all of us—even Rika and David—are hanging on to different tentacles, trying to pull the thing right out of the sky.

At first I don’t think it’s ever going to work. We’re not heavy enough. I remember seeing feelers uproot entire trees. Even if our weight is enough to destabilize it, I’m guessing it has some means of disentangling itself from us.

But maybe not, because I hear the rotors screaming as the tentacles try to pull us upward. We’re tenacious, and the feeler can’t get away.

The noise becomes an intolerable high-pitched cry of mechanical agony. Suddenly the feeler’s spotlight turns on, and we’re blasted with white light. I shut my eyes, temporarily blinded.

I lose my balance and feel myself getting pulled sideways across the ice. I realize that the feeler is trying to get away now, but it can’t lift off with our weight still on it. And so far, none of its companions have arrived.

We actually have a chance!

The thought gives me a burst of energy, and I try to get traction on the ice. But the tentacle is intertwined with my gloves and hands, and I’m flung down hard. The impact jars my jaw and knocks the breath from my lungs. I get dragged across the ice, still struggling and fighting.

“We’re going to beat you!” I scream at the tentacle. “We’re going to win!”

I get flipped over, so I’m staring up at the sky. The back of my head keeps slamming down on the ice as I get pulled along. I hear everyone screaming and shouting over the sounds of the engine.

And then I see it.

The thing above the clouds.

I just catch a glimpse. It’s black and round, like a small helicopter. It’s got a spotlight and a hatch mounted to its undercarriage between the attached tentacles, like an octopus’s mouth. I don’t know if there’s a person inside or if it’s some sort of automated device like Gadya said. I just know that I want to destroy it. When the spotlight moves out of my eyes, I can see a red UNA logo painted on the hatch.