The Shattered Dark (31 page)

And, hopefully, I’ll get at least a couple of hours of rest.

MY
door slams open, jarring me awake.

“McKenzie!”

I leap out of bed as Lena storms into my room. My leg gets caught in my blanket. I
hit my knees, get back up.

“Where are they?” she demands, inches from my face.

I’m groggy and off-balance. It takes a second to focus on her, and when I do, I take
a step back. Damn. I haven’t seen this look on her face since she ended one of my
escape attempts in Germany.

“Paige and Lee?” I guess. I can’t think of anyone else who would make her this angry.

“Of course Paige and Lee,” she snaps.

“They’re gone?” Even though I know Lena wouldn’t have
stormed in like this if they were safely tucked in their rooms, I can’t keep the note
of disbelief from my voice. Lee already surprised a guard and escaped once. The second
guard would have been more alert.

Or maybe he’d be less alert because who would have thought he’d try to escape again?

Lena grabs a fistful of my shirt. “If you don’t tell me exactly where they are, by
the
Sidhe
, I’ll ban you from the Realm.”

I grab her hand, try to loosen it from my shirt. “Lena. I didn’t—”

“I
thought
you wouldn’t do this,” she says, shoving me back. “But they’re gone, McKenzie. They
couldn’t have made it out of the palace on their own.”

“And I’m the only one who could have possibly helped them escape.” Sarcasm probably
isn’t the best way to address Lena when she’s this pissed, but I didn’t do this.

“She’s your friend—the only friend you think you have.” There’s a note of something
in her voice. Is she suggesting
she’s
my friend?

“Lena, don’t!” Aren sprints into my room. When he sees me, he stops and visibly relaxes.
“She didn’t kill you.”

I scowl. He’s a little too lighthearted about that.

“They were both in Paige’s room when I went to sleep,” I say. “They had a guard.”

“Their guard is dead,” Lena interrupts. “Lord Hison saw you with them.”

“But that was”—God, this is going to sound incriminating—“the first time Lee broke
out.”

Aren’s eyebrows go up. I give him a shrug that says, “Yeah, I screwed up,” but there’s
no apology in it.

I turn back to Lena. “Look, we’re wasting time. How long until we’re supposed to leave
for Boulder?”

“A little over an hour,” Aren answers.

“I couldn’t have been asleep for more than twenty minutes, then.”

Aren’s posture changes, becoming more alert, more ready for action. “They haven’t
had time to leave the city yet.”

Lena mumbles something in Fae.

“They’ll try for the gate.” I’m fairly certain of that. Otherwise, it’s a rough journey
through the Corrist Mountains to get to the Missing Gate on their northeastern edge.
That’s the next nearest place humans can safely fissure.

I slept in my clothes, so all I have to do is stuff my feet into my sneakers, then
grab my sketchbook off the hook hanging beside the door, and I’m ready to go.

“We can intercept them,” I say, stepping into the corridor. I almost barrel into a
fae. Jacia.

She steadies me with a hand on my elbow.
Edarratae
pool under her palm until she releases me, then focuses on the two fae still in my
room.

“The remnant, Tylan, is missing,”
she reports.

“I definitely had nothing to do with that,” I say to Lena. She gives me a look that
is extremely unamused.

“Notify Taltrayn,”
she tells Jacia.

Jacia acknowledges the order with a nod and departs. Aren and I leave right after
her, heading the opposite way down the corridor. Aren’s walking quickly even for a
fae, so I have to run to keep up. I’m not at a full sprint, though—I couldn’t keep
that pace up for long—but we’re out of the palace and in the Inner City in just a
few minutes.

“You should run ahead,” I tell Aren.

“I’m staying with you,” he says. “Tylan is an illusionist. We need your eyes.”

My side is starting to cramp. I concentrate on drawing air into my lungs, then blowing
it out. I don’t want to slow him down any more than I already am.

I’m sweating, but a cool wind blows from the south, chilling my skin, and I think
I hear a rumble of thunder. The sky was clear before I went to sleep. It’s not clear
anymore. Thick, gray clouds are gathering above the Inner City.

“Wait up.”

Slowing down, I look over my shoulder and see Naito running toward us.

Aren stops. “Why aren’t you on watch?”

“Taltrayn told me to go to the gate with you,” he says. Then he looks at me. “You’re
supposed to go to the
veligh
. Watch for remnants there. It’s safer than this.”

Aren mutters something in Fae about a fool. I can practically feel him seething beside
me. He’s probably taking this personally. I don’t really blame him. Kyol has no business
overturning Aren’s decision.

My hand tightens on the strap of my sketchbook. “I can’t get there in time to be any
help.”

“And I’m not letting you run back through the Inner City without an escort.” Aren
puts an arm on my shoulder, moves me toward the silver wall. “You’re both coming to
the gate.”

It’s less than a mile to the northwest portcullis. It’s closed. Two fae standing guard
watch us approach. Others are here as well, but hidden at their posts somewhere within
the wall, watching the Outer City. After a few quick words from Aren, one of the swordsmen
touches the wall behind him. A faint blue line climbs its silver surface. As it rises,
so does the portcullis.

The other swordsman says,
“We haven’t seen anyone approach the gate.”

Naito steps between me and Aren. “Maybe they haven’t left the palace.”

“Taltrayn will find them if they haven’t,” Aren says. Then he asks the swordsman,
“How many are on watch above?
”

“Eleven,”
is the reply.

“Send six down. Three to protect the humans and three with me.”
He ducks under the portcullis with a motion for Naito and me to follow.

“It’s clear, I presume?” Aren asks when I reach his side again.

I scan the flat area of land between us and the river approximately two hundred feet
away. The foothills are just beyond it. Theoretically, Paige, Lee, and Tylan could
go there, hide out in the caverns or in one of the mountain passes in the distance.
Then they could choose the time to fissure out of the city. It’s what I would do.

Well, it’s what I would do if I didn’t know that the rebels knew about the serum and
where to get it. I have to assume Paige has chosen her side now, and that she’ll tell
the remnants how she was given the Sight. I don’t think Lee will stop her.

The betrayal hurts exactly as much as it should. We were friends. She shouldn’t stab
me in the back like this. She shouldn’t ally
with my enemy without asking me what this war is about. I’m going to kick her ass
when we recapture her.

“McKenzie?” Aren says. He’s focused on the row of shops to our left. They’re a good
hundred yards away and difficult to make out with the sky growing so dark.

“I don’t see anything,” I tell him. “Do you?”

“Maybe. Keep heading toward the gate.”

The six fae he requested from the wall have arrived. He assigns three to Naito and
me, then he and the others disappear into slashes of white light. I see their exiting
fissures near one of the gray-bricked buildings. Aren’s looking down the narrow walkway
between them. He draws his sword, then—

I’m nearly blinded when a virtual wall of light opens up in front of me.

My guards react before I do, leaping between me and the newly arrived fae before the
nearest one is able to take my head off. Instinct makes me drop to the ground anyway.
I roll, and when I get back to my feet, Aren’s back at my side.

“Diversion,” he snaps out. “Stay close.”

Tylan must have fissured for reinforcements. No less than two dozen remnants fill
the clearing between the river and wall. We’re outnumbered, but not for long. Other
rebels join us—probably the rest of the guards from the wall—and they surround me
and Naito, attacking any remnant who gets too close.

“We should go back!” Naito yells. I just barely hear him above the sounds of the fight…and
of the thunder rumbling through the air. The sky is almost black with clouds. They
shift as I watch them, and just when I realize that this storm isn’t natural, the
hail begins to torpedo down.

Each strike feels like a bee sting. My clothing offers little protection. The tiny
pellets bruise my face, my shoulders, my arms. Someone’s controlling this, concentrating
the storm above us. If we…

There they are. Paige and Lee. They’re sprinting toward the gate from the east, not
from the row of buildings to the west.

“Aren!” I unsling my sketchbook from my shoulder, start to open it up, but I’m knocked
to the ground.

Then Aren’s above me, intercepting a remnant, keeping him away from me. I roll to
my stomach, scramble forward to grab my sketchbook, but another remnant is there.
His boot comes down on the center of a page. I grab the leather strap just as he lunges
forward and yank it as hard as I can. The packed earth is treacherous, with the hail
building up; the sketchbook slides easily, sending the remnant flying back on his
ass.

He hits hard, nearly loses his grip on his sword, the sword that’s just within my
reach.

I throw myself on top of him, grabbing his arm before he brings the blade up, but
I’m totally screwed. He’s stronger than I am. As he turns over, he hooks his free
arm behind my back, then slams me face-first to the ground.

I swing back with an elbow. Miss. Then I lose my hold on his sword arm and—

Warmth spills over my back. His weight disappears just before I’m yanked back to my
feet. Aren steadies me as the remnant’s soul-shadow rises into the air.

“Back to the wall,” he grates out.

“They’re here,” I tell him, turning toward the gate.

Aren follows my gaze, curses, then fissures out.

“Get back to the wall!” Naito shouts, showing up at my side, but I’m useless there.
I need to be close to read the shadows.

“Map the shadows of the injured fae,” I tell him. When fae are hurt, they instinctively
fissure to locations they’re most familiar with. They might fissure home or, if we’re
lucky, back to the remnants’ base of operations.

Naito protests, but I don’t listen. I catch the attention of the three nearest rebels
and order them to cover me as I run toward the gate.

I lose one of my escorts on the way. He doesn’t enter the ether, but he’s hurt. I
have to fight the urge to help him. Keep running.

“Paige!” I shout when I’m less than twenty feet from her. She looks my way. So does
the remnant who’s with her.

Shit. It’s the fae from the corridor, the one who was
supposed
to be replacing the guard Lee knocked out. I’m an idiot. A complete and utter idiot.

It has to be Tylan. He’s pushing her forward, toward the blur at the edge of the river.
I won’t reach them before they fissure out so I open my sketchbook and drop to my
knees.

This is always the hardest part of reading the shadows. I have to ignore the strikes
of metal against metal and the shouts and cries of the fae. I have to block everything
out, open to a blank page, and lock my gaze on the fae approaching the gate. I grab
my pencil, putting all my faith in the rebels who are protecting me.

A fissure splits through the air, but it’s next to the gate, not over it, and a fae
steps out of it, not into it. I squint across the distance, focusing on the newcomer’s
face and…

And it’s Kavok, the archivist. What the hell is he doing here?

I glance up at the sky, blinking as the hail continues to fall.
Kavok
is doing this? He’s fully capable of calling this storm, but he’s…He’s…

He dips his hand into the river.

He’s betraying us.

I have no time to let that soak in or to contemplate his motive; he steps into the
gated-fissure with Lee. Shadows replace the extinguished slash of light, and I draw
a long, curving line down the right side of the page. It hooks up toward the middle.
A peninsula. They’re somewhere near its eastern coast. I’m guessing it’s Brith until
I realize I’m not drawing the Realm. This is—

I can’t block out the remnant who fissures in front of my nose. He’s so close, he
steps out of the light and onto my sketch. No rebel is near enough to intercept his
attack.

I throw myself to the left, dropping my shoulder and rolling even though I know it’s
too late. Only, it’s not too late. Something hits the remnant, spinning him around
and throwing him so off-balance he loses his grip on his sword.

A fissure opens behind him. Lena steps out, crouches, then stabs upward, sliding her
blade in beneath the remnant’s cuirass. The fae goes pale an instant before his soul-shadow
replaces his body.

“Finish it,” she orders, taking up a defensive position to my right. She
so
shouldn’t be out here, but I grab my
sketchbook, pulling it back in front of me, then find Kavok and Lee’s shadows again.
They’re fading. My map won’t be very accurate.

Before I draw another line, Paige steps through those wispy shadows, escorted by Tylan,
who dips his hand into the river, opening a fissure of his own.

I rip the page out of my sketchbook, start a new map when they disappear. I’m not
even halfway through it when the sketchbook is whipped out from in front of me.

I look up, see Naito standing there. What? Does he want to be the one to map the shadows?
He’s not as good at it as I am, but he might be good enough.

He doesn’t start drawing, though. He just stands there staring down at me.

“Naito,” Lena says, pulling her sword free from another remnant. “What are you doing?”

“It’s okay,” Naito says.

“What’s okay?” I ask, climbing back to my feet. If he’s not going to draw the shadows,
I need to. Now. They’re going to fade away if I don’t.