Warmth strokes over me, seeping through my skin and dancing over my bones, seeming to strengthen me. Pinpricks of gold and blue dot the sky. Stars so bright you can see them during the day? I stretch out my arm, ghosting my fingertip through a brilliant ray of light. Dust motes twirl through the air, somersaulting just out of reach.
When I see the blood on my hand, I snap back into focus. The asylum. Escape. Bombs.
“Guards!” someone shouts.
And now we’re being hunted. Wonderful. I dart forward, constantly examining the ground for any sign of another bomb. I pass a charred sandal with a severed foot still strapped inside and gag.
There are one, five, ten, eighteen kids ahead of me, running, running. Eight others have stopped to catch their breath and figure out the safest course of action. Bad news, gang. Both choices suck. We can keep going, even though we’re without proper clothing and provisions, or we can allow the guards to return us to the hornet’s nest.
Am I being chased? I glance over my shoulder, my eyes going round with shock, my jaw dropping. The institution is massive, both tall and sprawling, with thirteen stories made entirely of gray stone, the front of the structure protruding from the mountainside, the rest hidden deep in the rock face.
There’s more to the place than I ever realized.
None of the guards have focused on me, at least.
Movement at the corner of my eye. Is that—
Yes! Bow! She races toward me, a backpack bouncing over her shoulder. She isn’t slow like the others, but swift and sure. I shout her name. Our gazes lock.
Boom!
There’s a seismic shift as a white-hot blast of air throws me backward. For a moment, I’m warm, and it’s nice. Until I land and my lungs empty. When I’m able to breathe, the air is heavy with smoke. I cough as debris rains. I don’t have to do an in-depth study to know another kid just bit the dust. Don’t be Bow. Please, please don’t be Bow.
She clears the smoke and comes up beside me, grabs my arm without slowing and yanks me to my feet.
Thank the Firstking! “Careful,” I tell her as we shoot forward.
“Careful will get you caught.” She runs faster. “Come on!”
I return to scanning the ground for anything out of whack. A stone, a frozen branch. The glint of metal—there. “Bomb,” I shout, jerking her around it.
“Thanks,” she mutters.
Step, step, step...stone...branch...metal! A pattern. A numerical rhythm my mind instinctively captures. One step, two, three, stone. One step, two, three, four, five, branch. One step, two, three, four, metal. They aren’t laid in a straight line, of course, but staggered. Which also presents a pattern. Left, left, right. Right, right, left.
I pump my arms faster, taking the lead, leaping over the next bomb and dragging Bow with me. When we reach the bottom of the incline, heading toward a densely populated forest, I stop looking for explosives and start praying I accidentally trip one. A burnt body is a warm body, and right now the cold feels like a thousand needles pricking at my skin. Shudders begin to rack me, one after the other, barely a pause between. My teeth chatter. Snot trickles from my nose and, like my tears, freezes.
“What’s in the pack?” Too much to hope for a battery-operated heat lamp? At this point, I wouldn’t say no to fetters.
“Essentials” is all she says. The temperature hasn’t affected her in the least. She isn’t shivering. Her teeth aren’t chattering. Her eyes and nose are free of tears and snot, and there’s no hint of blue on her lips. How is that possible?
We reach a bank of tall, thin boulders. In the center, two lean against each other, forming an upside-down V—creating a doorway. There’s an enter-at-your-own-peril vibe. Where are we?
I release Bow and slow down. “Got to take...a minute to rest. Not sure...how much...farther...”
“No, no. We can’t stop,” she says. “When I left the asylum, every guard inside was gearing up to come after us. And there were a lot of ’em! An entire army was training in the underground levels.”
An entire army to elude? Zero!
Can’t risk capture. I draw from a reservoir of strength I didn’t know I possessed and soldier on, tripping past the rocks. Icicles are extended like swords and cut at my face, but it doesn’t matter. Even the needle-prick sensation is fading, my skin numbing.
“Do you...know where...” My foot catches on a fallen branch and I tumble, landing in the snow and dirt face-first. Bow helps me stand, and I realize the “branch” is actually a leg. A human leg.
Hank, the kid Killian punched his first day at the asylum, is sprawled on his back. He’s motionless, his eyes glassed over with a sheen of ice. His skin is the color of the morning sky I’ve missed so much, and there are crystals protruding from the end of his nose.
Bow crouches to place her hand over his heart, not to feel for a beat, I don’t think, but to...mourn a lost life? “Light Brings Sight,” she whispers to him. “May the Everlife reward you for your kindnesses during your Firstlife.”
Her words humble me. Life is precious to her and yet, fifteen minutes ago, I ended one.
My guilt returns.
Her gaze brims with sadness as it meets mine. “He’s in the Everlife now. Let’s keep you out of it.” She straightens and draws me deeper into the forest.
Where did Hank go? Troika? Myriad? Many Ends?
Bow turns a corner. She seems to have a destination in mind, and I’m glad. My thoughts grow hazier by the second, and my eyelids are heavy. Fatigue settles in my bones.
“Keep up,” she commands. “We’re a two-man team. Do your part.”
Right. My part. But every step adds another pound to my feet until they are too heavy to move, and all I want to do is... “Nap,” I say. At least, I think I say it. I can no longer feel my lips.
“No! No sleeping.” She winds her arm around my shoulders to hold me up. I expect the heat of her body, even as little of it as there is, to warm me, but...no. There’s only cold, cold and more cold. “Just a little bit farther.”
My head lolls forward, my chin hitting my sternum. I manage another step, then another, counting as I go. One, two, three...all the way to one hundred and fourteen, before I begin to fall...fall...
“No!” she shouts. “Snap out of it, Ten. Stay awake.”
Sorry, I try to say. There’s an explosion of black inside my head, and it’s lights-out for me.
* * *
The ground shakes, waking me with a jolt. I jerk upright and gasp out, “Four!”
The sound of my voice startles me. So does the number. Four?
The number of directions I can go. North, east, south and west.
Four elements. Earth, water, fire and wind.
And in my song: Five times four times three, and that is where he’ll be.
A bead of sweat trickles down my temple. I’m sweating? Last thing I remember, I was morphing into a Popsicle. I wipe at my brow, the action setting off a domino effect, which ends with a terrible ache in my temples.
Grimacing, I scan my surroundings. I’m not sure what I expect to see. I only know this isn’t it: a cave smaller than my cell at the institution. In front of me, a fire blazes, throwing golden rays of light over rocky walls that are splattered with...dried blood? Paint? Bow’s backpack rests at my feet.
When I see the blood on my hand, I snap back into focus. The asylum. Escape. Bombs.
“Guards!” someone shouts.
And now we’re being hunted. Wonderful. I dart forward, constantly examining the ground for any sign of another bomb. I pass a charred sandal with a severed foot still strapped inside and gag.
There are one, five, ten, eighteen kids ahead of me, running, running. Eight others have stopped to catch their breath and figure out the safest course of action. Bad news, gang. Both choices suck. We can keep going, even though we’re without proper clothing and provisions, or we can allow the guards to return us to the hornet’s nest.
Am I being chased? I glance over my shoulder, my eyes going round with shock, my jaw dropping. The institution is massive, both tall and sprawling, with thirteen stories made entirely of gray stone, the front of the structure protruding from the mountainside, the rest hidden deep in the rock face.
There’s more to the place than I ever realized.
None of the guards have focused on me, at least.
Movement at the corner of my eye. Is that—
Yes! Bow! She races toward me, a backpack bouncing over her shoulder. She isn’t slow like the others, but swift and sure. I shout her name. Our gazes lock.
Boom!
There’s a seismic shift as a white-hot blast of air throws me backward. For a moment, I’m warm, and it’s nice. Until I land and my lungs empty. When I’m able to breathe, the air is heavy with smoke. I cough as debris rains. I don’t have to do an in-depth study to know another kid just bit the dust. Don’t be Bow. Please, please don’t be Bow.
She clears the smoke and comes up beside me, grabs my arm without slowing and yanks me to my feet.
Thank the Firstking! “Careful,” I tell her as we shoot forward.
“Careful will get you caught.” She runs faster. “Come on!”
I return to scanning the ground for anything out of whack. A stone, a frozen branch. The glint of metal—there. “Bomb,” I shout, jerking her around it.
“Thanks,” she mutters.
Step, step, step...stone...branch...metal! A pattern. A numerical rhythm my mind instinctively captures. One step, two, three, stone. One step, two, three, four, five, branch. One step, two, three, four, metal. They aren’t laid in a straight line, of course, but staggered. Which also presents a pattern. Left, left, right. Right, right, left.
I pump my arms faster, taking the lead, leaping over the next bomb and dragging Bow with me. When we reach the bottom of the incline, heading toward a densely populated forest, I stop looking for explosives and start praying I accidentally trip one. A burnt body is a warm body, and right now the cold feels like a thousand needles pricking at my skin. Shudders begin to rack me, one after the other, barely a pause between. My teeth chatter. Snot trickles from my nose and, like my tears, freezes.
“What’s in the pack?” Too much to hope for a battery-operated heat lamp? At this point, I wouldn’t say no to fetters.
“Essentials” is all she says. The temperature hasn’t affected her in the least. She isn’t shivering. Her teeth aren’t chattering. Her eyes and nose are free of tears and snot, and there’s no hint of blue on her lips. How is that possible?
We reach a bank of tall, thin boulders. In the center, two lean against each other, forming an upside-down V—creating a doorway. There’s an enter-at-your-own-peril vibe. Where are we?
I release Bow and slow down. “Got to take...a minute to rest. Not sure...how much...farther...”
“No, no. We can’t stop,” she says. “When I left the asylum, every guard inside was gearing up to come after us. And there were a lot of ’em! An entire army was training in the underground levels.”
An entire army to elude? Zero!
Can’t risk capture. I draw from a reservoir of strength I didn’t know I possessed and soldier on, tripping past the rocks. Icicles are extended like swords and cut at my face, but it doesn’t matter. Even the needle-prick sensation is fading, my skin numbing.
“Do you...know where...” My foot catches on a fallen branch and I tumble, landing in the snow and dirt face-first. Bow helps me stand, and I realize the “branch” is actually a leg. A human leg.
Hank, the kid Killian punched his first day at the asylum, is sprawled on his back. He’s motionless, his eyes glassed over with a sheen of ice. His skin is the color of the morning sky I’ve missed so much, and there are crystals protruding from the end of his nose.
Bow crouches to place her hand over his heart, not to feel for a beat, I don’t think, but to...mourn a lost life? “Light Brings Sight,” she whispers to him. “May the Everlife reward you for your kindnesses during your Firstlife.”
Her words humble me. Life is precious to her and yet, fifteen minutes ago, I ended one.
My guilt returns.
Her gaze brims with sadness as it meets mine. “He’s in the Everlife now. Let’s keep you out of it.” She straightens and draws me deeper into the forest.
Where did Hank go? Troika? Myriad? Many Ends?
Bow turns a corner. She seems to have a destination in mind, and I’m glad. My thoughts grow hazier by the second, and my eyelids are heavy. Fatigue settles in my bones.
“Keep up,” she commands. “We’re a two-man team. Do your part.”
Right. My part. But every step adds another pound to my feet until they are too heavy to move, and all I want to do is... “Nap,” I say. At least, I think I say it. I can no longer feel my lips.
“No! No sleeping.” She winds her arm around my shoulders to hold me up. I expect the heat of her body, even as little of it as there is, to warm me, but...no. There’s only cold, cold and more cold. “Just a little bit farther.”
My head lolls forward, my chin hitting my sternum. I manage another step, then another, counting as I go. One, two, three...all the way to one hundred and fourteen, before I begin to fall...fall...
“No!” she shouts. “Snap out of it, Ten. Stay awake.”
Sorry, I try to say. There’s an explosion of black inside my head, and it’s lights-out for me.
* * *
The ground shakes, waking me with a jolt. I jerk upright and gasp out, “Four!”
The sound of my voice startles me. So does the number. Four?
The number of directions I can go. North, east, south and west.
Four elements. Earth, water, fire and wind.
And in my song: Five times four times three, and that is where he’ll be.
A bead of sweat trickles down my temple. I’m sweating? Last thing I remember, I was morphing into a Popsicle. I wipe at my brow, the action setting off a domino effect, which ends with a terrible ache in my temples.
Grimacing, I scan my surroundings. I’m not sure what I expect to see. I only know this isn’t it: a cave smaller than my cell at the institution. In front of me, a fire blazes, throwing golden rays of light over rocky walls that are splattered with...dried blood? Paint? Bow’s backpack rests at my feet.
