Red Queen (Red Queen 1)

“Cal—” I try to squirm away from Lucas, to run back the way we came, but he throws me back. “Lucas, we have to help him!”

“Trust me, a bomb won’t bother the prince,” he growls, moving me forward.

“A bomb?” That wasn’t part of the plan. “Was that a bomb?”

Lucas draws back from me, positively shaking in anger. “You saw that bloody red scarf. This is the Scarlet Guard and that”—he points back to the ballroom, still dark and burning—“that is who they are.”

“This doesn’t make sense,” I murmur to myself, trying to remember every facet of the plan. Maven never told me about a bomb. Never. And Kilorn wouldn’t let me do this, not if he knew I would be in danger. They wouldn’t do this to me.

Lucas holsters his gun, his voice a growl. “Killers don’t have to make sense.”

My breath catches in my throat. How many were left back there? How many children, how many needless deaths?

Lucas takes my silence for shock, but he’s wrong. What I feel now is anger.

Anyone can betray anyone.

Lucas leads me underground, through no less than three doors, each one a foot thick and made of steel. They have no locks, but he opens them with a flick of his hand. It reminds me of the first time I met him, when he waved apart the bars of my cell.

I hear the others before I see them, their voices echoing off the metal walls as they speak to each other. The king rails, his words sending shivers through me. His presence seems to fill the bunker as he paces up and down, his cloak flapping out behind him.

“I want them found. I want them in front of me with a blade at their backs, and I want them to sing like the cowardly birds they are!” He addresses a Sentinel, but the masked woman doesn’t even flinch. “I want to know what’s going on!”

Elara sits in a chair, one hand over her heart, the other clutching tightly to Maven.

He starts at the sight of me. “Are you all right?” he breathes, pulling me into a quick embrace.

“Just shaken,” I manage to say, trying to communicate as much as I can. But with Elara so close, I can barely allow myself to think, let alone speak. “There was an explosion after the shots. A bomb.”

Maven furrows his brow, confused, but he quickly masks it with rage. “Bastards.”

“Savages,” King Tiberias hisses through gritted teeth. “And what about my son?”

My gaze trails to Maven, before I realize the king doesn’t mean Maven at all. Maven takes it in stride. He’s used to being overlooked.

“Cal went after the shooters. He took a band of Sentinels with him.” The memory of him, dark and angry as flame, frightens me. “And then the ballroom exploded. I don’t know how many were still—still in there.”

“Was there anything else, dear?” Coming from Elara, the term of endearment feels like an electric shock. She looks paler than ever, her breath coming in shallow pants. She’s afraid. “Anything you remember?”

“There was a banner, attached to a spear. The Scarlet Guard did this.”

“Did they?” she says, raising a single eyebrow. I fight the urge to back away, to run from her and her whispers. At any moment I expect to feel her slither into my head, to pull out the truth.

But instead, Elara rips her eyes away and turns on the king. “You see what you’ve done?” Her lip curls over her teeth. In the light, they look like glittering fangs.

“Me? You called the Guard small and weak, you lied to our people,” Tiberias snarls back at her. “Your actions have weakened us against the danger, not mine.”

“And if you took care of this when you had the chance, when they were small and weak, this would have never happened!”

They rip at each other like starved dogs, each one trying to take a bigger bite.

“Elara, they were not terrorists then. I could not waste my soldiers and officers on hunting down a few Reds writing pamphlets. They did no harm.”

Slowly, Elara points to the ceiling. “Does that seem like no harm to you?” He has no answer for her and she smirks, delighting in winning the argument. “One day you men will learn to pay attention and all the world will tremble. They are a disease, one you allowed to take hold. And it’s time to kill this disease where it grows.”

She stands from her chair, collecting herself. “They are Red devils, and they must have allies inside our own walls.” I do my best to keep still, my eyes fixed on the floor. “I think I’ll have a word with the servants. Officer Samos, if you would?”

He jumps to attention, opening the vault door for her. She sweeps out, two Sentinels in tow, like a hurricane of rage. Lucas goes with her, opening the heavy doors in succession, each one clanging farther and farther away. I don’t want to know what the queen will do to the servants, but I know it will hurt and I know what she will find—nothing. Walsh and Holland fled with Farley, according to our plan. They knew it would be too dangerous for them after the ball—and they were right.

The thick metal closes for a few moments, only to swings open again. Another magnetron directs it: Evangeline. She looks like hell in a party dress, her jewelry mangled and teeth on edge. Worst of all are her eyes, wild and wet and streaming with black makeup. Ptolemus. She weeps for her dead brother. Even though I tell myself I don’t care, I have to resist the urge to reach out and comfort her. But it passes as soon as her companion enters the bunker behind her.

There’s smoke and soot on his skin, dirtying his once clean uniform. Normally I’d be concerned at the ragged, hateful look in Cal’s eyes, but something else strikes fear into my bones. Blood stains his black uniform and drips over his hands. It is not silver. Red. The blood is red.

“Mare,” he says to me, but all his warmth is gone. “Come with me. Now.”

His words are directed at me but everyone follows, pushing through the passages as he leads us to the cells. My heart hammers in my chest, threatening to explode out of me. Not Kilorn. Anyone but him. Maven keeps a hand on my shoulder, holding me close. At first I think he’s comforting me, but then he tugs me back: he’s trying to keep me from running ahead.

“You should’ve killed him where he stood,” Evangeline says to Cal. Her fingers pluck at the red blood on his shirt. “I wouldn’t leave the Red devil alive.”

Him. My teeth bite my lips, holding my mouth closed so I don’t say something stupid. Maven’s hand tightens like a claw on my shoulder and I can feel his pulse quicken. For all we know, this might be the end of our game. Elara will come back and shatter their brains, picking through the wreckage to discover how deep their plot goes.