Red Queen

But—I can feel it. I feel the heat of the sparks, running up and down my body, setting every nerve on fire. It isn’t a bad feeling though. In fact I feel, well, alive. Like I’ve been living my whole life blind and now I’ve opened my eyes. Something moves beneath my skin, but it’s not the sparks. I look at my hands, my arms, marveling at the lightning as it glides over me. Cloth burns away, charred black by the heat, but my skin doesn’t change. The shield keeps trying to kill me, but it can’t.

Everything is wrong.

I am alive.

The shield gives off a black smoke, starting to splinter and crack. The sparks are brighter, angrier, but weakening. I try to push myself up, to get to my feet, but the shield shatters beneath me and I fall again, tumbling over myself.

Somehow I manage to land in a pile of dust not covered by jagged metal. Definitely bruised and weak in the muscles, but still in one piece. My uniform is not so lucky, barely holding together in a charred mess.

I struggle to my feet, feeling more of my uniform flake off. Above us, murmurs and gasps echo through the Spiral Garden. I can feel all eyes on me, the burned Red girl. The human lightning rod.

Evangeline stares at me, her eyes wide. She looks angry, confused—and scared.

Of me. Somehow, she is scared of me.

“Hi,” I say stupidly.

Evangeline answers with a flurry of metal shards, all of them sharp and deadly, pointed at my heart as they rip through the air.

Without thinking, I throw up my hands, hoping to save myself from the worst of it. Instead of catching a dozen jagged blades in my palms, I feel something quite different. Like with the sparks before, my nerves sing, alive with some inner fire. It moves in me, behind my eyes, beneath my skin, until I feel more than myself. Then it bursts from me, pure power and energy.

A jet of light—no, lightning—erupts from my hands, blazing through the metal. The pieces shriek and smoke, bursting apart in the heat. They fall harmlessly to the ground as the lightning blasts into the far wall. It leaves a smoking hole four feet wide, barely missing Evangeline.

Her mouth falls open in shock. I’m sure I look the same as I stare at my hands, wondering what on earth just happened to me. High above, a hundred of the most powerful Silvers wonder the same thing. I look up to see them all peering at me.

Even the king leans over the edge of his box, his flaming crown silhouetted against the sky. Cal is right next to him, staring down at me with wide eyes.

“Sentinels.”

The king’s voice is sharp as a razor, full of menace. Suddenly, the red-orange uniforms of Sentinels blaze from almost every box. The elite guards wait for another word, another order.

I’m a good thief because I know when to run. Now is one of those times.

Before the king can speak, I bolt, pushing past the stunned Evangeline to slide feetfirst into the still-open hatch in the floor.

“Seize her!” echoes behind me as I drop into the semidarkness of the chamber below. Evangeline’s flying metal show punched holes in the ceiling and I can still see up into the Spiral Garden. To my dismay, it looks like the structure is bleeding, as uniformed Sentinels drop down from their boxes, all of them racing after me.

With no time to think, all I can do is run.

The antechamber below the arena connects to a dark and empty hallway. Boxy black cameras watch me as I run at full speed, turning down another corridor and another. I can feel them, hunting like the Sentinels not so far behind me. Run, repeats in my head. Run, run, run.

I have to find a door, a window, something to help me get my bearings. If I can get outside, into the market maybe, I might have a chance. I might.

The first set of stairs I find leads up to a long mirrored hall. But the cameras are there as well, sitting in the corners of the ceiling like great black bugs.

A blast of gunfire explodes over my head, forcing me to drop to the floor. Two Sentinels, their uniforms the color of fire, crash through a mirror and charge at me. They’re just like Security, I tell myself. Just bumbling officers who don’t know you. They don’t know what you can do.

I don’t know what I can do.

They expect me to run so I do the opposite, storming the pair of them. Their guns are big and powerful, but bulky. Before they can get them up to shoot, stab, or both, I drop to my knees on the smooth marble floor, sliding between the two giants. One of them shouts after me, his voice exploding another mirror in a storm of glass. By the time they manage to change directions, I’m already off and running again.

When I finally find a window, it’s a blessing and a curse. I skid to a stop in front of a giant pane of diamondglass, looking out to the vast forest. It’s right there, just on the other side, just beyond an impenetrable wall.

All right, hands, now might be a good time to do your thing. Nothing happens, of course. Nothing happens when I need it to.

A blaze of heat takes me by surprise. I turn to see an approaching wall of red and orange and I know—the Sentinels have found me. But the wall is hot, flickering, almost solid. Fire. And coming right at me.

My voice is faint, weak, defeated, as I laugh at my predicament. “Oh, great.”

I turn to run, but instead collide with a broad wall of black fabric. Strong arms wrap around me, holding me still when I try to squirm away. Shock him, light him up, I scream in my head. But nothing happens. The miracle isn’t going to save me again.

The heat grows, threatening to crush the air from my lungs. I survived lightning today; I don’t want to press my luck with fire.

But it’s the smoke that’s going to kill me. Thick and black and much too strong, choking me. My vision swirls and my eyelids grow heavy. I hear footsteps, shouting, the roar of fire as the world darkens.

“I’m sorry,” Cal’s voice says. I think I’m dreaming.

EIGHT

I’m on the porch, watching as Mom says good-bye to my brother Bree. She weeps, holding on to him tightly, smoothing his freshly cut hair. Shade and Tramy wait to catch her if her legs fail. I know they want to cry too, watching their oldest brother go, but for Mom’s sake, they don’t. Next to me, Dad says nothing, content to stare at the legionnaire. Even in his armor of steel plate and bulletproof fabric, the soldier looks small next to my brother. Bree could eat him alive, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t do anything at all when the legionnaire grabs his arm, pulling him away from us. A shadow follows, haunting after him on terrible dark wings. The world spins around me, and then I’m falling.

I land a year later, my feet stuck in the squelching mud beneath our house. Now Mom holds on to Tramy, begging with the legionnaire. Shade has to pull her off. Somewhere, Gisa cries for her favorite brother. Dad and I keep silent, saving our tears. The shadow returns, this time swirling around me, blotting out the sky and the sun. I squeeze my eyes shut, hoping it will leave me alone.

When I open them again, I’m in Shade’s arms, hugging him as tightly as I can. He hasn’t cut his hair yet, and his chin-length brown hair tickles the top of my head. As I press myself to his chest, I wince. My ear stings sharply and I pull back, seeing drops of red blood on my brother’s shirt. Gisa and I pierced our ears again, with the tiny gift Shade left us. I guess I did it wrong, as I do everything wrong. This time, I feel the shadow before I see it. And it feels angry.

It drags me through a parade of memories, all raw wounds still healing. Some of them are even dreams. No, they are nightmares. My worst nightmares.