She cut a hand through the air, silencing me. “Hear that?” she said, her voice so low it was practically inaudible.
I held still, listening, trying to decipher what it was she heard, but my ears weren’t as good as hers. No one’s were. Well, except perhaps for dwellers themselves. She shared that with them.
Several moments passed, but there was no telltale shriek that signaled the approach of a dweller. Exhaling, she crouched back down at my side. She’d cleaned her face. The freckles stood out starkly against her milk-pale features as she closed a hand around my good arm. “Horses are coming this way. Half a dozen at least.”
I squeezed her wrist with hard fingers and studied her with an urgency I hope she felt. “This is your chance. Go. Slip away.”
She shook her head at me, her voice a fierce hiss. “You wouldn’t leave me. I’m not leaving you.”
“Is that what this is? Some stubbornness contest? Well, enough of it, Luna. You win. When you get an opportunity, you go. Don’t look back. You run.”
She made a sound of frustration. “No . . . “
The distant sound of hooves stopped all conversation then. Blades sang out on the air as the soldiers with us took position, drawing their weapons and standing in front of us. I tugged on her arm, signaling that this was the moment she should go. They weren’t even looking at either one of us, too focused on the impending arrivals. She could slip away. They probably wouldn’t bother to give chase. After all, I was the prize.
I struggled to rise, huffing out a pained breath, pushing the flat of my good hand down on the ground. My head spun with a surge of dizziness, but I managed not to topple over. Luna was there, of course, ignoring my command, wrapping an arm around my waist for support. Half the time I didn’t think she needed me. That she did now, when I couldn’t be all that I should be, all I had to be, for us to survive . . . it killed a part of me.
“You should stay resting,” she reprimanded.
I shook my head once, ignoring her as she ignored me. I wasn’t going to be on my back, defenseless against whatever was headed our way.
Sweat beaded my brow and my limbs trembled but I stayed on my feet. The horses materialized from the darkness, at first smudges of gray shapes against the moonlit night.
They moved with practiced stealth. As with all trained horses, they had been taught covertness. They even kept their heads relatively still so that there was no jingle from their harnesses. As they drew close, their hooves beat a muffled cadence on the soil. The shapes of the men atop the animals grew more distinct. They were armed to the teeth and with superior weaponry, too.
Luna’s hand slid down my arm, stopping at my wrist. Her slim fingers circled my thicker bones, clinging to me as though she needed me right then and not the other way around. It made my chest tighten and swell a little. Even as sick as I was, as helpless, it made me feel useful.
From the very beginning, from the moment Sivo had foisted her on me, I knew I would probably fail her. No one lived long on the Outside. No one lived long with me especially. History had taught me that. I knew this. I’d accepted it.
It didn’t, however, stop my will to fight.
SEVEN
Luna
THEY NUMBERED CLOSER to ten. I didn’t hear them until they were almost upon us, which was a testament to how good, how quiet, these riders were at maneuvering around in the Outside. They had adapted to this world. As one did. Adapt or die.
They wore the same chain mail as the other men accompanying us. I could hear the faint grind of metal beneath their tunics as they shifted their weight atop their mounts. A well-rested energy hummed about them. Their bodies were mostly clean. A hint of mint and sandalwood soap clung to them. They didn’t smell ripe of the Outside as we did. As everyone else I had ever encountered did. There was none of the loam and bitter metal that always seemed to find its way onto my tongue. They lived nearby. Someplace warm and dry and dweller free. Someplace safe.
My breath came a little faster as they stopped before our group. Fowler gave my arm a tug and turned to me, whispering, “Slip behind me.”
Anger slicked through me. He still sought to protect me when he was the one mortally wounded? “Stop it,” I hissed at him. The least he could do was trust me. After everything, he could give me that.
For three days I had traveled with these soldiers, caring for Fowler, not giving away the fact that I was a girl. Did that not count for something? Could he not have more faith in me?