I hurry, knowing I’ll have only a slight head start before their footsteps follow. I pray Alexa will at least get the water for Hope before coming after me.
It is still so dark, I know I’ve found Lonan only when he wraps his fingers lightly around my forearm. “Distract your friends,” he whispers. “The others will wake soon. Phoenix will be the first up, but we won’t have much time to move Cass and Finnley out of the trigger area of the cave—I’m almost entirely convinced it’s the phosphorescent material that activates the triggers. They were fine until we all sat in that area to eat. I don’t want you anywhere near, if things go wrong.”
“If what things go wrong?” Alexa is quicker, quieter than I give her credit for.
“If we don’t find a way out of here,” Lonan says, as if that’s what we’ve been talking about all along. “Can I count on you and Hope to help Eden find the other opening? Our intel says there should be one on the far back side.”
I don’t want to leave Lonan alone with Cass and Finnley, not after how wildly they attacked us earlier. Phoenix will be with him at least, and he likely has more strength than Hope and Alexa combined. It actually does sound wise to get Hope away from whatever might go down—she seems a bit weak right now, and definitely underhydrated, thanks to sweating buckets through my cardigan all day. She’ll have to take her grapes and water to go.
“I didn’t come all this way to sit in a dark cave forever, so fine, I’ll help,” Alexa says, an edge to her voice. “Just so you’re aware, you don’t have to lie to me. You can trust me, you know.”
In this total darkness, she could be talking to Lonan or me. Or both.
But it is Lonan who absorbs it for the both of us. “No,” he says, “I don’t know that I can trust you, actually.”
“You trust Eden—”
“Prove yourself like Eden, and I’ll trust you, too.” He has such even control over his spiny words, like he’s offering her an arsenal of swords instead of brandishing them against her. “I’ll let Hope know you’re waiting for her.”
I want to call out Be careful! as he leaves us, but then I’d have to explain the things Lonan doesn’t want Alexa to know. I trust Alexa enough, but she’d never be able to keep her mouth shut—Lonan would know immediately that I’d spilled all his secrets, and then where would his trust for me be? In pieces, I’d bet. And then we’d all be stuck not trusting one another in this trigger-happy cave, together with Cass and Finnley, live-wire HoloWolves who could—and likely would—turn on us. Lonan’s sedative supply can’t be infinite.
I keep my mouth shut.
Hope joins us. “I hear we’re looking for another way out?”
“He could have at least given us a flashlight,” Alexa mutters. “Or a torch, whatever.”
If I listen hard enough, I can just make out the sounds of whispers from the phosphorescent cave, the scrape of bodies against the cold, hard floor. We’ll know soon enough if Lonan’s theory is a raging failure. “He has other things on his mind.”
“Says the only one of us who knows what those things are.”
“Listen, Alexa”—I turn on her, though it is pitch-black darkness—“do you want to get out of here alive or not?” Or not, not, not: the words bounce from wall to wall like the lasers at the temple, every bit as electric. “I don’t want to keep his secrets any more than you want me to keep them.” The words are a hiss through my teeth. “But he has more secrets, I’d bet, secrets that could lead to real freedom, and I want them. If I tell you a single word, that’s it—we will be cut off from their information. We need them, and we need them to trust us.” On the other side of this, I could possibly convince Lonan to take us back to the Resistance island—freedom is freedom, even if it doesn’t look like the temple we initially set out to find. Freedom, plus the secrets about this island I hope to discover along the way? Clearly, sticking with the guys is our best option. “You’re going to have to trust me on this. Do you think you can manage that?”
Voices rise above mine, Lonan’s and Phoenix’s and—I strain to pick them apart—there’s Cass’s, too. Finnley should wake next. I don’t hear the sounds of hostility yet, but things could flip in an instant. And, according to what Lonan said about the Wolfpack using them as spies, they are likely monitoring our every move, even if they’re not actively attacking us, even if they’re not aware of it.
Such complications.
“Yeah.” The word barely comes out, and Alexa clears her throat. It almost sounds like . . . is she crying? Alexa does not strike me as someone who cries easily, or even at all. I would not be surprised to learn she’s never cried a single tear in her entire life. “Yeah,” she says again, this time more solidly. “Fine. We’re good.”
Torchlight floods our dark tunnel, and yes: her dark eyes are bright, bright. She looks at me just long enough to make sure I get the message—that she means what she said—and then her walls go right back up again.
“What is she doing here?” Finnley follows Lonan, Cass, and the torch, with Phoenix at the back of the pack. “I thought we didn’t trust Wolves?”
Lonan was right. Finnley has zero clue what’s been done to her—what she did to us. She has no clue that she is one we are guarding against, that she, too, is a form of Wolf. That, or she is a brilliant liar. From the short amount of time I spent with her before she disappeared, she struck me as blunt—maybe a touch passive-aggressive—but not necessarily a liar. I conclude she is either being ruled by someone’s will other than her own, or the people controlling her have ensured their subjects black out during attacks. Maybe both.
“We don’t,” Lonan says.
We file through the tunnel together, ex-Wolf and HoloWolves and syringe-carrying sheep, one after the other, in a single, straight line. It would almost look as if we were a unified contingent, if viewed from precisely the right angle.
From where I stand, all I see are cracks.
FORTY-FOUR
THE PITCH BLACKNESS doesn’t last forever. Sunbeams stream in through the top of the cave after we’ve taken a few sharp turns, and soon we see a strip of intensely blue sky.
It isn’t the exit we hoped for.
Instead, we’ve found a path so narrow we have to walk single file. We’re walled in on both sides, by moss-covered stones that stretch straight up toward the sun. It’s difficult to avoid the moss, but so far, we’ve managed. Hope is still wearing my cardigan—I get it now. I want to ask for it back, but can’t bring myself to do it. When it comes to these unpleasant bits of nature, her tolerance is much lower than mine. I’ll just have to be careful.
It’s strange, the way paranoia works: the farther we walk in peace, the more I wonder what’s waiting for us up ahead.
If there will be another trigger.
If there will be another attack—what could happen here, between these narrow walls, with no easy escape route.
If, if, if.
This is life now. Watching, wondering, waiting.
Even in the calm, there is no rest.
I take a breath. Take a step.
One foot in front of the other.
FORTY-FIVE