“My name is Rosamund Wyndham!” she shouted. “We aren’t here to hurt any of you, I promise.”
The booming voice echoed off the walls as the defenders hushed one another and searched for the source. As a precaution, I prodded Miss Rao and Miss Chen forward and pulled Rose and Emily farther down the passage.
“Captain Goode admitted he is threatening some of you and your families, forcing you to stay under his command. But if we all work together and stop him tonight, there will be no one to enforce those punishments.”
We continued farther down the street. The sounds of footsteps above us followed. “Those of you voluntarily helping him for more power, you are only giving him more control over your life. There will be a day when you’ll receive an order that hurts someone you love, and you will be powerless to do anything about it.”
I turned us back around toward where we started, right outside Traitors’ Gate. The fog surrounding us slowly began to dissipate, and the clouds shifted as the moonlight revealed the tower walls, the battlements, and the faces of our Society of Aberrations allies or enemies. Some of them blinked rapidly, their sight restored, looking as if they were coming out of a dream. They stared down at us, deciding our fates. My nerves were on edge, and I felt naked when the fog cleared.
“Please help us against him. So we can all go home. So we can all be safe.”
For a moment, no one moved on either side. We waited in complete silence, my gaze shifting between indecipherable faces and landing on Eliza, floating above us. I pleaded with my eyes, and she turned her gaze to her fellow members, judging their reactions to Rose’s proposal.
“No!” Emily whispered suddenly, looking around in an absolute panic. “Evelyn, something’s here!”
A pair of yellow eyes flickered in the darkness. I pulled Emily behind me with one hand and reached for my dagger fan with the other, ready to deal with the threat. But a winged woman was already in front of me, her warm breath on my face.
“I’m sorry,” she said as her claws sank into my chest. “We have orders.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
IT FELT HOT. As if five holes had burned right through me at once. I stumbled forward, swinging at her in desperation as I felt her other hand wrap around my throat. I didn’t have the leverage to push her away, but fortunately, Emily didn’t seem to have the same problem. With a scream, she flung the woman up over the stone wall and out of the castle.
As I coughed and tried to catch my breath, chaos broke out all around us.
Miss Chen and Rose spun around to give me support, leaving their backs open to a blast of fire. Miss Rao roused her heavy winds to shield us, but a man moving in bursts of speed slipped through and tackled her to the ground. And as Emily turned to help her, my animalistic attacker returned with her wings spread, swooping down like a bird of prey. All I could do was wheeze out a pitiful warning.
“Watch out—”
A miraculous blur knocked her out of the sky. She crashed to the ground with Eliza on top of her, keeping her pinned. The earth rumbled violently underneath us. A massive rock wall sprang up around us, shielding Miss Chen and Rose from Mr. Jarsdel’s blast. Emily wrenched Miss Rao’s attacker off and threw him at Mr. Jarsdel. Vines slithered out of the ground like snakes, trapping all three attackers to the ground.
Oliver’s friends. Thank God. I caught a glimpse of Eliza taking off toward a burning rooftop before a blast of electricity forced us to take cover under an archway.
“Rose, get in the center,” I said. “Emily, up here with me. Miss Chen, Miss Rao, you watch the back. We need to help them.”
“Can you even move?” Miss Chen asked.
Right, those stab wounds. I pressed my chest gently and felt a shock of pain course through me. Yes, very much still stabbed. But the fact that I’d forgotten about the injury for a moment had to be a good sign.
And there was no time to catch our breath. The rest of the Society members were picking sides. And there seemed to be plenty more still too scared to join us, judging from the fact that acid was melting through the archway. That was also on fire. And not at all suitable cover.
“Yes, it’ll heal,” I said, my eyes darting around, watching for movement on the battlements. “Remember the plan!”
I led the group forward out of the archway, toward the burning rooftop, hoping we’d find allies there. Beyond that, it was nearly impossible to know who was on our side, and no one was taking the time to hand us cards declaring their intentions. We marched down the outer ward street, keeping behind walls, staying out of sight of the White Tower, watching for attacks from the enemies above us.
A line of spikes flew at our heads first, and Emily flung them into a wall. Behind us, Miss Rao’s winds did the same to acid, the stones sizzling. Another bolt of electricity lit up the passage, a streak headed straight for me, and Emily diverted it to the rooftop where the spikes had come from, earning an explosion and a yelp.
Sounds of other roof skirmishes echoed off the walls as we neared the burning rooftop. Rocks and vines and smoke spilled over the edges and then Shirin herself. The earth rose up to catch her, but the massive man with the powerful jumping ability pursued her, leaping off the roof, aiming his landing right where she lay.
And he hovered in midair helplessly. Emily floated him to the ground, and Shirin opened up the earth to swallow him up to his shoulders, leaving him stuck.
The street led us into a small square, where Shirin’s friends were working together with other converts. Eliza plucked the metalcovered man from the battlements and dropped him over a pile of vines for George to ensnare. An older woman dressed in shawls and surrounded by ravens ordered the birds to swoop down at a long-haired man, whose hair moved to his every whim. He clutched a fistful that twined itself into a thick rope and swatted at the birds, but while he was distracted, an agile, strangely flexible man wrestled him to the ground and held him there until the ground opened up and trapped him there.
At the sight, I felt a little glimmer of hope. There were people fighting against Captain Goode. And we were winning. I couldn’t help but imagine what was happening in the White Tower. Captain Goode did not want to leave the safety of it to join the fight. He was likely too scared of what we might do to him if he wasn’t hiding behind his hostages. Stay safe, Sebastian. Hold on, Mr. Kent. Just a little while longer. We’re coming.
“Miss Rao, catch,” Miss Chen said as I heard something crumble behind us.
The winds picked up, rushing over our heads, throwing the acid woman into the square, where the vines restrained her.
“Well, that’s a terrible power,” Miss Chen said, glancing at the man’s flailing hair. “Not jealous of that one.”
I wasn’t either until I realized where his hair was going.
“Miss Chen, the hair.”
“Yes, I’ll focus on the hairy man while there’s an electric woman lurking in the shadows,” she said, her back turned as she searched the rooftops. “There!”
Miss Chen exploded something behind me, and I felt the winds of Miss Rao throwing the electric woman into the square, where the hair crept through George’s vines. The strands slipped into the metal man’s hand, which rendered it into steel. Cords of steel that whipped up, cutting through the vines and rocks, freeing the prisoners, and wrapping around the raven woman’s neck.
“Miss Chen!” Rose called.
Miss Chen finally turned around as a scream got her attention. “Oh.”
Acid and lightning flew at us and veered into a tower as Emily and Miss Rao shielded us. The raven woman was lifted up high into the air, gasping for breath in the moonlight, her birds frantically fluttering around her. The steel cord snapped under Miss Chen’s gaze, and Eliza swooped in to catch her.