She was so distracted by her attempts to dislodge Sybil’s control that she didn’t notice the roundhouse kick until it had crashed into the side of her head and sent her reeling halfway across the platform.
She lay on her side, dizzy, white sparks flashing in her vision and her left arm burning from skidding across the ground. Breath wouldn’t come into her lungs. She couldn’t lift her head. Programming diagnostics were going berserk and it took her a moment to remember how to send them away so she could focus.
As her vision cleared, she noticed shapes moving against the twilit sky. People and shadows. Fighting. Brawling. The hazy images were eventually coupled with grunts of pain.
The guards had attacked. Thorne had gotten a knife from somewhere, Cress was wildly swinging his cane, and Iko was using her metal and silicon limbs as best she could to defend herself. But Thorne was blind and Iko wasn’t programmed with fighting skills and as soon as one of the guards grabbed the cane out of Cress’s hands, she fell to her knees, paralyzed, cowering behind her arms.
As Cinder watched, a guard caught Thorne’s wrist and yanked it behind his back. He cried out. The knife fell. Another guard landed a punch to his stomach.
Then Cinder heard a growl. Wolf was crouched, ready to come at her again.
Cinder resisted the urge to close her eyes and brace for impact, instead letting a slow breath out through her nose. She urged her muscles to relax with it.
Your mind and body have to work together.
For a moment, it was like being two people at once. Her eyes were open, focused on Wolf as he lunged for her, and her body—loose and relaxed—instinctively rolled away, before she bounded back to her feet.
At the same time, her Lunar gift sought out the pulses of energy around her, targeted the six guards, and wrapped so tightly around them it was like clasping them in enormous metal fists.
There was a jolt of surprise from the guards. One crashed to his knees. Two fell onto their sides, convulsing.
Cinder dodged another punch, blocked another kick. Her instincts yearned to use the knife inside her finger, but she refused.
Wolf wasn’t the enemy.
She landed an uppercut to his jaw—her first solid strike—as those words infiltrated her brain.
Wolf isn’t the enemy.
A blur of blue caught her eye. Iko jumped onto Wolf’s back with a battle cry, wrapping her legs around his waist. Her arms surrounded his head, trying to blind or suffocate or distract him any way she could.
She was successful for 2.3 seconds before Wolf reached behind him, grabbed hold of her head, and twisted with such force the skin ripped around her throat. The wiring along her upper spine popped and sparked.
Iko slipped off him, crumpling to the ground. Her legs were twisted awkwardly beneath her. The external plating that protected her collar structure was peeled back on one side, revealing disconnected wires and a torn muscle pad, already leaking thick yellow silicon down her shoulder.
Cinder stumbled and crashed to her knees, staring at the crooked form. Her internal audio latched on to that awful sound and began replaying it over and over—that same brutal snap. That same heavy thud as Iko’s body hit the ground.
Her stomach heaved once, but she kept it down as she peeled her gaze away from Iko and looked, not at Wolf, but at Sybil.
The thaumaturge was standing at the base of the ramp now. Her beautiful face was pinched in concentration.
In her distant thoughts, Cinder could tell that the guards were picking themselves off the ground. Rounding on her friends again.
Snarling, she ignored them all. She ignored Wolf.
Sybil was the enemy.
Wolf turned back to face her. His feet pounded on the pavement.
But Cinder was too focused on the bioelectricity rolling off Sybil to care. Sybil’s energy was twisted and arrogant and proud, and Cinder had just slipped into the cracks of her thoughts when the impact came.
Wolf crashed into her, knocking her over, but Cinder barely felt it.
While Wolf pinned her to the ground, Cinder was working her way around Sybil’s gift. Becoming intimately acquainted with how the energy rippled along her limbs and fingers. How it was so different from the way that same energy churned and throbbed inside her brain.
As Wolf revealed his sharp canines, Cinder discovered where Sybil’s gift was boiling hot in her attempts to control Wolf, leaving the rest of her brain cool and vulnerable.
When Wolf lowered his fangs toward Cinder’s unprotected throat, Cinder seized Sybil’s mind and attacked.
Fifty-Five
Crack.
Cress glanced up just as Iko slid off Wolf’s back, landing broken and mangled on the hard ground. A shudder tore through her. Even from this distance she could see the torn flesh and sparking wires.
“What was that?”
She returned her attention to Thorne. She was still kneeling beside him, trying to steady him as best she could. He’d taken a hard punch to his stomach that had knocked the wind from him, but at least he was breathing and talking again.
“I think we just lost Iko,” she said. “Can you stand?”
Thorne groaned, still clasping one hand to his stomach. “Yeah,” he said, sounding none too convinced.
Something shuffled. Glancing up, Cress squeaked and dug her fingers into Thorne’s arms. The guards, having been paralyzed and empty faced for the past few moments, were twitching. One of them groaned.
Beside her, Thorne pulled himself to his feet. “There. Better,” he said, though he was still grimacing. “Do you see my cane anywhere? Or my knife?”
She spotted the cane behind one of the guards, whose furious gaze was no longer empty or harmless.
“Cress?”
“Guards are up again,” she said.
Thorne flinched. “All six of them?”
She glanced over her shoulder. “And Cinder’s on the ground—she might be unconscious. And Wolf’s still under Sybil’s control and I … I think he’s going to…” She squeezed Thorne’s arm, horrified at the sight of Wolf pinning Cinder to the ground. She wanted to look away, but couldn’t, like being stuck in a bad dream.
“That all sounds very dire,” said Thorne.
Shivering, she pressed her back against him, wondering how her death was going to come. Her skull crushed against the concrete? Her neck snapped like Iko’s?
“I guess it’s time.”
While Cress’s thoughts continued to churn through the horrible things that could happen to her, she felt herself being suddenly spun around and dipped backward, a supportive arm scooping beneath her back. She yelped and caught herself on Thorne’s shoulder.
Then he was kissing her.
The battle became a hurricane, with them caught in the eye—his arms cradling her against the wind, her skirt billowing around his legs, his lips gentle but coaxing as if they had all the time in the world.
Warmth overtook her and Cress closed her eyes. She thought her arms wanted to wrap around his neck, but her whole body was vibrating and dizzy and she could barely keep her fingers clutched around the fabric of his shirt.
She had just finished melting when she was suddenly righted again.
The world flipped. Thorne spun, embracing her against his chest with one arm while the other reached for his waist. Cress heard the gunshot and screamed, pressing herself against him, before she realized that Thorne was the one who had fired.
A guard grunted.
Another guard grabbed Thorne by the collar and he turned, elbowing the guard in the jaw.
“Cress, do me a favor.” He twirled her around so that her back was against him—she was beginning to feel like a satellite being constantly spun out of orbit, but she had no time to think as Thorne settled his arm on her shoulder. “Make sure I don’t shoot anyone we like.”
He fired again and the bullet clipped a guard’s bicep. The guard barely flinched, and lunged toward them.