Tayel considered the wrench. She kept crouched as she followed Shy along the wall toward the guards, wondering what to do with the thing. But as the screams grew louder and as she caught sight of Jace, what to do became a lot clearer. His exhausted form — still pulling against the guards — the pained refugees who only wanted to fight back, the image of her mom reaching out for help as the road dissolved under her — it all drove a little flicker in Tayel’s chest that burned hotter and hotter until she could almost scream.
Shy nodded the go ahead, and Tayel gritted her teeth. She lunged at the closest of Jace’s captors, tunnel vision blocking out anything else. The wrench landed, vibrating with every layer of popped blood vessel and cartilage. The man stumbled back. He reached to his face, but she swung again, connecting with his temple. He veered with the momentum of the swing, still on his feet, and she gave chase, rising the wrench over her head. She brought it down on his. His body jerked, and toppled to the cobblestone.
“Tayel.” Jace watched her, his eyes wide and afraid.
Her breath rasped out between dry lips. The wrench slipped from her fingers.
“Jace.” She fell to the ground beside him, and wrapped her arms around his thin, shivering frame. “Are you okay? Are you hurt? Can you move?”
“Tayel, how did…?”
Shy knelt beside them. Tayel hadn’t seen how she’d handled the guardswoman, but her body laid still on the ground a few feet away. Shy touched a chip key to the sensor on Jace’s cuffs. The locking mechanism slid out of place, freeing his talons.
The screams from the room below finally dwindled, and the faint light from the torches returned. The councilwoman’s voice rang out, “attention!” and a loud snap echoed against the walls. Shy moved to the overlook.
Jace whipped his gaze to Tayel, eyes bewildered. “We need to go.”
“I know.” She crouched down and inched toward Shy, but the scene stopped her from reaching out.
The thawed recruits all stood with arms at their sides, eyes ahead.
The councilwoman nodded at the man beside her. “If there are any defects, just shoot them this time. Resistance is too bothersome to try and snuff out.” Without waiting for a response, she yelled, “Turn left.”
The recruits turned the ordered direction, their feet hitting the ground all at once to form that resounding snap from before.
“No,” Shy whispered.
At a slight scuffing sound, Tayel turned. The guardswoman had recovered, an aether-tech broadsword raised and ready to strike.
Tayel’s heart leapt into her throat. “SHY!”
Shy jumped backward, dodging the guard’s attack as it cleaved the air where she’d been. Tayel jumped at the guardswoman. She grabbed her dazed form by the pauldron, and Shy grabbed her other side. With a unanimous heave, they pushed her from the balcony. She crashed into a heap below, and without thinking, Tayel poked her head over the edge. All heads — save for the indoctrinated recruits — craned toward her. Her jaw dropped. The councilwoman’s eyes sharpened, her head feathers rising.
“Get them!” she squawked.
Tayel bolted. She gripped the railing on the staircase and used it to balance herself while she hopped down four, five steps at a time. Even as fast as she reached the bottom, the guards got there faster.
She ran back up, noticing Jace and Shy weren’t with her. She reached the balcony landing, and Jace grabbed her arm, pulling her to the side as Shy toppled the crate of cryonades down the steps. A hundred little snapping explosions rolled downward, painting the walls in frigid white. A draft of cold air rushed out of the stairwell as anguished cries rose from the bottom.
Shy pulled the retrieved FTL drive to her back. “Go!” she yelled.
Tayel maneuvered down the steps, dodging patches of ice and shuddering at the cold. She veered past the wall of glacier blocking the archway — the result of so many detonated cryonades. Jace and Shy ran at her heels. She made a beeline to the stairs which would take them down to the rest of the castle. She paused at the first step, letting them run down first. The glacier exploded outward, dark waves of aether sprouting from between the shattered ice as still-standing guards darted forth from the room past the archway. Tayel ran.
Stealth had been abandoned. She followed Shy and Jace through the halls, winding a hard-to-follow path between the long corridors. Tayel’s motion ran purely on adrenaline and fear. Her arm burned, her shoulders hurt, and her head swooned with dizziness. Guards rounded the corner ahead, but Shy cut another path.
“This way!” she yelled.
Tayel shuffled to a slower pace to turn. A guard reached out, and an armored glove closed around her burned arm. She jerked to a stop. Pain screamed along her blistered skin. Jace stabbed his talons into the guard’s bracer. Fire lit under his grip. The man screeched and wrenched backward, letting Tayel go and swiping at the heated metal.
Tayel met Jace’s eyes for a half a breath and ran again, taking the turn that got her caught. Shy held a door open at the end of the path, waving frantically for them to hurry. Tayel darted in after Jace, taking in the small kitchen as the door slammed shut behind her.
Shy and Jace pushed a table, and Tayel joined them, enduring the sound of wood scraping across stone until it sat firmly as a barricade in front of the entrance. She steadied herself on the tablecloth. Jace stood beside her. Shy opened the window on the other side of the room, and stuck her head out of it.
Tayel squeezed her arm, trying to outdo the burning sensation. “Jace.”
Something heavy slammed into the door, and she stumbled forward, heart racing.
“Hey!” Shy yelled. “You — kid — get me that tablecloth. Now!”
Jace ripped the cloth off their barricade and jogged it to Shy as the door shook again. Muffled voices debated behind it.
“In here, sir! The raider princess and the others are in here!”
A wave of black, electrified aether blasted through the door and barricade. Tayel flew backward. Her back slammed into the ground. Dust hung like a cloud in the air. Debris rained all around, ticking and tacking off the stone floor and walls.
Tayel grunted as she tried to pull herself up. She couldn’t see much through the veil of gray dust. Her ears rang. Was Jace screaming her name? Or maybe Shy was. She shook her head quickly, trying to get her eyes to focus.
A figure stood in the doorway, dark aether pulsating from his hand. His face came into focus. First his short, dark brown hair and trimmed to a point beard, then his closed mouth pinched in a scowl. Finally, his eyes. Dark, narrow eyes staring directly at her. She tensed. He reached out and took a step forward.
Tayel scrambled to stand. Her foot snagged on a piece of the table and she fell backward. The man pursued her, one long stride at a time, his hardened stare unbreakable. She backed up, her hands and feet scraping over the cobblestone floor. Aether writhed around his hands. He rose them to strike.
Someone grabbed the back of her shirt and tugged. A glint of silver flew past. Her eyes shot wide. Cryonade. Stalagmites of ice detonated from the weapon’s point of impact, bursting outward like a deadly flower. An expanding edge of ice zipped past, clipping her shoulder. She groaned as warm blood slid down her shirt. The growing wall of icicles was the last thing in the castle she saw.
Whoever had pulled her let go, and she registered that she was falling. Window panes zoomed past. The starry night sky came into focus. Her back tore through fabric — an awning — and then into a bush. The wind knocked out of her. A million little cuts erupted over her exposed skin. Jace screamed for her, his squawk tearing through the pulse drumming in her ears.