Outcast (8 page)

“I have to.”

“What bargaining power will you bring to the table?” she asks.

I straighten my shoulders. “Troops from the other northern city-states. I’ll visit them—”

“Logan!” Willow sounds angrier than I’ve ever heard her.

“Willow, what choice do we have? We can’t take down three armies on our own. We need help. I can show the city-states how to destroy the beacons in exchange for a commitment of troops to march south under the Commander.” I look at Clarissa, and I see she understands what I haven’t yet asked.

“And you want to start with troops from Lankenshire?”

“Yes.”

The silence that stretches between us is filled with tension so thick it seems like I could reach out and touch it. Finally, she says, “I will send an emissary with you to the closest northern city-state. To Hodenswald. If you can convince Lyle Hoden to give you troops, I will convince the other members of the triumvirate to give you one-fourth of our army.”

“One-fourth!” Willow’s laugh is scornful.

Clarissa’s expression feels like a stone settling across my shoulders. “Understand this. If we commit troops to you, Rowansmark will know it. If the trackers within our city don’t realize it, the ones guarding Rowansmark will surely recognize the uniforms, the fighting style, and the weaponry. If you fail, my city is next in line for destruction.”

She steps closer, and I catch a whiff of perfume, crisp and powerful just like the woman who wears it. “Don’t fail us, Logan.”

“I won’t,” I say. Another promise to add to the list I’m already struggling to keep. Another responsibility to keep me up at night chasing worst case scenarios.

Clarissa turns on her heel and leaves the room, and I look away from Willow as I think through what I can possibly say to the Commander that will convince him he wants me as an ally instead of as a corpse.

Chapter Three

RACHEL

I
’m dreaming again. I know I am, but I can’t make it stop. The landscape billows around me like a sheet caught in the wind: streaks of green, smudges of brown, and a river of red that seems to follow my feet as I run. A yellow house wavers in the distance, its familiar rooftop beckoning me home where Dad is waiting. Where Oliver is baking. Where Logan is sitting at the table, pretending not to stare at me while he eats.

I run past the streaks of green, the smudges of brown, with the bright-red river nipping at my heels. I run, but the yellow house remains just out of reach, like the sun hovering against the corner of the sky. Close enough to feel the warmth. Close enough that if I squint, I think I can touch it. But always too far away, no matter how fast I run.

A voice cuts through the river.

“Rachel.”

I run faster, my bare feet slapping against the ground, but the house is too far away. I strain to see Dad on the porch, waiting for me, but the porch is empty. The chimney is cold.

“Rachel, wake up.”

The river snaps at my heels, and a bright streak of pain shoots through my veins.

I run and run, my breath sobbing in my chest, tiny daggers piercing my lungs. The house shimmers and grows pale, the color slowly draining from it until I can see through the walls into the rooms inside.

Dad isn’t there. Neither are Logan and Oliver. The emptiness presses against the walls like a living thing, and I fall to my knees as cracks spread across the plaster, raining ash.

“Get out of that wagon now, or you don’t eat.”

White-hot agony tears through me, dissolving the house and jerking me awake. My right arm lies beneath me, the blackened burn that stretches along my forearm rubbing against the rough wagon bed and sending spikes of pain from my fingertips to my jaw. I crane my neck to see one of the Rowansmark trackers who kidnapped me—a tall man with graying black hair, dark skin, and a thin frame—leaning against the wagon’s entrance.

Gritting my teeth against the pain, I carefully sit up. I’ve been traveling inside this wagon ever since Ian and his tracker friends forced me to leave Quinn behind in a clearing outside Lankenshire earlier today. A thread of weary triumph snakes through me as I remember Quinn’s eyes closed as if he was dead while his heart beat strong beneath the lightweight armored vest he was wearing under his tunic.

Ian stands a few yards away, watching me as I slowly climb out of the wagon. His dark-blue eyes sharpen as he notices the way I cradle my injured arm to my chest. I remember that he promised me a lesson in pain on this journey and lift my chin to meet his gaze head-on. If he’s waiting for me to break, he’s going to be disappointed.

I broke when the Commander killed Oliver in front of me. Lost myself when I found my father’s grave in the Wasteland. Slipped into a silence that cut me off from the grief and misery I couldn’t stand to face after I killed Melkin. And shattered completely when my best friend, Sylph, died of the poison Ian injected in her bloodstream as part of his pain atonement vendetta against Logan.

It wasn’t until Quinn found me trying to feel something—
anything
—by ripping apart the wound in my arm that I understood what it would take to heal. Quinn told me that healing takes the courage to face the things that hurt me. I still have a lot of grief inside of me, but I’m no longer the mess Ian seems to think he can destroy so easily.

I’m a survivor. If Ian thinks the burn on my arm—something
he
caused when he lit white phosphorous fires around our campsite outside Lankenshire—is going to break me, he’s as stupid as he is crazy.

Turning away from Ian, I take a second to get my bearings as shadows swim in front of my eyes. I can’t afford to pass out from pain and exhaustion. It’s one thing to sleep on my own inside the wagon. It’s another to be unconscious while the trackers might search me and find that I have a knife hidden in my boot. A knife Quinn risked his life to give to me.

“We’re stopping for the night,” Ian says. “Make yourself useful, or you don’t eat.”

“Going to be kind of hard keeping me alive all the way to Rowansmark if you don’t feed me,” I say. The tracker who awakened me pulls me away from the wagon before Ian can reply.

“Best not to antagonize,” the tracker says in a soft, controlled voice that reminds me a little of Quinn. I look into his dark eyes and find no malice. No murderous rage. Just steady confidence that he can face anything and survive to tell the story.

“I’m not very good at not antagonizing people.”

“Learn.” He helps me step over a fallen log, and though I want to shake off his hand on principle, I don’t. It’s been less than twenty-four hours since I woke up in Lankenshire from a three-day coma thanks to Ian’s nasty white phosphorous firebombs. My chest burns when I breathe. My arm aches in sharp throbs. And my head feels only distantly connected to my body. Without the tracker’s support, there’s a very good chance I’ll fall on my face and be unable to get back up.

I cradle my injured arm against my stomach and scan my surroundings. A faint road carves a path through slender tree trunks and clumps of ferns. Moss clings to the base of the trees, and glossy green leaves block out most of the sky. The light that filters through looks more orange than gold.

Sunset.

The crumbled gray rock and beaten-down grass that make up the road slice through the forest east to west, and the wagon is facing the fiery orange light bathing the canopy above us.

We’re heading west.

I frown as the tracker nudges a slender stick my way and says, “We’re gathering firewood.”

Rowansmark is south. Why are we moving west? Even knowing that Ian obviously needs a way to move a wagon through the Wasteland, it makes no sense. There are roads that lead north to south. Surely in the few hours that I spent dozing in the back of the wagon he could’ve found one.

I bend to pick up the stick, and my head spins as my pulse pounds painfully against my skull. I need sleep, but I’m not going to get it. Not when Ian wants to use me as his personal punching bag in place of Logan.

And not when I have my own secrets to protect.

The knife hidden inside my boot presses against my leg as I lean forward to grab another stick. The tracker squats beside me and scoops up a few thick branches that lie beneath the trees.

“Why are we heading west?” I ask quietly.

He casts an appraising glance at me. “How did you know that?”

“The sun is setting in the same direction we’ve been traveling.” Does he think I’m an idiot? Anyone could figure that out. “Rowansmark is south. Why are we going west?”

“Oh, we’ll go south soon enough,” the tracker says as he places another handful of twigs in my arms, careful to avoid my wound.

I try to stand, and the forest lurches sideways. Gasping, I reach for something solid to lean on and find the tracker already there, his hand cupping my elbow as he holds me steady.

“You should just sit and tend the fire,” he says. “And keep quiet. You’re in no shape to take more punishment tonight.”

I blink away the brilliant lights that dart at the edge of my vision, and take a deep breath. “Thank you.”

Three months ago, I could never have dreamed of a situation where I would not only willingly lean against a Rowansmark tracker as he helped me navigate the forest floor, but thank him for his trouble.

Of course, three months ago my family was still alive, my city was intact, and I was still confident that my first impression of anyone was absolutely right. Now I know that sometimes, for better or for worse, people aren’t who they seem to be. Sometimes the thing you think will fix everything ruins it instead. And sometimes what hurts you has to tear you apart before it makes you stronger.

I’ve also learned that a little deception goes a long way toward lulling your enemies into a false sense of security. Ian taught me that lesson, and I don’t plan to forget it.

I let my shoulders slump and make sure to stumble twice as the tracker helps me back toward the wagon.

“I’m not sure I’m up to eating.” I make my voice as small as I possibly can.

“You’ll never heal if you don’t eat,” he says. There isn’t an ounce of concern in his voice, but I don’t care. He’s talking to me. Trying to take care of me. That counts for something.

I need the pair of trackers who are with Ian to believe I’m not a threat. It’s the only chance I have of catching them off guard.

“I’m Rachel,” I say as we reach the wagon. The other tracker, a short, muscular woman with bright red cheeks, is already skinning a brace of small game. Ian is nowhere in sight.

Beside me, the tracker’s cool expression doesn’t change. “I’m Samuel.” He eases me down onto a half-rotten tree stump at the side of the road. “And we aren’t friends, little girl. Remember that.”

Samuel moves away to build a fire, and I make sure to look frail and nonthreatening in case he looks my way again. He’s old enough to be my father. I swallow the stab of hurt that thought brings and focus on the goal—appearing weak enough to make the trackers overlook me.

The second they give me an opportunity, I’m going to make Ian wish he’d never set eyes on me or the citizens of Baalboden.

Chapter Four

RACHEL

I
t’s dark inside the wagon where Ian told me I had to spend the night. I huddle on the floor, my back against the bench, and shiver though it isn’t cold. Now that I’m not falling down with exhaustion like I was earlier, I find it impossible to sit inside the wagon without being flooded with memories that cut into me like daggers.

The rough, splintery floor reminds me of lying beside Sylph, clutching her hand and whispering that I loved her as her life slowly drained away. Of watching Oliver’s blood pour from his throat while I tried to stop it even though I already knew it was too late. The canvas above me is a prison door locking me inside with memories I can’t stand to face.

My throat feels like I’ve swallowed a rock, and I pull sharply at the neckline of my tunic. I can’t get enough air. My fingers tremble, and there’s a faint ringing in my ears as I force myself to breathe slowly. In through my nose. Out through my mouth. Just the way Dad taught me when I needed to force my body past paralyzing fear and into a fight.

It isn’t working.

My heart races, a thick jerky rhythm that pounds against my chest. Somehow I’m convinced that I can smell blood—a metallic sweetness that fills my mind and sinks into my tongue until I gag with the effort to keep from swallowing it.

I can’t stay inside this wagon for another minute.

Telling myself that I’m not running away from something I know I need to face, I get to my knees and move toward the exit, pausing every few seconds to listen for Ian and his tracker friends. If I’m outside, I can observe my captors and maybe learn something useful. I can look for weaknesses that I can use to my advantage.

I can breathe.

And I can be on the lookout for Quinn.

I don’t know how fast he can track us. Between the smoke inhalation he suffered while rescuing me from the fire and the head injury he got fighting Ian in Lankenshire, he’s in bad shape. Still, I know he’s coming for me. He didn’t follow Ian out of Lankenshire just to pretend to die so that he could give me a knife. He followed me because he’s committed to protecting me. So is Logan. Probably Willow as well. There’s no way she wouldn’t follow her brother. I just hope she doesn’t blame me for the fact that, once again, Quinn is in harm’s way because he chose to help me. I begged him to leave. To save himself. He refused.

Even Willow can’t blame me for Quinn’s stubbornness.

The knife Quinn gave me is a thin piece of comfort against my ankle as I crawl the rest of the distance to the wagon’s entrance. Quinn has sacrificed himself on my behalf time and again. Part of me feels humiliated—I was trained better than to lose my head in a battle. The rest of me is grateful that Quinn’s protection bought me enough time to start climbing out of the pit of misery, guilt, and fear I’ve been living in. I don’t intend to let his sacrifices go to waste.

Slowly, I slide the canvas flap away from the wagon’s entrance and peer out. The stars are woven through the sky in a tapestry of silver that bathes our campsite in cold, clear light. Samuel, the tracker who helped me gather firewood, is seated on a log at least twenty yards from the ashes of the campfire, his back to the wagon. He sits straight and still, his hand resting comfortably on the hilt of his sword as he keeps the first watch.

The other tracker, Heidi, lies asleep beside the fire’s ashes, wrapped in her bedroll. Her sword rests beside her, where she can grab it the second she awakens. I give the idea of stealing her sword about two seconds of consideration before admitting that trying to sneak up on a sleeping tracker to take a sword that looks too heavy for me is suicide. Especially when Samuel is alert, and Ian might be awake as well.

Besides, I need to look fragile and weak if I want to trick them into overlooking me.

Quietly, I lean out of the wagon, holding on with my left hand while I press my injured right arm against my stomach. Turning my body to the side, I feel for the wagon step with my right leg.

“Going somewhere?” Ian asks behind me.

Startled, I lose my grip on the wagon, my foot grazing the edge of the wagon step as I tumble backward. Strong arms wrap around me and jerk me to my feet before I can hit the ground.

“Do you really think I’m stupid enough to let you just walk out of the wagon and into the Wasteland?” Ian sounds irritated. His arms tighten until my ribs ache.

“Let go of me.” I drive my left elbow into his stomach before I remember that I’m supposed to be acting weak and nonthreatening.

It would be a lot easier to be nonthreatening if the boy who killed Sylph and burned down my city wasn’t holding on to me as if he’d like to break me in half.

“You think you’re stronger than me? Think your precious daddy taught you every technique you need to survive an encounter with a Rowansmark tracker?” Ian’s laugh is ugly.

“You think your precious leader taught you everything you need to know to survive
me
?” I speak quietly, aware that Samuel is sitting a mere twenty yards away. Twisting and squirming in Ian’s arms, I pretend I’m trying to break free. The second he adjusts his grip, I slam my head backward and hear a satisfying crunch as my skull connects with his face. Pain spreads along the base of my skull in sharp throbs. I hope the pain in his face is fifty times worse.

Ian swears viciously.

“Ian?” Samuel calls from his perch on the log. “Everything okay?”

I swallow the words I want to say and let the harsh rasp of my smoke-scarred lungs as they struggle for air speak for me. Ian will never believe I’m too injured to fight, but Samuel might.

Something dark and wet drips off of Ian’s cheek and lands on my hand. I shudder and wipe my skin against my cloak before his blood can linger.

“Ian?” Samuel sounds like he’s coming closer.

Ian shakes me, his fingers biting into my arms. Dizziness joins the pain in my head, and I bite down on the urge to slam my boot into his instep. Not when Samuel is near enough to see us clearly. Instead, I let out a little whimper. When no one reacts, I whimper a little louder and add a breathy sob to the end of it. It isn’t hard. My body hurts in ways I never imagined possible.

“Stop that.” Ian shakes me again. I go limp, letting my legs give out as if I’m about to faint. Ian drops me onto the forest floor. My knees hit first, and I roll to the left so that my good arm takes the brunt of the fall. Ian shoves me with his boot. “What are you doing? Get up and fight back.”

“Enough,” Samuel says. “We need her in one piece.”

Ian kicks me in the hip, and I gasp even though what I really want to do is grab the knife from my boot and turn Ian into a eunuch. Samuel steps closer to Ian and puts a hand on his shoulder. Maybe I should cry. Most men can’t stand the sight of a girl crying.

Or maybe that would oversell the damsel-in-distress image. Especially considering the fact that Samuel already witnessed me antagonizing Ian earlier in the afternoon.

“This is between me and Rachel.” Ian sounds like he’s speaking through clenched teeth.

“No, this is between James Rowan and Logan McEntire.” Samuel’s voice is calm. “If you injure her—”

“She deserves it.”

My throat burns as I swallow the flood of bitter words I’d like to throw in Ian’s face. I deserve a lot of things. I deserve to answer for killing Melkin. I deserve to share the responsibility for failing to stop the Commander while we had the chance. I deserve to ache with guilt because if I hadn’t defied my leader, Oliver would still be alive.

But Ian deserves to die. And everything in me wants to be the one who kills him.

Samuel continues as if Ian had never interrupted him. “If you injure her too badly, her pain atonement will be considered paid in full.” His voice becomes cold. “And if she dies under our watch, and we fail to return both Logan and the controller, we won’t survive our punishments. I’m not willing to die because you hate this girl.”

No wonder Samuel cares what happens to me. He wants to save his own skin. I can appreciate that.

Ian takes a single step away from me, though his eyes glitter in the starlight as if a silver-white flame burns within them.

“Get some sleep,” Samuel says. “Both of you. We have a long day of travel tomorrow.”

“Fine.” Ian turns toward the wagon. “But I’m sleeping in here with her so she can’t try to escape.”

Oh yes, please. Please let Ian sleep in the wagon with me. The second he drifts off, I’ll slice his throat the way he sliced Donny’s while the boy stood guard over our camp in the Wasteland. My pulse pounds against my skin, and I press my lips together to keep from baring my teeth.

Samuel is quiet for a moment, and then he says, “She’ll keep watch with me or sleep beside Heidi.” The tracker looks at me. “Get up and either join me or lie by the fire. And if you even think about trying to escape under my watch, I’ll tie you to the wagon bench for the duration of the trip.” Without waiting for a response from either of us, he turns and strides across the campsite toward his log.

Slowly, I climb to my feet. My head spins, and my arm throbs in never-ending spikes of pain. I want to lie down and let darkness claim me, but that’s not an option.

“He’s not protecting you,” Ian says. For the first time since he revealed himself as the monster behind the death and destruction that followed the Baalboden survivors through the Wasteland, he sounds weary. “He’s only protecting himself. That’s all he’s good at. He’ll turn on you the second keeping you safe doesn’t guarantee his own life.” Bitterness seeps into his voice. “He won’t even protect his closest friends. Not if it means he might miss his next promotion.”

“He wouldn’t have to protect me at all if you weren’t trying so hard to hurt me.”

Ian’s chest heaves, and his fists clench at his sides. “Someone has to pay. Justice requires sacrifice. Blood and pain to wash away the crime.” His voice rises. “Someone
has
to pay.”

“Someone will.” Drawing myself up straight, I ignore the dizziness in my head and step closer. Close enough to see the shine of starlight in his eyes. To see the cords of his neck stand out as he glares at me. “I’m not the one who needs Samuel’s protection. You’d better watch your back, every second of every day, because you have crimes to answer for, and I’m not going to stop coming for you until you pay for them with your life.”

“You can’t kill me.” He sounds insulted.

I smile. “We both know I can.”

“Samuel and Heidi would punish you in ways you’ve never dreamed.”

My smile grows. “No, they wouldn’t. I have to arrive in Rowansmark alive and well or they’ll pay the consequence for their failure. You, on the other hand, never have to arrive at all.” I turn my back on him and walk away.