Phoenix (23 page)

I release my hands from my mouth and exhale. My whole body is shaking.

Elijah helps me up, and we quickly climb over the rooftop just as the digital screens
across the city blink on. Purian Rose’s face appears on the monitors.

The city falls silent.

“Citizens of Thrace, by now you will have noticed my Destroyer Ships above your city,”
he says. This is all starting to sound scarily familiar. “It has come to our attention
that the Dacian residents of your city recently voted against Rose’s Law. In accordance
with the new addendum to the law, this now classifies them as race traitors, and they
have been marked for segregation.”

Elijah gives me a worried look.

“You have precisely seventy-two hours to hand over all your Dacians to my men, or
you will be severely punished,” Purian Rose says. “If you have any doubt about my
sincerity, I have left a message for you in Spice Square. Good evening.”

The image cuts to a live feed from Spice Square. Kneeling in the center of the plaza
are six Pilgrims, all wearing the white robes of the Purity faith. They recite from
the Book of Creation as several Sentry guards—Sebastian included—walk around them,
splashing gasoline over the Pilgrims’ clothes. “What’s going on?” I say, dread slowly
creeping through me. “They’re Pilgrims, not Dacians. What could they have possibly
done wrong?”

“Nothing,” Elijah says darkly. “That’s the point. If Purian Rose can do this to his
most devoted followers, imagine what he’ll do to the people of Thrace if they disobey
him and don’t turn over the Dacians?”

The guards move away, and Sebastian picks up a flaming torch and tosses it at the
Pilgrims. They’re instantly engulfed in flames, but not one of them screams—only words
of praise for Purian Rose fly from their lips.

Rose is sending us a message, all right: if this is what he’ll do to his most devout
followers, imagine what he’ll do to the people of Thrace if they disobey him.

ASH

THE HOUSE
is in an uproar around me as Lucas and the children run about, gathering their clothes
and toys in readiness to escape. I help Giselle drag a bookshelf in front of the door
while Madame Clara bolts the window shutters. We saw Purian Rose’s message thirty
minutes ago, and already a few men have gathered outside the house, trying to break
in. I don’t think they know I’m here; otherwise there would be a full-on lynch mob.

I snatch a look at the grandfather clock. It’s past eleven o’clock. “Did Natalie give
you any indication when she’d be back?” I ask Giselle.

She shakes her head as she drags a few chairs in front of the bookcase to create a
blockade.

I touch a hand to my chest and feel the steady thrum of my heart under my fingertips.
Natalie is alive. That much I know. If she weren’t, my heart would’ve stopped beating.
As soon as Madame Clara’s kids are safe, I’m going to find Natalie. Then . . . I don’t
know what. One thing at a time.

There’s another loud thud against the front door.

“Go to hell!” Giselle screams at the men on the other side. “They’re just kids!”

“Where will we go?” I say to Madame Clara as I pile more chairs in front of the door.

“The Rainbow Forest on the outskirts of the city,” she replies. “We can take refuge
with Neptune.”

“Who’s Neptune?” I ask.

“The leader of our people,” Giselle replies. “He’s got a commune up in the forest.
They keep moving around, so it’s hard for people to track them down unless you know
what to look for.”

It sounds like our best shot at getting the kids to safety. I check the clock again.
Where are you, Natalie?
I rush over to the window and pull the curtain aside. On the digital screen on the
street opposite us, the countdown clock has already started ticking down: 71:28:14,
71:28:13, 71:28:12 . . .

I drop the curtain as a platoon of Sentry guards marches down the street. They’ve
been arriving in their Transporters for the past thirty minutes, setting up roadblocks
to stop people from escaping. I don’t know how we’re going to get out of here.

There’s a sudden thud on the roof, quickly followed by a second thump.

I bound up the stairs, Giselle following, and race into my bedroom. Standing on the
balcony are Natalie and Elijah. Relief crashes over me as I yank open the doors and
pull Natalie into my arms. She’s clearly exhausted, barely able to catch her breath.
She smells of Shine, and so does Elijah—I can smell him from here. So that’s what
they’ve been doing? If it were any other time, I’d be furious at Natalie for being
so thoughtless, but I’m so glad she’s safe, it’s hard to be mad. I hold her tight.

Elijah flops down on the mattress and runs a hand over his face. “That was close.”

“What happened?” Giselle says.

“Garrick and Sasha,” Natalie replies. “But we managed to lose them. I’m sorry, Ash.
Sebastian will know we’re here now.”

“Well, you and me,” Elijah corrects her. “They think Ash is dead, remember?”

There’s more banging on the front door, downstairs.

“It’s okay. We need to go,” I say. “We’re heading into the forest.”

Natalie struggles to her feet. “Okay. Let’s go.”

I collect my duffel bag while Natalie stuffs a few dresses into her bag. When we get
downstairs, Madame Clara is already waiting for us in the hallway with Lucas and the
other kids. They all look terrified.

There’s a series of loud thumps as the men outside hammer against the door. The wooden
frame starts to splinter.

“Come out here, you Dacian scum!” one of the men shouts from the other side.

The door begins to buckle. They’ll be inside at any minute.

“How are we going to get away?” Natalie asks.

“Through the service tunnels,” Madame Clara says.

She ushers us all into the kitchen and shoves the heavy oak table to one side. Underneath
is an oval rug. Giselle kicks it to one side, exposing a wooden trapdoor. She lifts
the lid to reveal a flight of rickety steps, which leads into a dark basement.

Giselle picks up the lantern from the countertop and then helps the blind old lady
down the stairs. The children go next, followed by Natalie and Elijah. I drag the
kitchen table back into its original position, then duck under the table and climb
through the trapdoor, shutting it behind me. The basement is musty and is stacked
with crates and forgotten furniture. Elijah helps Giselle lift a few crates of spiced
Shine to one side, revealing an old metal door. It creaks as she pulls it open, causing
flakes of rust to fall to the floor. On the other side of the door is a redbrick tunnel,
about seven feet high and four feet wide. It leads into a black abyss.

She enters the tunnel, followed by Lucas and the other children.

Madame Clara grips the strap of my bag for guidance as the rest of us head into the
tunnel after them. Just before Elijah slams the metal door behind us, I hear the front
door burst open upstairs.

The passageway is pitch-black, except for the light coming from Giselle’s lantern.
The air around us is damp and cool, and the ground is covered in dirty rainwater,
which has seeped through the crumbling mortar. The children all link hands as they
follow Giselle. Madame Clara walks behind me, while Natalie and Elijah bring up the
rear.

For over a mile, we walk in complete silence, other than the sound of our feet splashing
through the puddles in a rhythmic beat. I listen out for other footsteps, but no one
appears to be following us. That doesn’t mean we’re safe, though. Who knows what else
is down here? I think about the Wrath Hounds and shudder.

A truck rumbles by on the road overhead, and brick dust falls into my hair. I shake
my head to get it out.

“Where do all these tunnels go?” I ask Madame Clara.

“Most lead to the ports,” she says. “The merchants originally used the passages to
bring black market goods into the city. But they’ve been abandoned for a long time
because they’re not safe.”

Another truck rolls by overhead, shaking loose a chunk of mortar, which splashes into
the water in front of me.
No kidding.

Giselle takes a number of turns, and I soon lose track of where we’re going as we
head deeper into the tunnel network. A person could easily get lost in here. It’s
eerily quiet, a stark contrast to the world above us. The city is in pandemonium.
People are running; there’s screaming and the occasional pop of gunfire. It’s like
the siege on Black City all over again.

I glance over my shoulder at Natalie to make sure she’s okay. She looks utterly exhausted,
her feet dragging through the puddles, her skin glistening with sweat despite the
cool air. I worry she’s coming down with something, but then remember she’s been drinking
all night, not to mention running from Garrick. No wonder she’s tired. She’s leaning
heavily against Elijah, who’s got his arm looped around her waist. My fangs throb.
He notices me looking and drops his arm.

Giselle turns down a tunnel to our right. This one is much smaller and is on a slight
incline; I have to stoop to prevent my head from hitting the arched ceiling. We follow
this passageway for a few hundred yards. The farther we go, the quieter the city above
us becomes, until eventually, there’s complete silence. We reach a flight of stairs
and exit through an abandoned service hut, which leads into the Rainbow Forest.

Even in the moonlight, it’s immediately apparent how the woodland earned its name.
The forest is densely populated with eucalyptus trees, whose bark is a patchwork of
bright colors: lime green, sunset orange, purple amethyst, sea blue, maroon. Scattered
between them are a few sap-green conifers and Carrow trees, with their famous star-shaped
amber leaves.

I turn around to get a better look at the city below us. We’re on a hill, so from
this vantage point, I can see across most of Thrace. Thousands of people run through
the streets as a steady stream of Transporters brings more troops down to secure the
city. Every few seconds there’s the rat-a-tat-tat of machine gun fire. It’s utter
bedlam, and somewhere in the middle of it all is the Moon Star. A crushing weight
presses down on my shoulders, knowing the mission’s over. There’s nothing for us to
do now but get the hell out of Thrace.

ASH

WE WALK DEEPER
into the forest, putting Thrace as far behind us as possible. Natalie glances at
me, her expression reflecting my own disappointment. How can we possibly bring down
Purian Rose, when we’re so outnumbered and outgunned? Elijah walks next to her, his
head bowed, no doubt thinking about his mom. Natalie places a consoling hand on his
arm. It’s such an innocent touch, and yet it rips my heart in two.

“Why is Rose doing this to us?” Giselle says beside me.

“I don’t know,” I say, tearing my eyes away from Natalie and Elijah. “I think he’s
afraid of anything that’s not like him.”

“So his solution is to kill us all?” Giselle says. “What could have frightened him
so much that he has to resort to
this
?” She gestures toward the Destroyer Ships in the night sky.

“I have no idea,” I reply. “It’s impossible to understand what goes on in his mind.”

“I won’t let them take Lucas or any of the children to the Tenth,” Giselle says. “I’d
rather slit their throats than allow them to be sold as slaves or gassed like vermin.”

The violence of her thoughts knocks me back. Giselle stops and turns to me, her gray
eyes blazing.

“I want to start my own rebellion here in Thrace,” she says. “Will you help me?”

I consider her proposal. I may have failed to locate the Ora, but I can still help
the rebellion. I have to do
something.
What’s the point of being Phoenix if I don’t stand up to the Sentry and fight?

“All right,” I say. “I’m in.”

We continue our hike through the forest for the next hour. Giselle and I chat quietly
about our plans to start an uprising, while Natalie and Elijah hang toward the back
of the group, deep in their own private conversation.

I start to understand what Madame Clara meant about no one finding us in the forest.
It seems to go on for eternity, and all the pathways look the same. You could easily
lose your way. Giselle stops at one of the trees and traces her fingers down the colorful
bark, finding a small circle carved into the wood.

“They’re at the Circle Glade,” she says.

Giselle leads us up a steep incline, and my muscles groan with the effort. I don’t
know how Madame Clara’s managing it. I peer over my shoulder at the old lady, who
is holding hands with Lucas and chuckling at one of his jokes. The other children
race around her, their fear gone now that we’re in the woods.

“What happened to her eyes?” I ask Giselle.

“Neptune cut them out.”

I stop dead in my tracks. “
What?
Why?”

“Madame Clara fell in love with a woman, and Neptune didn’t take it well,” Giselle
says.

“Fragging hell,” I mutter, wondering if it’s the best idea to seek refuge with this
violent man.

“I don’t want you to think badly of our people because of what he did,” she adds quickly.
“We’re not all like Neptune, and this
was
thirty years ago. Attitudes have changed.”

We mercifully reach the top of the hill. Up here the forest flattens out, but the
vegetation is denser, making progress slow-going. Wild animals call out to each other
in the dark as we trudge through the bracken.

“How many Dacians live with Neptune?” I ask.

“Only a few hundred,” Giselle says. “Everyone else lives in the city, because that’s
where the work is. But representatives from each of the five clans have stayed with
him.”

“Which clan do you belong to?” I ask.

“Lambert, technically,” Giselle says. “But I just think of myself as Clara’s kid.”
We carry on trekking through the woodland.

“So, are your parents . . . um . . .” I don’t know how to put this delicately.

“Dead?” she asks. “Yeah.”

“How come your other family didn’t take you in after they died?”

“They didn’t want me,” she says. “My dad was a Dacian, but my mom wasn’t, and neither
family approved of the match, so I was shunned. There wasn’t anywhere for me to go,
so I was on the streets for a while, until I met Clara.”

“It sounds tough.”

“I can handle myself,” she says, subconsciously touching the bruise on her cheek,
where the guard hit her. “Ah! Here we are.”

We step into a large, circular clearing in the heart of the forest. Parked around
the outer edges of the glade are dozens of traditional Dacian caravans, painted in
reds, golds and greens, while directly to our right are five large tents. In the center
of the glade is a fire pit filled with glowing red embers. A metal sheet is suspended
a few feet over it, to prevent the fire from being visible from above at night.

Congregated around the fire pit are over a hundred Dacian men and women. A few of
the people have bags by their feet, and I’m assuming they came from the city looking
for refuge. They’re in the middle of a heated discussion.

Sitting at the far end of the fire pit, listening to everyone argue, are five men
and two women. One of the women looks similar to Giselle, with flowing auburn hair
and gray eyes, except she’s considerably older.

Giselle notices me looking. “That’s Pandora Lambert. She’s one of the five clan elders.
The blond woman next to her is Miranda Hicks.”

Miranda is in her midforties and painfully gaunt, with heavy Cinderstone powder drawn
around her eyes.

“Who are the men?” I say.

“The guy in the glasses is Sol Becket, and beside him is Gilderoy Draper.” The latter
has wavy black hair and bright blue eyes, like Lucas. “The man in the middle is Neptune
Jack.”

Neptune’s in his midsixties, stocky, with swarthy skin and a thick gray beard that
matches his curly hair. Like Giselle, he has feathers and beads woven into his hair.
The way he holds himself, with a quiet, confident power, makes it clear he’s in charge.

Everyone stops talking as we approach him. Several of the men draw their daggers,
but Neptune signals for them to hold back as Giselle, Lucas and the other children
kneel before him, bowing so low, their noses touch the moist earth. Only Madame Clara
stays standing out of their group, her chin lifted defiantly.

“You have some nerve bringing your litter of runts here, Clara,” Neptune says.

“We seek refuge,” she says. “Will you accept us, brother?”

Brother?
I look at Neptune and realize there are similarities in their faces—they have the
same wide nose, broad cheekbones and dark complexion, although Madame Clara’s face
is covered in tattoos and slightly disfigured from the scars over her eye sockets.

Neptune scratches his beard as he ponders her request. His gaze lingers on Elijah
and Natalie before fixing on me. He sits up straighter.

“We’d heard you were dead,” he says.

“Yeah, I heard that too,” I reply. “But here I am, and I want to help.”

Giselle lifts her head slightly, her auburn hair fanning around her shoulders. “We
intend to stage an uprising in Thrace.”

Natalie gives me a questioning look.

“When were you going to tell me about this?” she says under her breath.

“I’m telling you now,” I reply.

Neptune stands up and waves his hand. “Follow me.”

Giselle gets up and joins me, Natalie and Elijah as we follow him and the clan elders
into a large tent while Madame Clara stays outside with the children. Inside, the
tent has been draped with deep red and purple fabrics. In the middle of the tent is
a fire pit with a circular bench covered in silken cushions surrounding it. Neptune
gestures for everyone to take a seat on the bench while he sparks up a pipe.

“So you want to take on Rose, eh?” Neptune says.

“They’ve already started rounding us up,” Giselle says. “It’s only a matter of time
before we’re all captured and taken to the Tenth.”

I explain what the Tenth is, and Neptune’s eyes darken with fury. The other clan elders
pass angry looks between each other, equally outraged as their leader.

“How can we help?” he says.

I tell him the plan Giselle and I formulated while we were walking through the forest.

“What about the Destroyer Ships?” the red-haired woman, Pandora, says.

“We’ll have to infiltrate them,” I say.

“Once our people are inside, they can rescue the prisoners, then set bombs throughout
the ships and take the Transporters out of there,” Giselle adds.

“I’ve been on a Destroyer Ship,” Natalie says. “There’s not much security on them,
beyond the hangar. It can work.”

I give her a grateful smile, thankful she’s on board.

“The Sentry could just send in more reinforcements via the roads,” the gaunt woman,
Miranda, says.

“Then we’ll blow them up too,” Gilderoy Draper replies.

“I don’t think Purian Rose will send any reinforcements. He can’t spare the men after
the massacre at Iridium,” I say, referring to the battle that killed Nick and possibly
Juno. “The fact that he’s sent only five Destroyer Ships here confirms that—in Black
City there were a dozen.”

“Plus Thrace isn’t of military importance,” Natalie chimes in. “He can’t risk exposing
his strategically important targets.”

“We’ll have to take control of the news station,” the man in the glasses, Sol Becket,
says.

“My cousin works there,” Pandora says. “He’ll get me in.”

Neptune sucks on his pipe, considering. He gazes at the other clan elders, and they
each nod in turn.

“It’s madness, but it might just work,” he finally says. “We’ll begin preparations
at dawn.”