Smoke and Mirrors (44)

Forty-Four

Lock and Key

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Over the next few days, I was shown books, photos, and even videos—using fairy technology—of exactly why I needed to join the ‘cause’.

I had always been pretty good at memorizing lessons taught in school. That didn’t mean I understood them or thought them right, but I could pass a test. Those same skills allowed me to memorize this stuff pretty well. According to them, before this group existed, the world lived in chaos. Kids were born with seven or eight Talents, but sometimes people could have eighteen or twenty Talents. However, this often meant a villain with impure intentions could rise up and force others to bend to their will. They were too powerful for anyone else to stop.

The group formed as a solution. If they could slowly strip away Talent from people, generation by generation, eventually they would be the only ones with power. They would be the people’s protectors.

At least, that’s what they claimed.

The problem I saw with this was that, instead of allowing the people to grow stronger and protect themselves, they were creating an environment where the people could be easily endangered. An environment where only a select few had Talent and everyone else was forced to serve and slave for them, and pray they were there to protect the victims.

History was such a strange, tangled thing.

But I like to think I played my part well. I watched every video with intrigue—mostly over the fact that they even had videos, and how different the styles of filming were from the Outside. I asked plenty of questions and talked to plenty of members about why they joined and what branch I would be best at working in.

Through all of that, I couldn’t forget about Adrian. In fact, my desire to free him only grew. Controlling Seraphina would play a very big part in controlling the people. She was already being called the Rebel Queen by her own people for daring to defy the warnings of kingdoms around her, but what others didn’t know was that she also defied them at the expense of her own son.

I wasn’t sure if she was stupid, or incredibly brave.

I took a break between studying to go to the bathroom.

Except, instead of just going to the bathroom, I went specifically to the one the guards accompanied Adrian to every day. I withdrew the bag of tools from around my leg. On the outside of the bathroom stall, I hurriedly began installing a latch and lock that could quickly be snapped shut.

Then I hid my bag of tools under my dress and returned to my studying.

***

The next morning, I completed the next step of the plan.

Before anyone else was awake, I hurried through the hidden tunnels of the wall and found myself in the hall just outside of where the prisoners were. From there, I hurried down the hall and found the door into the prison.

It looked similar to normal prison cells back on the Outside. There were rows after row of cages, guarded by bars. However, unlike prisons I’d seen on the Outside, wires snaked ominously around the bars. Did these guys have the technology to create electrified bars? I hoped not.

Before locating Adrian, I slipped inside an empty cell and hid under the bed. It was a narrow squeeze, and I felt the wood board above pressing into my shoulder blades, but I managed it.

I looked at my watch. I had twenty minutes before the guards appeared for Adrian.

I waited, mulling the plan over in my head as if I was watching a familiar movie.

Suddenly, I heard the doors squeal and heavy boots began clicking across the floor. The guards were here.

It was time for the next part of the plan.

I waited for the sound of Adrian’s prison cell opening, then dared to look up over my arm, which was folded under my chin, braced against the cold tile.

For a moment, all I heard was quiet talking. My heart began to race. Was I too late? What if I had failed and Adrian was already dead? What would happen then? What would Seraphina do if she found out they killed her son?

But no, a moment later I heard the guard’s boots continue clicking, followed by a tired, muffled groan.

Adrian.

My breath caught as relief flooded me. He was still alive, and he had to be in good enough condition to walk.

I gave them a few seconds to disappear from my sight, then slowly slid out from beneath the bed and followed.

They rounded the corner outside the hall where the bathroom was. I heard the chains rattle as the guards removed Adrian’s cuffs.

Then I ran forward. I felt power pulse through my veins. I could feel it surge inside my heart like a river. Water began seeping out of my hands, then all at once began to gush, knocking the guards inside the cell and coming just short of pushing Adrian down, who stared at me in shock.

I snapped the lock shut on the door, trapping the guards inside. Chest heaving, I turned to Adrian. “We’re getting out of here.” My voice was hushed for some reason. If anyone paid any kind of attention to this area, they would have heard the flood of water pelting the walls, but whatever. I guess one’s thoughts aren’t always the most intelligent under pressure.

I grabbed Adrian’s hand, then stopped when he hissed. His wrists were covered in dry blood and scars marred his arms and face. He tried to mask his expression of pain with a grin. “Hey, fire squid.”

My eyes watered with the use of my nickname. I grimaced and tried to steel myself against the anger that was welling inside me. “Hurry, this way,” I said.

He nodded and we hurried across the floor, which was layered in a blanket of water. He stumbled a couple of times, and his breathing seemed as if it were clawing its way out of his lungs.

“I can’t—I can’t keep up,” he panted from behind me.

I turned to see him leaning against the wall for support. One of the wounds in his arm was open and bleeding.

Panic filled my stomach. “I know you hate water, but if I can flood the hallway I can get us out quicker. You won’t even have to walk.”

He grimaced, but nodded. “Do what you have to.”

I steadied myself, knowing full well that the task I was about to undertake would be huge.

I sucked in a breath and water began to emerge from the walls, the floors, the ceiling, my skin, until the hallway was filled with it. It was choking my lungs, pouring into my stomach. Adrian sucked in a breath just as his face was about to submerge, but I forced the water away from his body, creating a bubble. I made a second one for myself, and in an instant, we were shooting down the hall.

The sensation of swimming through a hallway was already strange enough, but shattering my consciousness a thousand times and fragmenting it enough to fit into every stray droplet of water was worse. It was chaotic and wild and I did not enjoy the feeling.

My mind felt as if it was being tugged in a thousand directions. At one point, it almost looked like my skin was water.

The extra water helped me sense the doorframe just ahead of us, leading into the hall where the exit was. I had the feeling of touching everything and yet nothing at once. This was taking sensory overload to a whole new level.

The water was cold and piercing at first, but there were a few moments where I didn’t even feel it anymore. It was as if I and the water were the same thing, instead of two separate things.

We spilled into the hallway and raced towards the exit. Seraphina should have been just outside the hideout, in the forest.

I felt myself struggling to stay together. Every part of me wanted to follow every droplet of water. It was like watching a school of minnows and being unable to keep an eye on a single fish for more than a minute.

I struggled to remember to breathe.

The exit loomed just ahead of us. Just ahead. So close.

I shot off one last pulse to push us outside, then we disappeared from the hideout, likely destroying most of the rooms as we left. I hoped we did; they deserved it.

The moment we made it outside, I collapsed. I felt the fire within me raging to be let out. I was thirsty and dehydrated, but I allowed it to blanket me in flames, then dissipate all at once.

Adrian stumbled just beside me as the water receded back into my body. I thought I heard him say something, but I couldn't tell over the ringing in my ears. My head felt as if it was full of thick clouds.

From the corner of my eye I saw Seraphina emerge, holding a ball of sparkling flame which she launched at something behind me. I was too weak to see what the object was.

Adrian tried to pull at my arms, but he was so weak that he barely moved me.

One of the masked figures emerge from the tunnel. Part of the mask was torn, revealing a face that I knew well.

Shi.

The very same Shi that my mother had tried to convince me to marry.

He grimaced when he saw me and it was then that I noticed he was aiming a dagger at Seraphina.

Panic set in. She was one of the only rulers who knew about my mother’s group and openly defied it. If she died, there wouldn’t be anyone left who could stop them.

I gathered my last bit of strength, but it felt like trying to hold a fistfull of sand. I could feel it slipping with every movement.

In an instant, I was launching myself at Shi.

And in that same instant, I caught the dagger in my chest.