“He killed my grandparents,” she says. “He burned my home.”
“I completely sympathize with your desire to stab your family’s killer,” I say, glancing back toward my mother. “But trust me, nothing you could do would begin to compare to the torment he’ll face once the Commandant gets her hands on him. He was guarding me. He failed. My mother hates failure.”
Laia glares at the Mask for a second more before giving me a quick nod.
As we duck through the arches at the base of the belltower, I look over my shoulder. My stomach sinks. Helene is staring straight at me. Our eyes lock for a moment.
Then I turn and push open the doors to a classroom building. Students rush through the corridors, but they’re mostly Yearlings, and none of them look twice at us. The structure rumbles ominously.
“What the hell did you do to this place?”
“Set charges in sandbags all over the courtyard. And—and there might be some explosives in other places. Like the mess hall. And the amphitheater. And the Commandant’s house,” she says, quickly adding, “All empty.
Didn’t want to kill anyone, just create a distraction. Also...I’m sorry I held a knife to you.” She looks embarrassed. “I wanted to make sure you’d say yes.”
“Don’t be sorry.” I look around for the clearest exit, but most are flooded with students. “You’ll be holding a knife to more than one throat before this is all over. You’ll need to practice technique though. I could have disarmed you—”
“Elias?”
It’s Dex. Faris stands behind him open-mouthed, flummoxed at finding me alive, chain-free, and standing hand-in-hand with a Scholar girl. For a second, I think I’m going to have to fight them. But then Faris grabs Dex and uses sheer bulk to turn him around and shove him into the crowd, away from me. He looks over his shoulder once. I think I see him smile.
Laia and I burst from the building and skid down a grassy slope. I make for the doors of a training building, but she pulls me back.
“Another way.” Her chest heaves from the running. “That building—”
She grabs my arm as the ground beneath us shakes. The building shudders and collapses. Flames explode from its innards, sending plumes of black smoke into the sky.
“I hope there isn’t anyone inside,” I say.
“Not a soul.” Laia releases my arm. “Doors were barred ahead of time.”
“Who’s helping you?” She can’t have done all this alone. That red-haired fellow at the Moon Festival, perhaps? He had the look of a rebel.
“Never mind that!” We sprint around the remains of the training building, and Laia begins to lag. I pull her along mercilessly. We can’t slow down now. I don’t let myself think about how close I am to freedom, or how close I came to death. I think only about the next step, the next turn, the next move.
The Skulls’ barracks rise ahead of us, and we duck inside. I look back—no sign of Helene. “In.” I push open the door to my room and lock it behind us.
“Pull up the center hearthstone,” I say to Laia. “The entrance is beneath. I just have to grab a few things.”
I don’t have time for full armor, but I buckle on my chest plate and bracers. Then I find a cloak and strap on my knives. My Teluman blades are long gone, abandoned on the dais of the amphitheater yesterday. I feel a pang of loss. The Commandant has probably claimed them by now.
From my bureau, I pull out the wooden token given to me by Afya Ara-Nur. It marks a favor owed, and Laia and I will need all the favors we can get in the days to come. As I pocket it, someone pounds on the door.
“Elias.” Helene’s voice is pitched low. “I know you’re in there. Open up. I’m alone.”
I stare at the door. She swore fealty to Marcus. She nearly took my head off minutes ago. And from how quickly she caught up to us, it’s clear she came after me like a hound after a fox. Why? Why do I matter so little to her, after everything we’ve been through?
Laia’s gotten the hearthstone up. She looks between me and the door.
“Don’t open it.” She sees my indecision. “You didn’t see her before your execution, Elias. She was calm. Like...like she wanted to do it.”
“I have to ask her why.” I know when I say the words that this will be the life or death of me, what happens now. “She’s my oldest friend. I have to understand.”
“Open up,” Helene bangs on the door again. “In the name of the Emperor—”
“The Emperor?” I yank open the door, dagger in hand. “You mean the lowborn, murdering rapist whose been trying to kill us for weeks?”
“That’s the one,” Helene says. She slips under my arm, her scims still in their sheaths, and hands me, to my astonishment, the Teluman blades.
“You know, you sound just like your grandfather. Even when I was smuggling him out of the damn city, all he could talk about was the fact that Marcus was a Plebeian.”
She smuggled Grandfather out of the city? “Where is he now? How did you get these?” I hold up the scims.
“Someone left them in my room last night. An Augur, I assume. As for your grandfather, he’s safe. Probably making some innkeeper’s life hell even as we speak. He wanted to lead an attack on Blackcliff to set you free, but I convinced him to lay low for a while. He’s clever enough to keep a rein on Gens Veturia, even while in hiding. Forget about him, and listen. I need to explain—”