April obeyed, her hands shaking. As the bracelet dropped to the floor, she was able to see the call was from Khall.
Too late, Khall. You’re too late. I’m so sorry.
“Very nice,” D’agryx said. “Now let’s get moving.”
“April is afraid of heights,” Minerva said quietly.
“Is that so?” D’agryx asked conversationally. “Well, if she doesn’t get out there quick enough, I’m going to cut off one of her fingers. That should give her something else to focus on. She can still dance with nine fingers, right?”
“April,” Bo yelled in a scared voice, tears streaming down her pale green cheeks.
“He’s only teasing,” April said, trying to get herself to walk toward the glass doors. “Besides, I’m going.”
But her feet wouldn’t obey.
“Please move, April,” Minerva whispered desperately. “I know you don’t like heights, but you have to do this.”
“April,” Bo sobbed. “You have to try something seven times to be sure you don’t like it. You said so. You said.”
And just like that, her feet were moving.
She slid the door open, and wind blasted in, swirling her hair around her head. An airship hovered outside, its deck just below the level balcony. Two of D’agryx’s lackeys manned the controls.
April inched her way onto the concrete, trying not to notice the way the buildings seemed to both stretch and shrink as they disappeared far, far below.
“Good job,” Bo commended her.
But April couldn’t reply as the wind grabbed at her, tugging her toward the balcony railing.
“That’s it,” D’agryx shouted. “Jump down into the ship.”
Her legs almost went out from under her at the suggestion.
She sensed movement in her periphery and saw Minerva was sliding the rail sensor.
Before her horrified eyes, the railing slid sideways, leaving nothing between them and a sheer drop to the moving walkways a hundred stories below.
“The ship is right there, April,” Minerva murmured. “All we have to do is jump.”
She forced her eyes to the gondola of the ship. It was just below them, but it wasn’t properly docked. Which meant that they would have to jump across a big gap of nothing to get to it - a gap just big enough to let a body slide through, and then down, down, down…
The wind whipped her air into her eyes as the fruit ice she had eaten threatened to come back up again. That wouldn’t be a pleasant surprise for anyone walking down there.
“I need movement, or you’ll be jumping with one less finger,” D’agryx yelled.
Two warm hands wrapped around hers.
April came to her senses as she looked down at the girls, standing tall on either side of her.
“I can do this,” she said calmly.
“Me first,” Minerva said, letting go of April’s hand before she could stop the girl.
She watched as Minerva flung herself through the air.
Time seemed to move too slowly as she fell.
She landed in a crouch on the deck of the gondola, then looked up at April and grinned.