The Gauntlet (The Cage 3)

The room went silent. Ellis jerked Nok back and pulled back the frilly apron over her belly. For a second, whispers spread throughout the tent, the tension palpable.

Then Ellis shrugged. She flicked a finger, making the knife blades press closer against Nok’s temples. “That’s two into the fire, then.”

“Five hundred!” Bonebreak sputtered. “That’s as high as my credit goes! Check the system!”

Ellis glanced at Fian.

The Kindred only shrugged. “Go ahead and throw her into the fire, pregnant or not. That one means nothing to me.”

Ellis’s eyes narrowed. “You’re bluffing.”

Fian didn’t blink. “Burn her and see.”

“No!” Rolf cried. “Nok!”

He tried to climb up and over the corral bars, but a swarm of deputies aimed rifles at him. Cora’s heart was thrashing with panic. She grabbed the corral bars, knuckles going white. This couldn’t be happening.

Think!

Ellis gave Nok a solid push toward the flames.

“No!” Cora yelled.

Time seemed to move more slowly. She forgot about the deputies. She forgot about the Kindred. She could only focus on her friend, falling forward, pitching toward flames.

No.

She threw out a hand, palm aimed toward the knives. She poured every ounce of her concentration into those knives. Wrapping them with her thoughts like a hand. Gripping them. Jerking them away from Nok so that Nok could twist safely to the side.

The knives clattered to the floor. One slid off the platform.

“Nok!” Cora yelled. “Roll!”

Nok tucked her chin and balled herself up as though preparing for a somersault. The quick movement threw Ellis off-balance. Nok twisted to the right, rolling backward and landing behind Ellis. She pushed to her feet. The sheriff spun away from the fire pit to face her.

Nok and Ellis both looked down at the remaining knife on the platform.

Quickly, Nok stepped on the blade. It rattled under her foot, trying to move telekinetically, but Nok threw her whole weight on it.

“Burn, you bitch!” she yelled, and shoved Ellis backward into the fire.

9

Leon

IN THE NEXT INSTANT, the tent plunged into full-on chaos.

The sheriff’s screams still echoed through the tent. Leon didn’t have to be a genius to see that Ellis would be dead in another second—the flames crackled impossibly hot in the dry alien atmosphere. Too bad she couldn’t levitate herself above the fire.

Her deputies stood in a stunned stupor, not used to making the slightest decision on their own. There was no designated second in command. Half the deputies, the tent guards who had kept him captive in the wives’ tents, immediately looked toward the mine guards, who in return seemed just as wary. He’d heard the grumblings. The two groups had no love for each other.

At the commotion, another dozen Kindred soldiers poured through the entrance.

“Oh, shit,” Leon said.

He glanced at Cora. She was just as slack-jawed as the deputies. He gave her a sharp nudge. “This is what you call a distraction, sweetheart!”

She immediately blinked out of her shock. “Right. Let’s move!” Together they scaled the corral fencing, and right behind them was Rolf, who ran to Nok on the platform, enveloping her in his arms.

“Over here, little childrens!” Bonebreak yelled, waving to them as he cowered behind Ellis’s big chair.

But Kindred soldiers were already headed in their direction. Anya scrambled up onto the platform, knitting her unsteady fingers in the air, and a handful of Ellis’s deputies started swaying at her command like puppets. They raised their rifles. Assumed battle stances. Charged Fian’s troops.

Leon braced himself.

The warring bodies collided in an explosion of sparking weaponry. Tent guards. Mine guards. Kindred soldiers. In the confusion, the Kindred fought back against both, but uncertainly—their war was with neither.

“Leave them!” Fian yelled. “It’s the girl we want!”

Two Kindred soldiers turned toward the corral like mechanical warriors. A thrill ran through Leon. Damn, but he loved a good fight. He started to draw back a fist, ready to smash it into their faces, but then paused. There was no telling how long the Kindred shuttle would be docked at the transport hub. And before it took off back to the Kindred station, he and Mali needed to be on it. He’d promised her that he’d help her rescue Cassian.

Where was Mali?

He scanned the tent until he found her in the very center of the fight. Of course she’d be in the thick of it—she loved a fight as much as he did. She kicked a Kindred in the kneecap with an audible crack. He grinned.

“Cora! This is where we say good-bye.” He jerked his head toward the fight. “Mali and me, we’ll meet you on Drogane after we’ve found Cassian.”

“Hang on,” Cora called. “I have to tell you something.” She jerked her head toward the corral fencing, which provided just enough shelter that they could speak in safety for a few moments. She pulled out Lucky’s journal from her pants waistband. “You might need weapons. And I know where a stash of kill-dart guns is on the station. Lucky wrote about it. The hostess gave them to Dane in case an animal ever got out of control. There are a few big ones and more handheld ones. They’re kept in a secret panel in the Hunt’s medical room. This is the symbol to use to open it.” She flipped through Lucky’s journal and showed him the emblem.

Leon patted her on the shoulder. “You’re full of surprises, sweetheart.”

Cora threw her arms around him. “Thanks for going after Cassian, Leon. I mean it. The sooner you can get him, the better. We only have twenty-two days until the Gauntlet starts.”

He hugged her back. “We’ll get him in time.”

Leon turned back toward the fight. It was such a tangle of bodies and flashes of armor that he didn’t see Mali at first. But then—there she was. Fighting off a female Kindred officer who must have weighed double Mali, but hell, that girl knew how to use her small size to her advantage. She was faster, lower to the ground. She managed to throw the Kindred off-balance and slam the woman’s head against a metal tray.

“Mali!” he called.

But two gloved hands suddenly grabbed him from behind. His muscles tensed on instinct, until he recognized Bonebreak’s shielding and relaxed.

“What gives?” Leon hissed. “Mali needs my help. How did you get over here so fast, anyway? I saw you just a second ago on the far side of the platform.” He sniffed the air. “And why do you not smell as bad as usual?”

“The girl will be fine,” Bonebreak answered, dismissing Leon’s worries with a wave. “You and I have unfinished business.”

“The money I owe you? Seriously? Now?”

“Forget the debt.” Bonebreak motioned for Leon to follow him into a corner of the tent, deep in the lee of the canvas curtains. “I overheard your plan to return to station 10-91 and free the Kindred Warden.”

Leon eyed him suspiciously. “Yeah, so?”

“I left a valuable provision pack on that station, in my old storage containers. If you were to use the tunnels to fetch me that pack, I would make it worth your while.”

Leon scoffed. “I don’t smuggle anymore. I’m a hero now, didn’t you hear?” The fight raging in the main part of the tent showed no signs of dying down. Cora and the others were arguing. Nok kept pointing to the platform emphatically. He thought he heard Cora yell something about a chimpanzee.

He started to push past Bonebreak, but Bonebreak clutched him with an iron grip. “Wait, boy. A hero, are you? The kind who would help a pretty girl, yes? Isn’t that what heroes do?” His gaze shifted to Mali.

Leon hesitated. “What are you saying?”

“I saw glimpses of what is in that girl’s mind. A family back home that she barely remembers and no way to get in touch with them. So sad. So tragic. But I have ways. Fetch me that pack, boy, and I will tell you how to find your girl’s family. She would be grateful to you. You’d be a real hero, yes.”

Leon gritted his teeth. He looked at Mali, who was now fighting off two Kindred at the same time.

“An easy job,” Bonebreak continued in a rush, preying on Leon’s indecision. “It will take you only a few minutes. Just grab the provision pack, that’s all I’m asking. Your girl does not even have to know about our arrangement.”

For a second, Mali looked his way and their eyes met. Blood was splattered on the side of her head, but it was dark. Not hers. She gave him a time to go look, jerking her head in the direction of the shuttle outside, before she punched one of the Kindred officers in the nose, sending more black blood spurting everywhere.