The Gauntlet (The Cage 3)

She let go of him, stepping back out of his arms. He didn’t stop dancing as his face returned to a static mask of normalcy. With a mixture of apprehension and distrust, she watched him dance away, then slid into the arms of the second one.

He smiled down at her in an identical way as the last one.

“Cora,” he said tenderly.

She wanted to trust that loving look in his eyes, but she didn’t let herself be influenced. “Tell me about the necklace you first gave me,” she repeated.

“It was a charm of a dog,” he answered on cue. “To help you sleep at night.”

She let go of this one too, stepping back into the center of the room. Different wording, but the same answer. If she asked the other four, she’d doubtless get the same response.

A heavy jolt shook the room. She tossed a look up at the chandelier, whose crystals all trembled wildly. A sound rumbled beneath the music, like twisting metal. Something was happening just outside this chamber. Something was tearing it apart, either the storm or the Axion.

She ran to the third Cassian, wasting no time. She rested her hand on his left arm as they danced and squeezed the place on his biceps where he was wounded, hard. But the dancing Cassian didn’t flinch. She let go of him and ran to the fourth, squeezing his arm, and he didn’t react either. She ran to the fifth, but he too showed no reaction when she squeezed his arm.

She watched the last one, the sixth. If this one flinched, then it was the real Cassian. She moved into his arms, meeting his eyes. There was warmth there. Every inch of him was identical to the Cassian she knew. She moved her hand slowly down his biceps.

Squeezed.

He didn’t flinch. He smiled at her as blandly as the others had.

She cursed and pushed him away, but he returned seamlessly to the dance. She raked her nails through her hair, pacing. Think, think . . . If she couldn’t tell them apart by their wounded arm, and she couldn’t tell by asking them questions, how was she supposed to figure out which one was him?

That’s the point, she reminded herself. It isn’t about deduction. It’s about being psychic.

The room shook again and she balled her fists, pacing in the opposite direction from the dancers. They passed her in flashes, each one giving her an identical smile. Bile rose in her stomach. Solving the puzzle was impossible if she couldn’t use her mind.

But . . .

She stopped pacing abruptly.

Maybe she could use her heart.

The idea took hold of her. The Kindred thought that perceptive abilities were about training one’s mind to perform feats of telepathy and telekinesis, but intuition was perceptive too. Cora had always been especially intuitive, which was one of the reasons Cassian had first picked her. In those moments when she’d felt true intuition—like the time she knew Lucky was lying to her—she had felt it not in her mind, but in her heart.

Maybe humans were different from Kindred and the other intelligent species. Maybe this was one of her race’s unique gifts: that they could be perceptive using their feelings, not just their thoughts.

She watched the dancing Cassians with renewed attention. Studying each one not with her mind, but with her heart. Instead of looking for any visual differences or trying to make them guess riddles, she just observed. Just felt.

She let her heart guide her—feeling her heartbeats in her core, waiting for some sign, some skipped pulse, some flood of warmth, that would lead her to the right one.

The music faltered again. For a few terrifying seconds, she heard the squeal of something metal close by being ripped apart. The floor beneath her started to rumble.

She looked among the Cassians quickly.

She had to pick one—now.

40

Leon

“QUICK,” MALI SAID TO Leon. “Hand me that electrical cord.”

Leon squinted in the direction she pointed. Almost all the lights in the central vestibule had shattered, casting everything in semidarkness. He found the black wire she was talking about a few feet away, flopping like a snake on the metal floor, shooting out sparks.

“Leon, hurry!”

They were hidden away deep in the corner of the Gauntlet’s smallest control compartments, one of the few rooms that hadn’t yet been destroyed. The Axion who had assumed Anya’s identity lay on the floor beside Mali, still wearing Anya’s clothes. His hands were bound with wire. His sharp eyes threw hateful glares between Mali and Leon. Gray blood oozed from cuts Mali had made on his arms.

“It’s sparking,” Leon said, eyeing the wire as though it would bite.

“Well, use something else to pick it up.” Mali glanced impatiently toward the door. The sound of fighting continued in the central vestibule, though it had shrunk to just a few yells and clanks of metal. The Axion had all but won. When they did—any moment now—they’d come looking for any hidden survivors, like Leon and Mali, and the prisoner they were currently preparing to torture.

“Bloody hell,” he muttered, and snatched up a ripped piece of jumpsuit from a dead Mosca and used it to grab hold of the wire. He held it at arm’s length, grimacing, and passed it off to Mali.

“Tell us where Anya is,” Mali threatened the Axion. “Or we go from the knife to the wire.”

The Axion narrowed his eyes. “Even if I told you, you would never be able to reach her. You know as well as I do what is happening beyond that door. That is the sound of my people defeating yours. You’ll be taken prisoner if you’re fortunate, killed if you aren’t. There will be no rescue for your friend.”

A crash of thunder rumbled through the room, shaking the walls. Something cracked in the ceiling, and Leon tossed his head up just as a flood of frigid rainwater burst through the ceiling tiles and drenched him.

“Bloody hell!” he yelled.

“Shh,” Mali hissed, jerking her head toward the door. “They can’t know we’re in here. Make sure no one’s coming.”

Ice water dripped down the back of Leon’s neck. He gritted his teeth against the cold, wiping water from his eyes and off his clothes. He went to the door, keeping watch.

Behind him, Mali kept threatening the Axion. “You haven’t won yet. This battle goes beyond that vestibule out there. Cora’s still running the Gauntlet. There’s still hope.” She held up the wire. “Hope for us, that is. Not much for you unless you start talking.” She lowered the wire to the side of his head. The closer she held the wire, the more the gray veins in the Axion’s face stood out, as though drawn to the electricity.

Leon grimaced, watching. Mali could be a holy terror. And he loved it.

“Tell me where Anya is,” Mali said. ?

?Now.”

Leon looked through the doorway, checking to see if the coast was clear. Three Axion were fighting with Serassi by the dais. The rest of the Axion were capturing wounded prisoners—a few Kindred soldiers, a tall Gatherer with silver blood trickling down her arm, Mosca with broken shielding, leading them to a back room. One of the Axion slammed a fist into Serassi’s chest, hard. Leon flinched. It sounded as though something had cracked.

Leon muttered a curse and turned back to Mali. “Screw it. You’re doing a good job, sweetheart, but we don’t have time for this.” He grabbed the wire from her hand and shoved it straight into the Axion’s face.

The Axion started screaming.

“Leon!” Mali warned. “Keep him quiet!”

“Too late for that,” Leon said, jerking his head toward the fight outside. “They’ve nearly won out there.” He shoved the wire into the Axion’s gaunt cheek. “Tell us!”

“Leon . . . ,” Mali warned, looking toward the door. He could just make out the sound of heavy boots headed their way. The Axion’s screams had given them away. He shoved the wire harder against the man’s face, his heart thudding in his chest. This had to work. He had to do this, for Mali. . . .

“Theta!” the Axion screamed.

Leon dropped the wire. At the same time, dozens of Axion grabbed him, pulling him backward. They’d gotten Mali, too.

“Let her go!” Leon went irate at the sight of their hands on her. He tried to fight off the ones holding him, but Mali shook her head.

“Don’t. There are too many. It’s over.”

The Axion soldiers pulled them into wreckage of the central vestibule. Leon’s stomach clenched at the sight of so many dead bodies. Many he didn’t recognize except for their clothes, Kindred and Mosca and Gatherers who had been loyal to them. And then there was Ironmage, dead in the puddle of electrified water. And the scraps of shielding that were all that remained of Bonebreak.