The Gauntlet (The Cage 3)

The fireball erupted instantaneously. It happened so fast he didn’t even have time to fully take shelter in the alcove. Flames swept over the right side of his body, charring his skin. He let out a hiss of pain. Mali cried out in surprise from the next alcove down, and suddenly his worry for himself was gone. He clutched his burned arm, but his thoughts were on her. As soon as the flames subsided, he crawled into the tunnel, wincing at his burned, crackling skin. “Mali! Are you okay?”

Mali spilled into the tunnel too.

His eyes were already searching her for any burns, any bruises. But she was so small that she had managed to tuck her whole body into the shelter of the alcove. Except for a singed hem of her pants, she was unharmed.

Her eyes went to the cleaner trap, to the burned shoe, to his charred skin. “That was a stupid thing to do!”

“I think you mean brave.”

She sighed. “Stupid and brave.”

He grinned, then winced. Damn, his face hurt.

She moved aside to allow him room, and, together, they pressed against the panel. Sure enough, the fire had melted the sealant, and the panel crashed into Cassian’s cell. Leon cringed at the noise.

“Think someone heard that?” he asked.

“Of course they heard it. We must be fast.”

Mali dropped down into the darkened cell, and Leon followed. As she crouched beside Cassian’s curled body, Leon drew a kill-dart gun and, sidling up to the closed door, positioned himself to fire if anyone came through.

“How is he?” Leon said over his shoulder.

“Alive,” Mali answered. “Barely. Can you carry him?”

Leon looked at the Kindred doubtfully.

Suddenly, Cassian coughed.

“I can . . . walk.”

“Cassian!” Mali kept her voice low as she ran her hand down his arm, helping him sit up. Leon cast another doubtful look at the Kindred. He’d never been a fan of Cassian’s, but he had to admit, Cassian had saved their asses more than once. Now, he looked awful. He wore only black underclothes that covered his torso and hips, and the bare flesh on his arms and legs and neck were marred with dark bruises. His limbs looked shockingly pale.

“He can’t fit in the tunnels,” Mali said.

Leon cursed under his breath. He tightened his hold on the kill-dart gun. “Then we take the hallways and hope the fight on the bottom level has pulled all the guards away from here.”

Cassian tried to sit up. “Just get . . . to Tessela . . . Cora . . .”

Cassian’s normally black eyes were a glassy gray color that made Leon grimace. Mali tried to help him up, but he was too heavy, too disoriented. As soon as he put pressure on his scarred legs, he nearly collapsed again.

“Christ,” Leon said. “They really did a number on him.”

“Help me get him up,” Mali said.

Leon stowed the kill-dart gun in his waistband and went to help, throwing one of Cassian’s scarred arms over his shoulders and heaving him to his feet. Once they had Cassian up, he was able to inch along on his weakened legs. They approached the door, and before Leon could ask Mali to try to open it with her mind, it slid open.

Leon glanced at Mali. “Did you do that?”

She shook her head, then glanced at Cassian. “I think he did.”

But, delirious, Cassian didn’t answer.

They shuffled him into the hall. Leon’s pulse pounded in his ears. He checked both ends of the hallway. Left. Right. All the soldiers had been pulled away to the battle. The hall was empty.

“Wait,” Cassian breathed. His voice was raspy, his lips split. He swallowed hard, then nodded toward another cell. “In there. We need him.”

Leon exchanged a look with Mali, wondering if they could rely on Cassian’s words. Mali nodded, and Leon slammed the heel of his hand on the controls. The door opened.

Mali gasped.

Another Kindred prisoner rose from the floor. There was a dark bruise ringing an injection site on his cheek and scars down one arm, though he wasn’t in as bad shape as Cassian.

Fian.

Leon pointed his gun at him. “Traitor!”

“Wait.” Cassian, eyes glassy, motioned for Leon to lower the gun, speaking between strained breaths. “We can . . . trust him. Fian is . . . loyal to me . . . and to the Fifth of Five.”

“Bullshit,” Leon said. “He turned on us. And he tried to kill us on Armstrong!” Even as he said it, he realized the timing didn’t work. How could Fian have been on Armstrong and at the same time been here, being tortured?

“That . . . was not Fian,” Cassian answered in his stilted voice.

Fian came forward, taking Mali’s place under Cassian’s arm, lifting his fellow Kindred with ease. “It is true,” Fian said. “I have been here for over eight rotations. The person you saw on Armstrong was the same one who incarcerated me, and later, Cassian. It was someone posing as me.”

Leon shook his head. “Look, mate, I posed as a Kindred once. I know what a disguise looks like, and that guy was you.”

“It wasn’t,” Cassian said. “The real Fian was here the whole time, badly wounded. The creature you saw . . . was an Axion.”

Leon wrinkled up his face.

“The Axion are shape-shifters,” Fian explained. “There are safeguards to prevent them from taking on someone else’s identity: they give out a high-pitched frequency when they’re in disguise that all intelligent species can hear. But the Axion impersonating me must have figured out how to silence his frequency. The same for Arrowal. The real Arrowal was killed long ago.”

Leon felt his head spinning. “But Tessela . . .”

“Tessela and the others do not know the truth,” Fian said. “I didn’t know myself until I was i

mprisoned here, and of course, I could not escape to tell anyone. It isn’t a war between cloaked Kindred and the Fifth of Five; it’s a war between Axion and Kindred. The real Fian and Arrowal were never trying to stop Cora. It was the Axion impersonators.”

“I do not understand,” Mali said. “Why do the Axion care if Cora wins? What bearing could the Gauntlet have on their war?”

“Because . . . aeons ago . . .” Cassian leaned against the wall, face flushed with exertion.

Fian explained for him. “Aeons ago, the Axion ruled the universe. But then the Gatherers also gained intelligence and developed the Gauntlet to give all species a chance. Fifty human years ago, the Mosca achieved intelligence. They didn’t like that the Axion were shape-shifters. Didn’t trust them not to pose as someone else. The Intelligence Council mandated that they maintain their true appearance or else emit a frequency when altered—it works through a genetic implant. The Axion accepted the ruling at the time.”

“Let me guess,” Leon added. “They were actually super pissed off.”

“To put it mildly,” Fian said. “Here, Cassian and I learned the extent of their plan. And their fury.”

Distractedly, as though fighting a bad memory, Cassian placed one hand over the oozing scars on his left arm.

Fian continued, “The Axion felt that, as the original intelligent species, they had granted everyone else freedom, and now theirs was being taken away. They set about a plan to retake their original control.”

“I’m afraid to ask how,” Leon said.

“They had to learn to hide their frequencies so that they could infiltrate the upper echelons of each intelligent species. At the same time, over the decades, they began to build an army. They produced ships in far greater numbers than ever before, claiming it was so all species could be better connected. Of course, the ships were actually a war fleet. But first, they knew they had to take out the Kindred.”

Mali’s eyes were wide. “Why not attack all the species at once?”

“We serve as the peacekeepers of the universe. We are the strongest physically, with the most integrated infrastructure, which makes us the only real militaristic threat to them. Take us out by infiltrating our leadership, and the other species would be easy to dominate. That is where the Gauntlet comes in.”