Snow Like Ashes(14)

I need to keep him distracted, focusing on body parts other than my hands.

“How are they?” The question is quick and sharp. They, the Winterians in the camps.

I swallow. Two of the ropes are cut. One more …

Herod turns to me. He smirks, pulls my horse close so that I’m hip to hip with him. “The backbone of the Spring Kingdom. Though you Winterians die too quickly for my taste.”

A few more fibers cut, and the rope falls off my wrists. I fight the urge to stretch my poor, abused arms and concentrate on Herod, on letting him think I’m resigned to my fate.

I turn to him, meet his eyes, and lean a little like I’m sliding toward him in my saddle. “Well, there’s one Winterian I know who isn’t dying. At all. And he’s going to destroy Angra.”

Herod does exactly what I hoped he’d do: he lets go of my horse’s reins long enough to slap me. The slap yanks my hand up, the hand that I had managed to slide into his saddlebag and wrap around the small blue box.

I kick my horse, hard, and launch down the sewer’s walkway, all so fast that Herod still has his hand in the air before he realizes I’m free—and I’ve got the locket half.

“No!” he screams, gravelly voice reverberating off the stone walls.

I urge my horse on, galloping beside the muck of the sewer until we escape into darkness, out of the lantern light. Arrows fly past but smack off the stone, lost without something to aim at. Hooves pound behind me, shouts and curses follow, and I make a mental note to always, always put a knife in my sleeve when I go on missions.

The horse seems to know where he’s going, so I just urge him faster. Surely he’s as repulsed as I am by the stench and remembers how he got down here—too bad his new rider is covered in sewage. I gag, finally calm enough to feel the stick of feces all over me.

I shift on the reins, keeping my other hand pressed so tightly to my stomach that tomorrow I’ll have a box-shaped bruise there. A mark of my heroics—Meira, the first soldier to retrieve half of Winter’s locket. A well of pride springs in me, and I hold on to the feeling as tightly as I clutch the box.

The horse curves around one more turn and we fly up to the surface. The cool, fresh night air makes me smile and I kick the horse faster, faster. Not quite free yet.

We’re only seconds from the north gate when the guards stationed there realize what’s happening. They scramble for the lever that will close the iron bars over me, but it’s too late—I push the horse on, throwing a glance at the guard who first stopped me on my way in. His eyes widen with recognition, so I rip off the black cap that covered my hair as I whizz past, galloping across the bridge over the Feni River. White strands stream around me, some matted with sewer muck, but most tossing in the wind. A living snowstorm, a vibrant white reminder that they haven’t enslaved every Winterian. Some of us are still alive. Some of us are still free.

And some of us are half a locket closer to taking back our kingdom.



5


I MAKE IT back to camp in two days, stopping only for a handful of half-hour breaks. I don’t see Finn along the way, but I have to believe it’s because he sped back to camp with just as much ferocity and beat me there, not because he didn’t make it out of Lynia.

I leap off my horse, poor steaming thing, and lead him to a narrow stream where he slurps down water like he’s never tasted anything so sweet. As he drinks, I lunge across the stream and stumble up the hill, prairie grass pushing against my thighs. There, under a clear blue sky, sits our camp, like I never left at all.

A horse bearing Lynia’s golden L on its livery stands in the corral—Finn got back safely. I relax, inhaling the earthy scent of dried grass. No other prisoners of Herod’s will come stumbling back into camp bloody and broken. Not today, anyway.

I pull my shoulders back and stride into camp with as much dignity as I can muster, considering I’m still caked with dried sewage. No one’s around, though, no one poking at a crackling breakfast fire or scrubbing clothes at the well. Which means almost everyone will be in the meeting tent, the largest of our dull yellow-and-brown structures. I don’t bother alerting anyone to my presence—I fling back the flap and stomp in, leaving clumps of gunk on the faded brown carpet.

Our five men cluster around a dented oak table in the center of the room. Each face scrunches in varying states of worry, from silent grimacing to outright shouting, so caught up that they don’t notice me at first.

“We’ve got to send someone back for her! Each moment we waste is another moment she could be dead,” Greer shouts. His deep voice carries farther than anyone else’s, but he rarely, if ever, speaks out in meetings. The skin on my arms prickles. If he’s worried enough to talk, they must be pretty concerned.