6.9 km from flash curtain
THE STEEL DOORS grind on hinges that sound like they’re a hundred years old. I race toward them, my boots kicking up trails of sand. Since Delvers don’t wear neck cloths, I press my glove over my nose and mouth so I don’t inhale emberflies. They illuminate the darkness, twirling on drafts of air like the fireflies Mom once told me about.
“Wait!” I shout. The doors are halfway closed. “I’m going in!”
“No Delvers with Brunts,” the Strider says. He braces his legs apart and crosses his arms, but makes no move for his weapon. I think he’s curious to see how far I’ll actually go.
I sense the shift in the curtain, like a nocturnal beast stirring to the hunt. Over his shoulder, orange bands ripple down from the cloud cover. I’m dead if I don’t get belowground. I sprint forward, and the Strider reaches for his gun, uncertainty flashing across his face. Shooting Delvers is not something he’s been trained for.
“You can’t—”
“Flashtide!” It’s all I have time to say as I drop and skid beneath the lowering door. I hear the man curse and the sounds of his footfalls as the metal seals shut above me. I stagger in the darkness, tripping down the first few stairs carved into the ground. My eyes adjust to the frail light. Old-fashioned bulbs drape the perimeter with just enough energy to reveal that there is nothing down here but desperate humanity and dirt. I descend, and hundreds of eyes follow my progress as I make my way to the rectangular pit below. The air is stale, but free of ash and dust, and I take cautious sips of it as I search the dirty, battered faces for Dram’s.
Brunts watch me, hungry—not for me, but for the protective suit covering me neck to ankle. I’m a fool to come down here like this, practically flaunting my good fortune. If I don’t find Dram soon, I might end up a dead fool.
A boy leans against the dirt wall, Tempered appendages crossed over his chest. He’s the only one not eyeing me like I’m a flash wand that just rolled into camp.
“I need to find Dram Berrends,” I say softly. “Do you know where he is?” He tilts his head, and my heart sinks. I know why he didn’t notice me before. I’m not sure he’s aware of anything at all. He stares over my shoulder into space. “Sorry,” I whisper. And I am sorry. He’s just a boy, a little younger than me. I look around and realize at least half the Brunts wear the same glazed expression. Their bodies are here, but the rest of them checked out a long time ago.
“Dram!” I call his name, no longer caring how much attention I draw. I trip over arms and legs, sprawled bodies of people who just collapsed on the ground. I hit a wall—no, a man. He reeks of stale sweat. He grabs my arms. For a second I can’t think, can’t understand why the wall is holding on to me. Then the Brunt beside him—flash me, is that a woman?—cracks a light stick—mine, she pulled it off my belt—and I see that Wall Man is missing half an ear, and the smell is coming from his broken-toothed mouth.
“Delver,” he says, and the way he draws it out makes shivers ripple along my skin. I pull away, but he squeezes tighter. I reach for my knife, and a hand grasps mine, twists until I drop the blade.
“She’s still got all her parts.” The voice belongs to the man still twisting my knife hand. His Tempered metal hand pinches my skin.
“I’ll take your weapons and lights,” Wall Man says. He nods to the woman. “She’ll take your clothes. And your chain. Payment. Then we’ll take you to Weeks.”
“You’re insane.”
“And you’re dead if we don’t help you.”
“Help me? I can’t give you my Delver’s chain!”
“Nothing is free, here, Subpar. Especially not protection.”
My gaze shifts to the shadows, to the pairs of eyes gleaming. I can’t believe what I’m considering. A trade. Then Wall Man will take me to Dram, and when he does, I’ll be alive instead of dead.
“Fine.” My heart hammers in my chest so hard, I’m sure the woman can feel it as she unbuckles my suit with greedy hands and peels it off my body. I drag on her dirty, shredded rags and follow them into the dark.
The Scout who can find anything would not have found Dram. I’m forcing myself to move—one foot in front of the other—beside Wall Man when I walk right past him.
“That’s him,” Wall Man says. He’s pointing at a hooded figure leaning against the wall with his eyes shut. The Brunt is covered in filth and dried blood—and the twisted gray spines of a cactus. They cover his arms like a deadly warning.
“That’s not Dram,” I say. My voice sounds strangely monotone, as if I bartered my emotions along with my clothes.
“Subpar,” he says. “From the outposts.” He lifts the Brunt’s arm and peels up the cactus armor enough for me to see a Radband with a familiar amber indicator.
I shake like I’m crying, but no tears come. “Dram.”
The Brunt doesn’t move. I kick his foot, the only place he’s not studded in thorns and gull feathers. He cracks his eyes open and stares at me without reaction.
“It’s Orion,” I murmur, feeling suddenly as if I’m drowning.
He closes his eyes.
I’m speechless. I’ve found Dram—bartered myself to get to him—but he’s already gone.
“Why doesn’t he know me?”
Wall Man shrugs. “I doubt he even knows himself. He’s been here longer than any of us.”
My legs give up, and I sink to the ground.
“Keep your back to the wall, Subpar,” Wall Man says. “This is the Tomb, not a Delver’s pod.” He sits a few meters from me.
My defenses are broken, worn away by the horror of the past hours. I curl onto my side, draw my knees to my chest. Dram hasn’t moved from where he leans against the wall. He’s barely blinked. I have never felt so alone.
“Sleep,” Wall Man says. “I’ll make sure you’re not harmed again tonight.”
A frayed laugh bursts past my lips. “You’re protecting me? From what, exactly?”
“From him.” He nods toward Dram.
Dram’s hollow gaze lands on me. His stare is like a flash vulture’s. Curious. Feral. He lifts a spear into view, the metal tip gleaming in the sparse light. I shift closer to Wall Man. Dram turns and melts into the shadows. He draws something from his pocket.
“What is that?” I ask Wall Man.
“Venom spike,” he says, “from the tail of a cordon rat.” I peer closer and see the fluff of tail and fur. “The toxin paralyzes, but in small doses it can be used to numb the mind. Many Brunts do it.”
I thought everyone was dazed from exhaustion. Maybe there was more to it. I can’t tear my eyes from Dram, hunched in on himself. Tremors rack his hands as he tries to bring the pointed spike to his forearm.
“Stop,” I order. Nearby, Brunts lift their heads. But not Dram.
Anger erupts from someplace deep inside me—a place torn open and exposed. It floods me from the inside, this rage born from pain. It engulfs me, so that I’m kneeling, then leaping to my feet, striding toward Dram like he isn’t some broken thing ten steps from death.
“Subpar,” Wall Man cautions, “you don’t want to start a fight with him.”
“Yes, I do.” I feel hot, then cold. Maybe it’s shock; maybe it’s this storm of hate rising in me. Whatever its source, I embrace it, because for the first time in an hour, I don’t feel the imprint of metal tines on my skin.
“Get up.” I stand over Dram, daring him to give me that vulture stare again.
But he doesn’t even look up. He presses the venom spike into his skin.
There is a sound I have never made bursting from behind my clenched teeth. In my periphery, Brunts stir, some jolt to their feet. I’m not afraid. I’m a banshee, screaming into the face of death. I have joined their ranks of dead things in this Tomb, and they should be afraid. Of me.
I tear the rat tail from Dram’s fingers.
“What happened to fighting?” I shout. “What happened to finding a way out?”
“Leave me, Brunt.” His voice sounds low, reedy.
“I’m not a Brunt,” I whisper. But even as I say it, I know that’s what he sees. Just another shadow, pulled away from this place of darkness. Another nothing. Like him.
Dram pushes himself to his feet. “Leave before I hurt you.”
“Too late,” I murmur.
He swings at me, and I duck. His cactus-barbed fist whiffs through the air above my head. Holy fire. He really is going to fight me. Other Brunts shuffle closer, forming a ring around us.
“Weeks, Weeks, Weeks!” they chant. I glance at Wall Man, but he backs away, shaking his head.
Fine.
Adrenaline surges through me, and my instincts fire along my nerves. Flash bats, tunnel gulls, vultures, termits—of all the things I’ve fought, this is going to be a first.
“Give it back,” Dram says.
I follow his gaze to my hand, where I’ve clenched the damn rat tail in my fist.
“This is what you’re fighting me for?” I’m wearing my Delver’s boots with the steel toes, so it’s with utter satisfaction that I fling the poison to the ground and pulverize it beneath my foot.
His eyes narrow. In the dim light they appear orange, gleaming like orbie water.
“Now give me the rest,” I demand.
“You’ll have to fight me for them, Brunt.”
“With pleasure.” I launch myself at him, ducking his barbed fist. He topples backward, and I follow him down, dodging his armor. I root through his grimy pockets, searching for more venom spikes. He nearly flips me over as we tangle on the ground.
“I’ll kill you!” he growls. He doesn’t recognize me, his partner and best friend, and I’m struggling to see anything of Dram left in this shell of a person.
It makes it easier to fight him. My hands are unprotected, so I use my legs, my heavy boots, landing kicks to his ribs, his face. More Brunts gather around, so close I can smell them. Some of them begin fights of their own, and the others make way, like this is a common occurrence. Maybe this is why Dram is so quick to fight me. Maybe he’s had to survive every night down here like this.
I’m just another brawler to him.
I reach into the tangle of cordon brush at the top of his spear, heedless of the thorns, and grasp the dead rat. I throw it as hard as I can over the heads of the Brunts. Dram roars and dives at me.
I block his attack, my arms straining. “I’m trying to help you, you idiot!”
Dram would normally win this fight. He’s taller, and heavy with muscle, despite weeks in the Overburden. But his senses are dulled from the venom, his reactions delayed. Which is good for me, considering that Weeks, the Brunt, apparently has no conscience.
“You want to cry about cordon rats?” I snarl. “Well I have glenting termits hunting me down!” I yank my hair free from his grasp and roll to my feet. “The Tomb is unbearable for you, I know. I have to delve tunnels where moles can conjure stone around me! I watched one of them turn a person into a tree!” I land a kick, and cactus barbs crunch beneath my foot. A tail rips from his pocket, and I grab hold of it.
“Give it back!” Dram roars.
“No,” I answer, bobbing away. “This place is hell! But we were supposed to fight it together!”
Dram lurches toward me with his spear. His spear! Barbed with cordon brush and gull feathers.
“Dram!” I choke out his name—my heart is in my throat.
He whips it toward my legs, and I leap over it.
“Dram Berrends!” But this isn’t the boy who etched step in my steps into our bonding cuffs. This is Weeks.
“That glass around your neck,” I shout. “You remember who it’s for?”
He catches me in the arm with his spear, and I cry out. The venom spur falls from my grasp as I set my hand to the stinging gash. He drops his spear and snatches the rodent tail off the ground.
Blood streams beneath my fingers, and I lift my hand to check the wound. Dram lurches at me. He yanks my hair back, baring my neck to the stale light. I barely recognize Dram’s voice, laughter rumbling past his sneering lips.
“You want a taste of this poison, Brunt?” he asks, sliding the venom spike along my throat. “A prick, and you’ll escape this hell for a while.” He presses it harder, and I gasp as it nicks my skin. “Any deeper, and you’ll escape permanently.”
Tingling pain radiates along my nerves, and I fight him, twisting in his grasp. The spike cuts deeper. Tears fill my eyes. Horror clenches my gut. It won’t be the flashtide or a termit that claims me. It might be the person I trust most in the world.
“You were my marker,” I gasp. “In Outpost Five.” There’s a fervor in his eyes that terrifies me, so I squeeze my eyes shut and invoke the memories of the Dram I know. “You had a sister. Lenore.”
The spike stills against my throat.
“You wear her ashes, and your mother’s—in the pendants around your neck.”
“Stop,” he says.
“You like outpost ale. And mountains. You love being a Conjie, even though you’re a Subpar.”
“Shut up!” he yells.
“You wore a talisman in your hair, for me!” He presses the spike, and I gasp, struggling against his hold. The poison sears through me.
Metal hinges screech, and everyone looks up at the doors opening above us. I use the distraction, leveraging my weight and slamming my head against Dram’s face. He staggers back, clutching his nose, and sinks to the ground.
“You taught me that move, you glenting skant.” I swipe his spear off the ground, twirl it in my hand, and point it at his throat. I lean down and snatch the remaining tails from him. “This—” I hold the barbs up so everyone can see. I am shaking, the venom tripping up my nerves, but I raise my voice. “This is not an escape. The only escape is out there! If you’re going to die, do it trying to live!” I drop them. I can’t even hold my arm up anymore, but I have just enough strength to crunch them under my boot. I taste blood and swipe my hand beneath my nose. I can already feel my cheek swelling from Dram’s sloppy right hook. He rolls onto his side and spits blood onto the ground. I can’t believe we’ve done this to each other.
“Anyone who lets this Subpar put more of this poison in his veins answers to me.” I stalk toward the woman wearing my Delver’s suit and point the spear in her face. “I’m a Delver with Fortune. Give me back my badge.” She stares at me, wide-eyed, then hurriedly lifts it over her head.
Above us, the metal doors open, and the flashfall steals into the Tomb in shades of luminescent green. Particles slip into the air, pricking my lungs with a tease of danger.
“Strider!” a voice shouts.
The soldier descends into the Tomb. He wears his helmet and visor lowered, his suit charged so high it gives off a crackling sound. The Brunts step away as he nears.
“Keep your distance, and everyone lives,” he says. “I’ve come for the Delver.”
I know that voice. Greash.
He stops before me, suit humming. “You’re alive.”
“If you’re here because of my noncompliance—”
“I’m here because I thought they might kill you.” He takes in my Brunt’s rags and bleeding face. “I see I was half right.” His head shifts to where Dram is crouched, blood dripping down his chin. “Did you see what you needed to see?”
“Yes.”
“Will you allow me to escort you back to Fortune?” he asks. “Or do we need to see how your spear holds up against my flash rifle?” I look down and see that I’m still holding it raised in a double-handed grip.
I hand Dram’s spear to Wall Man. I don’t trust Dram not to try to stab me with it. “Give it to him when I’m gone.”
“Whenever you’re ready, Subpar,” Greash mutters. Despite his bland tone, I can tell he’s on edge. Armed and electrified as he is, he’s still outnumbered, and these people are half mad and desperate, their bloodlust stirred by my fight with Dram.
He directs me up the stairs, guarding my back as we wade through the Brunts. We emerge into the cordon, and the doors lower behind us. I stagger a few paces and throw up in the sand. He doesn’t say anything, but I hear him mute the charge on his suit as I wipe a shaking hand over my mouth.
“We need to go,” he says. “We’re exposed out here.”
I feel the particles, the mercifully low Radlevels. I’m surprised I can still feel gratitude for something like a green indicator flag.
He hauls me to my feet, and I flinch away from his touch. An unnatural panic flutters in my chest, heavy as a body knocking me down. Greash releases me immediately. I can’t see his eyes through his face shield, but I know he’s scrutinizing my face.
“So, I take it Dram hurt you down there.”
“Hurt is not a big enough word,” I murmur.
He presses a code into his screencom and guides me through the turnstile. “You shouldn’t have gone in there.”
I want to shout, to rail at him. Of course, of course I know that now. But all the fight has seeped out of me. Everything I had left was used defending myself against Dram. I lurch to the side and heave again.
“Were you hit in the head?” Greash asks. “You might have a concussion.”
“Toxin,” I mutter. “From a cordon rat.”
“What?” He lifts his face shield and studies my eyes.
“Not enough to kill me,” I murmur. Blood patters on the sand at my feet, and he mutters under his breath, tearing the rags apart to see my arm wound.
“Spear?” he asks. I can only nod. He draws a tube from one of his pockets and opens it with his teeth. “This first part burns like a skant.” He rubs the disinfectant over the gash, and I groan behind my teeth. He pushes the edges of the wound together with one hand and spreads the liquid over it. “Liquid stitches,” he says.
“Thank you,” I murmur. “For this, and…” I glance toward the Tomb.
“You can thank me by promising to never do that again.” We reach the door to Fortune and he waits as the tech reads my badge. “That—Brunt—isn’t Dram anymore, Orion. He’s not worth giving your life for. Not now.”
“You don’t understand.”
“Understand what?”
“Subpars.” The door opens, but I don’t step through. “When there’s a cave-in, we don’t protect ourselves first. We brace our axes over the head of the caver next to us.” I lift my hand, try to bend my swollen, bloody knuckles. “I’ve done that since I was nine. That instinct we develop doesn’t wear out over time. It grows stronger.”
“If that’s true, then why are you crying?”
“I didn’t say it was easy.”
I step inside, and the bolts slide home. The night-dim lights cast shadows over me where I shudder, safe behind Fortune’s coded entrance. I’ve never felt more exposed.
I ache in too many places to count, though I know my senses are dulled and I’m not yet feeling the full effects of my brawl with Dram. The remnants of the venom pulse through me in a way that makes my head feel like it’s hovering above my body.
The stink of the Tomb permeates my skin, my hair. I try to breathe past the lump in my throat. Slowly, my fingers shaking, I reach up and trace the cut on my throat.
“You want a taste of this poison, Brunt?”
Dram.
“I’ll kill you!”
He’d snarled the words, spit the threat at me like an animal. And then he’d really tried to do it.
My throat works as I struggle to hold back tears; my shoulders shake with silent sobs. I slide down the door and fold in on myself, like I can shut out the memories of the past hours. I tear the Brunt’s rags off and sit shivering. But I can’t pull away what happened.
I could open this door and walk toward the flash curtain, and it would all be over. The pain. The loss. A few dozen meters for the flashfall to burn away every terrible choice I’ve made. Every failure.
Shame, swept away in ash and ember.
It would all just fade.
Memories from the Tomb rise up, until it’s all I see, all I hear. I press my hand to the door. A soft chime, the click of the bolt, the door opens. I stop at the threshold.
The stories about the Marker and the Scout can’t end like this.
Dram couldn’t shield me from the horrors of the Overburden. When the rocks fell, he wasn’t able to keep his axe braced above me, and I feel the pain of every impact.
But I’ve still got my axe wedged above him. I’m damaged, bleeding, but I’m not letting go.
Whatever was taken from me down in that pit, I’m still a Subpar.
And we fight to save the people beside us.