The hideout was quiet when we returned. I heard the slight whispers of breath as we passed by small alcoves where boys slept and in the main room, where Dimic and a handful of other boys were also fast asleep.
I stayed in the entryway while Cion crept over the boys to his brother. He woke him with nothing more than a tap on his shoulder.
Dimic rubbed his eyes and sat up. He must’ve understood the need for silence since he followed his brother out into the hallway without a word.
“We’re going after the controls tonight,” Cion said. “I need you to use your lock-picking skills to break into the palace.”
Dimic’s eyes went wide. “I’m assuming you have a plan.”
Cion filled him in as we double-checked our weapons. Then Cion handed me a ladleful of water. I let the coolness slip down my throat. I dipped the ladle back into the bucket and held it out to Dimic. He didn’t take it.
A mischievous smile spread across his face. He grabbed the bucket at our feet and started chugging water.
“Dimic,” Cion hissed.
Dimic released the bucket and wiped his sleeve across his face, getting rid of dirt and water droplets but not his smile. “What? Either we break the controls tonight and get all the water we want, or Rodric catches us and we never get to drink again.”
“Thanks for your vote of confidence,” Cion said. He took the ladle from me and drank. I could see the makings of a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
As we carefully made our way across the still-dark desert, Dimic regaled us with everything he was going to do once he had all the water he could dream of.
“First, I’m going to take a bath,” he said. “Then I’m going to build a moat around our house,” Dimic continued. “Big enough to swim in.”
“You should probably learn to swim then,” Cion cut in.
Dimic ignored his brother. “And I’m going to have a fountain I can drink from whenever I want. It’ll be taller than the palace. Everyone will come to see it.”
I was glad for Dimic. His dreams blocked out the reality of what lay ahead of us.
But by the time the city wall came into sight, even Dimic had grown quiet.
The barest ring of light formed a halo around the horizon, hinting that the sun was eager to spread its heat once more.
The city gates lay unguarded, as they had since being blown off their hinges by a sandstorm before I was born. The only things worth guarding in the city were the wells anyway since no army could make it across the desert without kicking up a cloud of dust we’d see miles away.
The arena lay not too far past the wall.
After checking to make sure Rodric hadn’t posted any guards, we ducked toward it. There was just enough light to see by.
A thick bolt secured the gates I’d left the arena from just a handful of days before—I shuddered at how little regard I’d paid the people clinging to those bars then. Maybe they hadn’t been looking to me just for water. Maybe they’d been looking to me for hope.
Dimic knelt down in front of the lock and stared through the keyhole. After a few seconds of consideration, he pulled up his thin shirt to reveal various sizes and shapes of metal. He pulled one out and shoved it into the lock. After a few moments, there was a click and the bolt retreated.
The hinges groaned against the sand trapped in them as we moved inside. I led the way down the tunnel, past the prep room.
The tunnel was cool and quiet. Our feet scraped against the sand-littered floor.
I stopped at a heavy wooden door. Again, Dimic selected a tool and went to work. This door took slightly longer, and he put more effort into shoving the metal into the lock.
I couldn’t help casting glances down both ends of the tunnel, but no one appeared.
Once we entered, I was as blind as they were in our pitch-black surroundings. I’d never been in the tigers’ tunnel before. I kept my hand on the wall, where every few feet there were deep grooves. Claw marks.
I tried to gauge how far through the city we’d moved. We were probably between the southern and eastern well. We were sloping up, which was a good sign. We were getting closer.
Sooner than I expected, a light appeared. It silhouetted the doorway in front of us, the one leading to the tiger trainers’ prep area. My breath caught at the chance someone was in there at this hour.
I slowed my approach and crept toward the door, trying to keep my footfalls softer than those Cion made.
Peering through the tiny window in the door, I saw ropes and the long poles used to control the tigers lining the walls. A table sat in the corner. Bits of leftover meat dripped blood onto the floor. A long stretch of the small room sat empty, presumably so the tigers could be walked through.
“It’s empty,” I said. I tried the latch, and this door was unlocked.
I snuck into the room and heard the others follow. We moved quickly to the door across from us and threw it open.
Despite the two torches lit on either end of the room, I shivered in the cold.
Both tigers leapt up at our appearance.
Dimic jumped and plastered himself against the wall opposite the cages. Cion stared at the tigers, as though he were finally getting to come face to face with an enemy that had always stalked him unseen.
The closest tiger launched its claws at the bars. Cion didn’t flinch.
Slowly, he pulled himself away from the tigers and moved toward the door that led to the hallway. “Let’s keep going before all this noise attracts attention,” he said.
Dimic eagerly scurried after him.
Cion motioned for me to follow, but something tugged at me.
I spun around the room. Cion’s words from the desert came back to me. When you went so long without water, you learned to recognize when it was around.
The air down here wasn’t just cold.
It was moist.
I’d always thought the tiger cages had to be kept cool to keep the tigers from overheating. But what if that wasn’t it?
I scanned the room and came to a dead stop in front of the cages.
There through the bars, straight across from me, stood a small wooden door. The same door I’d thought as a child you’d have to be crazy to go through because you’d have to make it through the gauntlet of tigers.
I turned around to the wall, to the small keyhole.
But the trainers didn’t have the key to pull back the tigers by their chains. Only my father did, and it never left his sight.
He only used to come here to pick out which tiger he wanted present at an arena trial. But more and more recently, he and Rodric had been going together.
I wandered closer to the cage. A tiger leapt at me, but I ignored it.
If I didn’t hate him so much, I would be oddly impressed at how well my father protected his controls.
“Kateri,” Cion whispered. “The hall’s clear. Let’s go.”
“I found the controls,” I replied, pointing to the door.
Dimic peeked back into the room and shook his head. “Uh-uh. I’m not going in there. I don’t look good with slashes down my body.”
I moved aside to reveal the keyhole. “Can you pick that?”
“And let the tigers free?” he asked incredulously. “I think the lack of water has gone to your head, Kateri.”
“This pulls back the tigers’ chains,” I explained. “We should be able to walk right past them.”
“You’re sure that’s where the controls are?” Cion asked, coming to stand next to me in front of the cage.
“If Latia’s searched as much as she can down here, this makes sense. She wouldn’t have been able to search back there. My father has the only key.”
Cion nodded and motioned Dimic forward. “It’s worth a try then.”
Dimic reluctantly knelt down, pulled out a bigger piece of metal, and went to work.
Cion took up position by the door leading to the rest of the palace.
The tigers paced the length of the bars, studying our movements. Their eyes sparked with intelligence, understanding. They knew what that keyhole did. And they were waiting, ready to strike, to fight for their freedom, before the chains dragged them backward.
The torches made the shadows of the tigers play across the wall. Up and up they rose, surging across the ceiling.
I shivered and shut my eyes. Did they always keep the lanterns lit? I fingered my sword hilt. I wish I’d spent more time down here to know. I kept waiting for some trainer to come through the door at any moment. Every growl of a tiger made me freeze, listening for boots running toward us.
After what seemed like an eternity, Dimic cried, “I got it.”
A great cranking echoed through the room. The tigers fought against the chains around their necks, but slowly they were pulled backward toward the walls. There was just enough room between where their paws could reach for us to walk single file through the room.
Dimic opened the door to the cage as quickly as he’d gotten my shackles off.
Cion was the first to step into the cage. He held his sword at the ready. The beasts tugged at their collars, but they couldn’t reach him.
Dimic and I hurried after. Long claws fell just short of our shoulders. Teeth glinted against the light. But for the first time, I noticed the missing fur and scarred skin around their necks where their collars had dragged them back so many times. My father was choking the life out of them, out of the desert itself, as much as he was the rest of us.
The tigers’ sides heaved with effort as they continued to pull at their chains. Their ribcages were visible since my father had kept them underfed to make them more aggressive in the arena—just like he hadn’t fed me the truth about my mother in order to motivate me to fight.
I looked away before the pain in their eyes reflected too much of my own.
Dimic scooted forward and unlocked the door faster than any of the others, probably because he didn’t like the tigers being so close.
We all pushed through the door, eager to be away from the tigers. We ended up on a ledge overlooking a vast underground lake contained in a bowl-shaped ring of rock. The whole cavern had to be at least four or five times the size of the palace grounds. I could barely make out the ceiling above us. A narrow staircase of about thirty uneven steps led down the side of the ledge, toward the lake.
What a lake it was. I’d never seen so much water in my life. From one tunnel at the far end of the cavern, even more water poured into its depths.
“A waterfall,” Dimic said in awe.
The end of the lake closest to us had a gap in the rock face about the size of two of my arm spans. Ten or so long beams of wood and clay dammed it up. A small amount of water trickled over the beams and down into one of four grooves, each leading toward a tunnel about the size of a doorway.
Those must lead to the wells.
All of the tunnels had slabs of thin rock raised to various heights that, once the dam was removed, would allow a certain amount of water through. The slabs were held in place by ropes that looped upward toward the ceiling of the cavern and down to a spot below us.
There were a few more unblocked tunnels situated around the room, but I doubted they went anywhere important since they weren’t blocked off. They were probably just tunnels carved out by the water over time.
A few torches cast light around the area.
“Dimic,” Cion said, “cut those ropes.” He pointed to the ones holding the slabs in place. “Kateri, come with me. We’re going to chop through those beams blocking the rest of the water.”
“I don’t think you are,” a voice called.
A figure meandered out of one of the unblocked tunnels and into the light.
My heart stopped.
Rodric.
Soldiers followed him.
“Run!” Cion shouted.
I turned just in time to see a guard in front of the keyhole. A large clanking reverberated through the room. Chains clinked to the ground. The tigers sprang to life. I was barely able to slam the door closed before one raked its claws right toward it.
I leaned back against the wood, my heart hammering in my chest.
We were trapped.