Ren remained silent, muzzled as he was, and watched and listened as Adne and Logan reached an agreement. He watched as Adne wove a door made of light and witnessed his sister and Chase carry Sarah’s limp form through the passage. When they reappeared, Adne closed the portal and surrendered her skeins to Logan.
Ren saw all of this. And there was nothing he could do.
Nothing.
Except remind himself that one day soon he would find a way to free himself and then he would kill Logan Bane.
THE SCENE IN THE dining hall went from bad to worse as Connor and Ethan watched Tristan grab Anika and shield her with his body. Connor couldn’t remember any gathering of Searchers he’d witnessed devolving into nothing more than shouts and accusations, and he didn’t even know who was yelling insults at whom, but he was pretty sure that he was hearing curses in at least a dozen languages.
“Good man,” Connor muttered to himself when he saw Tristan forcing his way through the press of bodies to get Anika clear of the scene.
He’d made up his mind to follow them. Connor didn’t need to hear any more of Holt’s grandstanding, but Ethan swore loudly, and when Connor turned, he saw the other Searcher shoving his way further into the room.
Connor surged after his friend. “Where you are going?” he shouted over the din.
For a second Connor thought Ethan had gotten fed up enough to storm to the stage and drag Holt off it. An ill-advised move for sure, but at least it would be fun.
“Sabine went down,” Ethan called over his shoulder while pointing at the mob ahead. “These fools will trample her.”
Grimly, Connor and Ethan pushed forward, throwing elbows and shoving bodies hard. Like he had been the night before, Connor was filled with shame and disgust in the face of his comrades’ behavior.
How could this be happening in the Academy? What the hell has happened to us? We’re supposed to be the good guys.
Connor felt as though he was surrounded by strangers, enemies even. Confirming his worst fears, the crowd began to shove back against Ethan and Connor.
What had been annoyed grunts and sour looks became threats. Connor didn’t see who threw the first punch. It might have even been Ethan, pushed past the brink of frustration in his effort to reach Sabine. But what had been a surly crowd took no more than a couple of minutes to devolve into a brawl.
For his part, Connor tried not to break any noses or jaws. He still believed that most of the Searchers shared his mindset and had been drawn into this chaos from sheer confusion, lashing out at a threat they couldn’t understand.
Connor groaned when someone socked him in the gut. His own fist landed solidly in the middle of another man’s chest, sending the attacker reeling back.
“Damn it!” Ethan was trying to knock his assailants aside and keep moving forward, but the fight had turned the crowd into a veritable wall of bodies.
Lowering his shoulder, Connor lunged forward and plowed past Ethan. They rushed through an opening that immediately closed up behind them. Confusion worked to their advantage as the fighting continued at their backs, but no one pursued them. It was obvious that violence was happening for its own sake and no other reason.
“I can’t find her,” Ethan shouted, wild-eyed. “She should be here. This is where she fell.”
A sick feeling seized Connor as he searched for any signs of the girl and saw blood on the floor.
“Sabine!” Ethan turned in a circle, bellowing. “Sabine!”
“Ethan!”
Both men turned toward the sound of Ethan’s name. It wasn’t Sabine calling to them, but Tess. She was at the edge of the crowd, moving toward the rear of the hall. Shiloh was beside her and he had a body slung over his shoulder.
“Oh God.” Ethan threaded through the crowd. When Tess saw them coming, she nodded and then continued with Shiloh to exit the room.
Connor tried not to hit anyone on his way out. Angry as he might be, leaving was more important than throwing a few more punches for good measure. Besides, the only person he really wanted to deck was standing on top of a table like the fool he was.
Holt would get his eventually. Connor was going to make sure of it.
When Ethan and Connor were free of the crowd, which showed no signs of dispersing, and out of the dining hall, they found Tess, Shiloh, and Sabine waiting for them in the corridor. Sabine was on her feet, and though she sported a nasty bruise on her temple, she seemed otherwise unharmed.
Ethan scooped Sabine up, crushing her in his arms.
“Easy there, tiger,” Sabine said. “I think I may be concussed.”
“We should take you to Eydis.” Ethan set her down gently.
Sabine shook her head. “I’ll be fine. Just got knocked around a bit. I don’t need an Elixir for this. Though I really miss having Guardian blood right about now.”
“What the hell was that?” Connor asked Tess, nodding in the direction of the dining hall.
“Who knows?” Tess frowned. “Holt’s up to something, but what he hopes to achieve with a stunt like that is beyond me. He’ll gain more enemies than friends. You can’t just threaten the Arrow, and that’s basically what Holt did.”
Connor hoped Tess was right, but he had trouble feeling confident about much of anything, given the general downward spiral of events lately.
“We should find Anika,” Tess told them. “Regroup. She needs to know she’s not alone in this.”
“Do you know where she is?” Ethan asked.
“My best guess: Tactical,” Tess answered. “That’s where I go when I need a strategy.”
“You don’t think she’d go to her room?” Shiloh asked. “It was pretty brutal back there. She might be shaken up.”
“I’m sure you’re right,” Tess said. “But Anika won’t want to show any weakness. Her authority is being called into question and as much as that’s not pleasant, it will also piss her off. She’ll fight back.” Tess turned to Shiloh. “Would you mind waiting here and keeping an eye on things? I need to know if there are any new developments.”
Shiloh nodded and headed back to the dining hall.
“Come on.” Tess waved for the others to follow her.
Ethan leaned down and said something to Sabine that Connor couldn’t hear, but it earned Ethan a hard shove.
“You are not going to carry me,” Sabine said.