Endurance (Razorland #1.5)(8)
Author: Ann Aguirre

The wait seemed endless.

At last, Stone drew her out of hiding with a hand on her arm. His chest churned from the running, but apart from the sweat, he appeared to be intact. Snarls and moans of pain reached her ears. A few Freaks struggled in their snares; others had been killed outright. She heard monsters moving nearby, seeking prey.

“I should put them out of their misery,” he said grimly.

It was common knowledge that Freaks fed on their own dead, but they didn’t attack live ones. So the injured could suffer for a long time. Even as her stomach roiled, she nodded, digging through her pack to find a knife. She was grateful he had the nerve; for all her ability to create instruments of pain, Thimble didn’t know if she could sink a blade into flesh. That had never been her role, and so long as the enclave functioned, she’d only needed to craft. Now, that had to change.

One by one, the ominous sounds fell silent while she comforted Boy23, and when Stone returned with the torch, his blue eyes held a hard light. In that moment, Thimble felt like she didn’t know him at all. He kept the dagger in hand, large and intimidating in the swirling shadows.

“This should earn us some time to get away,” she said.

“If we can.” But he didn’t sound as hopeless as he had before. “We didn’t kill them all.”

“That would be impossible. Douse the torch and let’s go.”

For the first time in her life, Thimble went toward the barricades with the intention of leaving. Her heart thundered in her ears, but she ignored the fear. After taking Boy23, Stone helped her clamber over, and then they were out in the tunnels. Where the Freaks lived.

She swallowed her fear. The pack felt reassuring on her shoulders, filled with things she’d made with her own hands. Things that could save them. The traps worked, she told herself. You can do this.

Here, it was so dark. There came quiet rustlings from behind them, other survivors scurrying for the exit as well, perhaps, but she didn’t call out. It would take all her ingenuity to save Stone and Boy23. Nothing compelled her to rescue those who had cowered while they laid the traps.

Though she’d never taken visual deprivation training like a Huntress, she closed her eyes and turned her face to either side of the tunnel. Stone waited beside her in patient silence. That was the thing she liked best about him—he never questioned her competence. Thimble didn’t doubt he believed she’d lead them to safety. And therefore she was determined not to let him down.

Things had changed so fast. Once, Stone had been so far beyond her. Builders didn’t socialize much with Breeders once they left the brat dorm. She’d noticed that he’d had less time for her after their naming ceremony, if not less affection, and it had cut her deeper than the three scars she bore on her arm, taken when she committed herself to crafting for the good of the enclave. Stone only wore one mark, representing his value as breeding stock. She’d known for ages that she cared more for him than she was allowed to—and that he went off to do things in the dark with other Breeders. That hurt, too, because she could never have more than his careless arm about her shoulders. And maybe he didn’t even want to do what he did, but the elders set the schedule for reproduction, and it was his lot to follow their orders.

It had been hers, too.

But not anymore.

“There’s air moving that way,” she said at last. “Can you carry a weapon as well as Boy23?”

“I have to, don’t I?” His voice was cold.

He wasn’t the simple, affectionate friend from her brat-hood any longer. These days had changed him forever. He’d killed. Maybe he wasn’t a Hunter, but he wasn’t a Breeder either. Circumstances had forced him to adapt, become some new thing. And she loved him from all angles. She had since he first balled up a fast and hit the boy who was taunting her.

Stone accepted the weapon she’d designed: a long wood haft with a metal spike attached. The Hunters had preferred knives and clubs. They said this weapon was too long to work in the tunnels, particularly in close quarters—and it was too likely to inflict collateral damage on a partner in the dark—but in her friend’s big hands, it looked right. She wondered if he knew what to do with it, or if he’d be insulted if she explained.

Probably not, she decided. He’d always accepted that she was cleverest of what had been their inseparable trio. Their third—Deuce—had been gone what seemed like forever, and now the enclave was broken entirely. So there was no reason to imagine he’d mind an explanation.

“You don’t slice with that,” she whispered. “It’s meant to impale, throat or chest.”

Stone nodded. “I don’t have to be fancy with it, then. I can brace for their charge.”

“You need to be quick to disengage,” she warned.

“Or I’ll get it stuck and I won’t be ready for the next Freak.”

“Exactly.” He pleased her with his ready comprehension, and his lack of scorn regarding her ideas. The other Hunters had refused to try her design. She could still hear the mockery:

Don’t be stupid, Builder. You’ve never gone outside the enclave, and a cripple like you never will. You don’t know what we need. Why don’t you make me some decent furniture?

But he was already planning for the first fight. “So brace, pierce, pull, pierce, right?”

And the idea that he’d bear arms on her behalf brought tears to her eyes. Nobody had ever thought her worth saving before, because she was bent. Imperfect. It didn’t matter that she was smart or that she worked twice as hard as any other Builder because she feared the elders would decide she hadn’t been worth the cost of feeding her after all.

“Yes.”

“At the first sign of trouble, you take Boy23 and get behind me.”

Nodding, Thimble swallowed back the tide of emotion and turned toward the flutter against her skin that might herald safety in a world that had become utterly foreign and ferocious. “This way.”

“How do you know?”

“I listened to the Hunters sometimes. They talked about following fresh air. There are cracks in the rock to let the wind in.”

“From where?”

She shrugged. “All I know is, if the air doesn’t smell of Freaks, you follow it.”

Chapter 8

They had been walking a long time.

Distant noises hinted at Freaks in other tunnels, but they stepped carefully and didn’t draw attention. His hand sweated on the weapon, and Stone worried about whether he would be strong enough to defend her. There would come a time when their survival depended on him.

Nothing ever had, at least not in this way. Feeding the brats, making sure they were safe? That wasn’t dangerous work, though it could be sad if one died despite his best efforts. He’d gotten used to caring for them but not getting attached. Too much pain could drive you crazy, and he had to block out the idea of their little bodies outside the barricades, carried away by the Hunters so the Freaks could feast and they’d leave the enclave alone.