“Leave who?” I asked, while Warwick was leading me toward the exit. “I don’t understand. Come with us!”
“I can’t.” Sorrow flickered over Caden’s face. “I won’t leave my mother.”
My mother.
“Wha-what?” I sputtered in shock. “Your mother?” The pieces were clicking into place—the woman in the back cage before the door shut. The image of her huddled on the floor, her eyes meeting mine briefly. Nothing about her would be recognizable as the elegant, graceful perfection of the woman I grew up with—the one who could be a queen. This woman was dirty, gaunt, beaten, scared, and in filthy rags.
Except for the eyes. Her son’s eyes.
“Oh, my gods…” My hand went to my mouth, the realization knocking like a drum. “Rebeka.” She was here. This is where Istvan had hidden his wife. Was he using her as a lab experiment?
Yells from guards, followed by a groan from Istvan, captured Caden’s attention.
“Go,” he ordered again.
“No, I won’t leave either of you.”
“You don’t have time, Brex.” Caden wheezed, his throat raw, his legs still unstable. “He will kill you. He’ll kill both of you.”
Warwick gripped me tighter, trying to get me to move as pounding steps came for us. Time was running out.
“What about you?” My feet shifted with Warwick, but I still leaned toward Caden.
“I’ll be fine,” Caden said to me, but his gaze went to Warwick. It was odd, but I felt them understand each other. A nod of the head.
“Állj!” Stop! A bark came from the main doorway.
We whirled for the only other exit out of here, the one leading back to the cells.
“Get them!” I heard Istvan’s voice strain, climbing up to his feet. “Shoot to kill!”
“Fuck!” Warwick hissed, both of us ducking as shots rang out over our heads, spraying sparks down on us. Ankle-deep in water, the equipment floated around like a minefield, slowing our retreat. I paused, swiping up a piece of debris I could use as a weapon—a broken piece of thin pipe with a jagged edge. It wasn’t a gun, but anything was better than nothing when guards and bullets were heading straight for us.
“Come on!” Warwick yanked me through deeper sludgy water, things bumping my leg. Peering down, a scream caught in my chest. A dozen dead bodies floated on the surface, some face down, some staring blankly above, but it was the one knocking into me that held my attention.
David Andor.
Seeing his lifeless carcass and empty eyes slithered around my ribs, tightening in and choking the air from my lungs. He was dead. All of them were dead. Not one person had survived in the tanks. I had killed them, whether with my magic or by cutting off their air. They had all perished.
Except Caden.
Bang! Bang!
A squeak lobbed up my throat as we ducked and weaved to avoid bullets. Warwick shoved the door, breaking us through to the familiar passage which led to our prison.
“Don’t let them escape.” Istvan’s voice boomed from behind.
“Where the fuck do we go?” Warwick yelled back at me, our feet pounding across the cement, our wet clothes weighing us down. “This leads us right back to our cells.”
Shit. Shit. Shit! My brain whirled, trying to figure a way out of here.
“There are three levels under the factory. Not only do they all join to each other, but the middle level leads straight to the Ferencvárosi railway station.” My conversation with Nora came back to me.
Another memory popped into my head when Ash and I were hiding behind the viewing dome a level above us.
“Tell Dr. Karl more shipment is coming in. I’ll prepare the side bay for their arrival.”
A shipment from the railway station.
The prisons and labs were the bottom level. The viewing bay was the second, and where Ash and I got into the fight with those soldiers had to be the first.
That meant…
“We need to go up,” I screamed as we continued running, the sound of guards gaining on us from behind. Tension sprang down my arms and legs, my heartbeat pounding in my ears. If there wasn’t a way out, we were just herding ourselves into a pen for Markos.
Trapped.
Dead.
Warwick’s boots pounded the ground, searching for any doors or way out, while we took the same route we had taken several times in the last few days.
“There are stairs behind that door.” A small voice brought me to a complete stop, whipping my head to a cage full of emaciated bodies and sorrow-filled faces of the fae children.
An older boy pointed his arm through the bars at what resembled a tiny closet, almost hidden in the wall. “Behind the door are stairs. I’ve seen them come in and out.”
Warwick started to run for the doorway.
I didn’t move a muscle.
“What are you doing?” Warwick growled, motioning me to hurry. “Come on, we don’t have time.”
“No.” I shook my head. “Not without them.”
“Kovacs…” He gritted his teeth, his gaze darting from the corridor soon to be filled with soldiers to the kids. “It’s impossible. We can’t save them right now.”
“I’m. Not. Leaving.” I shot every word to him. I hadn’t been able to save the little girl. And probably a hundred others similar to her. Like Rodriguez’s little sister. I still felt I owed it to him. To save someone’s sister, daughter, son.
Warwick growled. We stared each other down. I would not relent.
“Az istenit!” Warwick dug his hands in his hair, frustration bellowing from him, swinging around for the cages. I was right by his side, searching for a way to break into them. “There are no fucking keys, Kovacs. How the hell are we supposed to get them out before the guards shoot us down?” He motioned back down the tunnel, filled with the sounds of yells and boots hitting the ground. Every second was counting down to our last.
Did I just hang the noose around our necks? Was my need to help them only ending our lives and saving none?
“Don’t happen to have a spare brownie and imp on you?” He shook the bars, trying to find the hinge’s weak spot.
Damn! Opie and Bitzy would be very handy right now. I missed them so much.
“No, but you have me.” I pinched the rod I picked between my fingers, going down on my knees to work the lock, the kids gathering close, their faces hopeful and pleading. From my years of being a thief, breaking locks was second nature. I just hoped these weren’t spell-locked or goblin made.
“Fucking hell, woman.” Warwick shook his head with a grunt. “You really want to challenge death, don’t you?” Whirling around as guards closed in, Warwick roared, bulldozing straight for the first string of officers in the tunnel. In the tight corridors, they couldn’t spread out, allowing him to slip right up.
Gunshots fired, then bellows and the sound of flesh being hit.
Biting my lip, I fought back the urge to look behind me, keeping my concentration on the lock, not wanting to waste even a second Warwick was trying to give me.
The thud of a body hit the ground next to my leg, an HDF uniform patch in my peripheral. A large hand swiped down and grabbed the gun from the victim, shooting down others of his troop.