Page 92 of Shadowlands Omega

The girl frowns. “She said I’d get to see my mommy and daddy again, but instead she brought me and my grandparents to that inn. We had to walk so far. It took us until the sun got dark. The woman who owned it didn’t want us there — she wanted us to go to the ports, too — but your sister lied again. She said that she didn’t want us to go to the ports, so she should make us the Lady’s problem. That’s you, isn’t it? The Lady she was talking about?”

I’m so frazzled I don’t answer except with a dull nod. The girl grins up at me. “Your sister wasn’t very nice but she said you would be. And she also gave me a message for you. Just for you. She said I wasn’t allowed to tell anybody else.”

“Can my sister hear it, too?”

The girl glances at Zelie and then, in true little girl fashion, shrugs and smiles and says, “Sure.”

“What did she tell you?”

“She said to tell you not to try to find her. She said she’d be fine, but I don’t know, she sounded very scared, too.”

“What?” I say, voice sounding very far away. I feel my sweaty fingers curl into the nice fabric of my new dress. This one doesn’t have a corset, but built in boning that stabs into my ribs when I jerk abruptly forward. I almost topple the tray as I reach for my glass of wine and down half of it in one swallow.

The young girl stares me in the eyes unflinchingly in a way that unnerves me as she repeats what she said before, word for word. She cocks her head as she finishes. “But if it were my sister, I think I’d want to help her.”

“And you’d be right,” Zelie says, rising to her feet at once. “We have to go.”

“We should tell the Riders,” I say.

“Yes,” the little girl nods. “That would be good. The Riders are friends with the people in the rags, right? They were dressed like refugees, too. And you were so nice to us, maybe you and the Riders will be nice to them, too. Since your sister was with them, they’ll give her a nice room and some good food.” She smiles. Her teeth are so clean compared to the rest of her body. I feel…sick. The girl is nodding along enthusiastically, but I know better than she does. I know the truth of it.

Zelie and I exchange a look. I’m sitting. She’s standing. I drink the rest of my wine and set down my glass, then I stand, too. We don’t need to speak for me to know what she’s thinking. “We can’t. Owenna is a grown woman. She needs to own her decisions.” I try to remain cryptic — the little girl doesn’t need to overhear talks of war and torture.

Zelie doesn’t have such qualms and spits, “If Lord Yaron finds out she’s working with Trash City again, what do you think he’ll do?”

I wince. My heart sinks, shattering into pieces. I can’t picture it, but I know I won’t survive whatever it is…not only because I’ll lose Owenna… I’ll lose Yaron, too. “It’s too dangerous, Zelie.”

“We have to try for her. You know she’d try for you.”

I don’t know that, but Zelie must know as well as I do that my decision is already made. I will have to beg forgiveness from Yaron later, if he finds out, and I have no doubt he will find out. If he was on the fence about me before…then he will certainly forsake me after this. My heart will be broken no matter what. But…Owenna has left me with no choice.

Again.

I look into Zelie’s pretty, familiar eyes and clench my hands into fists, feeling how they heat at the center of each palm. She says, “If we find her, how will we get her out of there?” She scratches the back of her arm, looking so beautiful in her new dress.

“I don’t know. But we need to go to the Cliffs of Oblivion. Now. I just…I don’t think I’m allowed to leave the castle… After what happened last time, the guards will stop me, I’m sure of it.”

“I know a way.” The little girl stands up, her head tilted to the side. “One of the boys who works in the stables showed me when those nice ladies brought us to the castle and gave us our rooms. I got to go play for a little while. That’s how I got all this dirt on me.” She smiles as she shows off her skirts, covered in dirt — or possibly, horse manure. “My grandparents weren’t happy.”

I smile hesitantly. “I couldn’t ask you to risk yourself…”

“No, no, no risk. I will just go right back to my grandparents after this. They don’t even know I’m gone, really.” She gets up and, with the confidence of a much older girl — or perhaps, a much younger infant who doesn’t understand rules or the consequences breaking them can bring — she comes to me and takes my hand. She leads me to the door and then opens it. Cyprus isn’t back yet, which is our first bit of fortune, but what makes me instantly suspicious is that the guards that were at the bottom of the stairs earlier en masse are no longer there, either.

“See here, this way,” she says, taking a servant’s passage hidden behind a pretty tapestry, instead of the central corridor that tapestry hangs in. She walks like she knows her way, like she’s done this a thousand times before, taking twists and turns, leading Zelie and I down suspiciously empty servants’ passages, through a suspiciously empty castle, out of a conveniently placed side door that deposits us right near the stables. “You can just follow that dirt lane to the main highway line there, I think. That’s what the little boy said. Good luck saving your sister! Tell her Margarite said hi when you find her!”

The little girl leaves us, returning the way she came, and Zelie and I stare at one another in her absence. It isn’t cold, but I feel cold as I stand there, prepared to defy Yaron yet again.

“This isn’t a good idea, Zelie.”

She nods. “You’re right. It isn’t.”

“But if we don’t, Owenna’s as good as dead — either killed by Trash City, or by Yaron when he discovers her. Right?”

Zelie nods, glancing back at the castle, grim determination etched into the lines of her expression. “Trash City has guns.” She hugs her elbows, her dress a pretty pattern of bright oranges and purples. Not armor. Not even camouflage.

I scratch the back of my neck. “I’m a Fire Omega. I can protect Owenna.” I think. I hope.

“You know what they say about fighting fire with fire.”

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