TO CAGE A WILD BIRD
TO CAGE A WILD BIRD
Brooke Fast
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First published in Great Britain in 2025 by Wayward TxF an imprint of Transworld Publishers 001
Copyright © Brooke Fast 2025
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To my hunny. Life with you is a dream come true.
One hundred twenty- seven.
That was the number of lives I’d traded for a full belly over the years.
Today would make one hundred twenty-eight.
I’d been holed up in the shadowed alcove of the alley since midday, the reek of piss and rotting trash making my eyes water.
My muscles were stiff, begging to be stretched, but I resisted, keeping my gaze fastened to the entrance of the safe house.
The ramshackle townhouse was tucked between two crumbling apartment buildings, its front door worn enough that it might have crumpled from its hinges with a well-aimed kick.
What was taking so long?
Typically, before the sun dipped below the tops of the skyscrapers and continued its descent toward the horizon, I’d have a fugitive cuffed, dragging their feet as I pulled them toward the city jail. From there, the fugitive would be transported to Endlock, the prison that lay over a hundred miles from the city border.
At Endlock, they would await their fate – death at the hands of Dividium citizens.
But even though Aggie’s informant had said the fugitive would move from the safe house before dark, there had been no sign of him, and at this time of evening the Lower Sector buzzed with activity. Vendors shouted and pushed rickety carts through the streets as they attempted to make their final sales to the day-shift laborers rushing to spend a bit of their meager wages, while darkhooded figures skulked through the crowds, hoping to overhear information they could trade to the authorities for extra credits.
Wary pedestrians shot fleeting glances my way as they slipped by my hiding place, likely mistaking me for a patrolling guard.
I was worse.
A bounty hunter – a traitor.
The safe-house door creaked open an inch. I pressed myself farther into the alcove, breath caught in my throat, for fear that the slightest sound would send me home empty-handed.
A heartbeat later, the door yawned wide, and a finely clothed figure ventured out, braving the alley in hopes of blending into the wave of Lower Sector commuters.
I abandoned my hiding spot, and a grim smile spread across my face as I stepped toward the retreating form.
This would all be over soon. I could already imagine the credits on my wristband creeping from a few dozen into the thousands. Enough for several months’ rent and a pantry full of rations to get my brother, Jed, and me through the winter. Maybe even enough for a new pair of boots to replace the ones falling apart on my feet, and a winter coat for Jed.
‘Torin Bond,’ I called.
The figure halted mid-stride, craning his neck. His hood slid back to expose a mop of brown hair streaked with gray. His weary eyes were underscored with deep purple and lined with faint wrinkles.
‘Stop,’ I commanded as he took another step, my hand reaching for the set of handcuffs secured at the belt of my black cargo pants. ‘I don’t want to hurt you.’
A half-lie. There would be some small satisfaction in getting into a fistfight with a citizen from the Upper Sector – one of the wealthy who took and took, even as they watched us starve.
‘Then don’t.’
With that, Torin vanished into the bustling crowd of commuters, a shadow swallowed by a river of moving bodies.
Shit.
I’d lose my advantage if he made it to the border checkpoint that controlled the flow of movement between the Lower and Middle Sectors. Thousands of commuters were lined up on either side of the checkpoint, waiting for the patrol guards to scan their wristbands to verify their identities and confirm they had the correct permissions to cross the sector border. If Torin got there, I would either lose him in the masses, or one of the guards would recognize him and wind up with my credits.
The boundary dividing the two sectors was unmistakable – the structures in the Lower Sector stood as crumbling remnants of the world before, unchanged since the Council partitioned the city into three sectors after the second Civil War.
A few blocks from where I was positioned, on the other side of the checkpoint, the Middle Sector was full of newly constructed buildings and well-dressed citizens. Their pressed suits and flowing dresses were only the beginning of the divide between us and them.
I caught sight of Torin among the stream of commuters. He elbowed through the masses, but the throng of bodies slowed his progress.
I raced along the outskirts of the crowd, pushing myself to move faster.
The cuffs at my waist clanged against my thigh with each stride,
nearly drowned out by the soles of my boots slapping against the packed dirt.
Glancing over his shoulder, Torin exhaled in apparent relief when he didn’t see me behind him.
Just like I planned.
I chose that moment to step directly into his path.
His jaw went slack, and I might have laughed at the look on his face had he not pulled back his fist and swung it at my nose.
I ducked, charging into his legs, sending him crashing forward onto the gritty street. Some of the commuters jumped back, gasping, while others merely glared and stepped around us.
Torin cried out, scooping up a handful of dirt and gravel and hurling it at me.
I yelped, shielding my eyes, but felt the sting of the debris nicking my cheeks.
The move gave Torin enough time to scramble to his hands and knees, but I launched myself onto his back before he could stand, sending both of us tumbling to the ground in a heap.
Torin rolled until he was on top of me, subjecting me to heaving gasps of putrid breath. I rammed my head into his face before he could work out his next move, his yell muffled as his teeth cut into my forehead.
‘Fucking bitch!’ he screamed, spitting out a tooth and a mouthful of blood, a glob landing on my cheek.
‘Original,’ I muttered, grimacing as the blood trickled across my skin. ‘If only credits could buy wit.’
I entertained the thought of pocketing Torin’s tooth. It was customary for hunters who visited Endlock to collect the teeth from their kills and wear them on chains around their necks, or shaved into strings of pearls. I’d seen teeth worn as cufflinks or as the centerpiece of extravagant, diamond-encrusted rings. They were morbid trophies – status symbols. Those who weren’t skilled in hunting went so far as to buy teeth from vendors in back-alley
markets to fit in with their peers – I’d seen my neighbors pull their own teeth to sell to the wealthy during especially harsh winters when they couldn’t make rent or afford rations for their children.
Torin’s hands clamped around my throat, cutting off my air supply and any coherent thought. I flailed about, seeking a weapon, but my fingers found only dirt. On instinct, I kneed him between the legs before delivering a pointed jab to his throat. I shoved him off me, forcing him onto his stomach, and pressed my knee into his back, gasping in lungfuls of air as I caught my breath.
I unfastened the handcuffs from my belt and secured them tightly around Torin’s wrists.
He spluttered but still managed to twist his neck until his eyes found my face. I didn’t meet his gaze.
Never make eye contact.
That was the first rule of bounty hunting.
‘I have children,’ he whimpered. I swallowed.
So did my parents when the Council sent them to Endlock.
Dividium was ruled by a Council that had formed in the aftermath of the war – three leaders elected by a board of officials from each sector.
Each Councilor was assigned to a sector to enforce regulations: Councilor Elder to the Lower Sector, Councilor Baskan to the Middle Sector, and Councilor Peña to the Upper Sector. They all resided in the Upper Sector in homes that were vast enough to house dozens of people.
‘Please. I don’t want to die.’ Torin’s words were a mere whisper. He overestimated my character if he thought begging for mercy would help him.
‘Neither do I,’ I murmured. Empathy wouldn’t keep Jed alive.
The mass of pedestrians continued to weave around us, unfazed, a testament to the number of people arrested and sent to Endlock every day.
Many of the most frequent visitors to Endlock paid to hunt the lower-level criminals – that was typically all they could afford. But the wealthy loved nothing more than the chance to stick it to one of their own. And a prisoner like Torin? The hunters from the Upper Sector would be itching to take a shot at him.
My heart had nearly stopped when I’d checked the criminal database that morning using the ancient tablet I’d scraped up enough credits to purchase second-hand a few years prior. An advertisement had popped up, urging me to visit the Lower Sector’s Endlock Experience office to discuss booking a budgetfriendly hunting package featuring a meal plan and two nights’ accommodation at a campground within view of Endlock’s grounds.
Book now for a free photo package and weapons upgrade!
I’d snorted as the text scrolled across the screen, and swiped the ad away to reveal an updated list of bounties. Next to a grainy picture of Torin, the reward for his capture was set at ten thousand credits.
It was the highest reward I’d seen for a criminal, and the prison would make at least twice that from selling his life to a hunter.
I’d never had the funds or the desire to partake in a hunt, though I’d sent enough people to the prison to hold myself responsible for signing their death sentences.
I figured hunting was an addiction, like gambling or spirits. It gave people a sense of power, a perception of control in a society that constrained us with unending rules. Rules for the times of day we were allowed outside our homes. Rules that dictated where we could step foot within Dividium – we weren’t permitted above the Lower Sector without documented authorization.
I exhaled, hauling Torin to his feet and shoving him toward the city jail.
‘What have you got for me today, Raven?’ Captain Flint asked, his voice gruff and unfeeling as the concrete walls that surrounded us.
The jail was the newest structure in the Lower Sector but also the least inviting. The front room was nothing but gray walls and barred windows, bare save for the desk occupying the middle of the space and the blood-red flag covering the wall behind it. In the center of the flag were three black interlocking circles – one on top, two below. Three circles. Three sectors. Three Councilors. The flag of Dividium.
The heavy entrance doors cut off the chatter of the streets, immersing us in a tense silence broken by the tinny voice emanating from the small screen of the tablet Captain Flint held.
‘We have a breaking update on the attack on the western quadrant of the crop fields that occurred nearly two weeks ago. After a tireless investigation by city guards, the Council has reported findings that Eris Cybin, known terrorist and leader of the rebel organization called the Collective, is the culprit behind a fire that destroyed a large portion of the city’s coming harvest and resulted in the death of several field workers, as well as the death of Silas V. Elder, the husband of Councilor Caltriona Elder.’
I squinted at the tablet.
That couldn’t be right.
Eris was the leader of the Upper Sector’s cell of the Collective. Though Eris had led dangerous rallies and attacks against the Council in the past, none had focused on the city’s harvest. Damaging the crops would hardly impact the Council – it was the Lower Sector that would suffer. The Collective’s responsibility for the death of Councilor Elder’s husband would mean more patrols and arrests in the Lower Sector, warranted or not.
‘Guards are still investigating what Elder was doing beyond Dividium’s border wall in the first place, with the leading theory being a
meticulously planned kidnapping and execution by the Collective. Eris Cybin remains at large.’
The news stream faded into a commercial for a Middle Sector jewelry shop that specialized in shaving teeth from Endlock into charm bracelets.
Flint’s bulbous form hunched over the device, his eyes never lifting from the screen, even as I shoved Torin before me.
Torin had dragged his feet on the short walk to the jail, only relenting when I’d pulled out my dagger and threatened to remove his favorite appendage. After that, I could hardly keep up.
‘Torin Bond,’ I announced, handing him over to the guards beside Flint’s ornate desk.
Flint’s device fell, his attention fully captured by the man now in his custody.
‘Council above, you went after a fugitive from the Upper Sector?’ His blue eyes held mine, but I couldn’t tell whether he admired my bravery or found humor in my stupidity.
‘Flint, we’re talking about ten thousand credits here.’
He scanned a piece of parchment, searching for Torin’s name. ‘What did he do?’
‘His wife had an affair last year. When Torin caught her, he reported her lover to the guards – told them he’d stolen a valuable watch. The man was sent to Endlock for it. Killed. And then, a few weeks ago, Torin’s wife found the watch hidden in his study and reported him.’
Flint let out a whistle. ‘Juicy.’
‘The bitch set me up,’ Torin snarled, and the guards yanked at his arms until he quieted.
I curled my lip, addressing Flint but speaking loud enough for Torin to hear. ‘Even if he hadn’t done that, isn’t watching children starve while having more food than he could ever eat crime enough?’
Perhaps that wasn’t fair. Maybe I was a touch bitter that Torin
had been born into a family that knew nothing about the lengths most of us had to go to for survival.
But food wasn’t the only thing that separated the Lower Sector from the Upper. In the Lower Sector, getting arrested was nearly as easy as breathing. But in the Upper Sector, most citizens got a slap on the wrist for anything other than the most heinous of crimes.
And what Torin had done was as good as murder.
Flint grunted, not keen to say anything untoward about the Upper Sector when one of the Council’s spies might be listening.
The guards disappeared behind a door with Torin. They would lock him in a holding cell until the next transport to Endlock was ready.
Flint shook his head at me before swiping at his tablet, typing in a passcode to access the reward system. ‘Slow day. You’re the first to come in.’
He hit a final button, and my wristband vibrated. I tilted the face toward me and watched as the credits on the small screen steadily increased, relief flooding my body.
I’d been down to my last fifty credits, left from the bounty I’d turned in a month before. A woman named Perri.
There were plenty of illegal operations running rampant in the Lower Sector, but Perri’s had been the most lucrative. Mostly because it preyed on desperation. She’d sold counterfeit medication. Antibiotics that failed to treat infection, knockoff heart medications – you name it, she sold it. Aggie had heard rumors that Perri’s arrest had done little to end the business, and I was still working on tracking down the other people involved.
I narrowed my eyes as the screen on my wrist stopped at a number just north of eight thousand. I turned back to Flint. ‘Eight? It’s supposed to be ten.’
He shrugged, grimacing. ‘You brought me damaged goods.
He’s missing a tooth, and he has a black eye. You know the broken ones bring in less for Endlock.’
He spoke as if the prisoners’ injuries, their lives, were an inconvenience to his bank account – but voicing that thought would only make him a witness to my hypocrisy. Their deaths funded my existence as well.
‘Jed’s eighteen now,’ I blurted instead, hoping maybe he’d take pity on me and throw in a few extra credits. My brother, Jed, was why I’d gotten into bounty hunting in the first place – he relied on me, and I would do anything to keep him fed.
‘Already?’ Flint whistled, logging out of the reward system and sealing away my chances of more credits. ‘I remember the day you first walked in here.’
Jed was eleven then, and I was sixteen.
The jail had seemed terrifying to my innocent eyes. Sterile cement walls and hulking guards who shouted through the locked door when inmates got too rowdy on the other side. Captain Flint had printed me a list of wanted fugitives without batting an eye. I dropped out of school the next day and began scouting for my first target.
But for all Flint’s shortcomings, I was indebted to the man. Without his help, Jed and I would have starved on the streets, unable to scrape together enough to pay the rent on our run-down apartment.
‘He grew up fast,’ I said weakly. And he had. I’d been responsible for Jed since our parents’ deaths seven years ago.
Now, Jed would be considered a fully-fledged member of society, sentenced as an adult for any indiscretions instead of receiving a strike.
Minors were afforded three chances to stay within the bounds of the law. Three strikes, and then they were sent to Endlock to be selected as hunting targets, no matter their age.
With each crime committed by a child, the city guards slashed
a long, deep line into their shoulder with a standard-issue switchblade – the scars were how they kept track of how many chances each child had left.
I reflexively rubbed at the two strike marks carved into the back of my left shoulder, the scars thick and permanently raised.
‘Better get going.’ Flint made a shooing motion in the direction of the door, already bored and ready to get back to watching the news stream. He put his stockinged feet up onto his desk. ‘May the Council watch over you.’
I waved to Flint, pushing past the guards who stood watch at the entrance to the city jail as I muttered the required response. ‘May they guide us to eternal peace.’
‘Give me a pint, Vern.’
‘Not until you go see Aggie,’ the barkeep growled, wiping the worn wooden counter with an oily rag. ‘She’s in the back with the others.’
‘And I can talk to her just as well with a mug of ale in my hand, even better with a mug of ale in my hand, as a matter of fact,’ I said, waving my wristband in his direction, showing off the screen full of credits. Calling it ale was a stretch – a compliment, really, for the homebrew that Vern illegally concocted.
The plump, wiry-haired man had owned the musty basement tavern – aptly known as Vern’s Tavern – for as long as anyone could remember. He was perpetually grouchy and a man of few words, but as long as his patrons paid their tabs and shut their mouths when the patrols came around, he couldn’t have cared less about the insidious activities they got up to under the comfort of his leaky roof.
Vern scanned my wristband and shoved a mug into my hand, the ale sloshing over the sides and soaking my skin.
‘Now get back there,’ he demanded, turning his prickly gaze toward the next paying customer.
I raised the mug in a mock salute but stopped short, narrowing my eyes when I saw Jed descending the steps into the tavern.
At eighteen, he was all sharp angles and lanky limbs, the spitting image of our father with his light blonde hair, wide blue eyes, and the constellation of freckles that danced across his ivory cheeks.
Though I had five years on him, I was often mistaken for his younger sibling.
I’d inherited our mother’s features – gray eyes and long, dark brown hair that fell in waves down the middle of my back. The only trait Jed and I had in common was our complexion.
‘What are you doing here?’ I snapped, grabbing him by the elbow and yanking him into an unoccupied corner of the tavern. ‘You should be at work. It’s almost curfew.’
‘I’m on my way there.’ Jed rolled his eyes, pulling his arm from my grasp. ‘I needed to make a quick stop.’
‘At Vern’s ?’ I pressed, raising a brow. ‘For what?’ I glanced around but no one seemed to be paying us much attention.
Jed tried to push past me, but I held an arm out, refusing to let him by.
‘You know what I’m here for, Raven,’ he said in a whisper, nodding in the direction of the private meeting room. ‘I’m eighteen now. I can start initiation.’
‘Absolutely not,’ I seethed, fighting to keep my voice down. ‘You’re not getting involved with them. It’s not safe.’ Panic clawed at my chest when I pictured him getting caught and sent to Endlock. I’d gotten us this far by having as little to do with the Collective as possible, but, of course, he would want to follow in our parents’ footsteps by joining the rebel group.
‘I don’t need you to keep me safe.’ Jed’s voice shook, his hands fisting at his sides. ‘I need you to stop using me as an excuse to arrest people to pay the rent.’
‘Jed, I—’
‘For every person you turn in, you’re aligning yourself with the Council. Taking their side. You’re no better than the hunters who get off on putting a bullet through a prisoner’s head.’
My mouth snapped shut, his words cutting into me like a thousand shards of glass. I knew he disapproved of my job, but it was something we almost never talked about. Just like our parents.
‘There is no other side,’ I whispered, my voice brittle. ‘There is the Council’s side or death.’
‘You sound just like them,’ Jed spat. ‘You’re not even willing to try anything else.’
‘If I hadn’t taken a strike for you, maybe I’d have the option of trying something else,’ I hissed. As soon as the words left my mouth, I wished I could take them back.
It was true I’d taken a strike for Jed, and that having two strikes made me unhirable at the factories, but that wasn’t his fault. It was mine. I’d take it again in a heartbeat. Take all of his pain if I could.
Jed stared at me for a moment, lips pressed into a thin line, and then turned on his heel and marched toward the exit.
‘Where are you going?’ I asked, shoving a strand of hair from my heated cheek.
‘Work. I can’t look at you right now.’
Jed stomped up the stairs and out of the tavern without a backward glance, and I tipped back my mug of ale, drowning everything out with the sour liquid.
‘Getting drunk so you can live with yourself, Thorne?’
I groaned, looking up to see Aggie’s son, Graylin, leaning against the bar. His brown hair, streaked with gold, was curled up at the edges from the damp humidity of the room, and he twirled a dagger between his fingers.
Self-righteous prick.
There had been a time when my mother and Aggie would
whisper behind their hands and shoot each other conspiratorial looks when they saw the way Gray teased me and how I blushed in turn.
Then, there was the stolen kiss, a week after my sixteenth birthday. The sticky heat of summer had given way to a deliciously cool breeze as we sat watching the sunset from the rooftop of my apartment building. Gray had transformed the barren, concrete space with a blanket and the nubs of some of Aggie’s homemade candles, their gentle glow softening his features as the sky faded from blue to orangey-pink, then velvet black and glittering with stars.
Gray had leaned in, emerald eyes intent on mine as he cupped my chin. I’d let out a shaky breath, and he’d closed the distance between us, our lips brushing as we jumped over the line of friendship into something new.
The next day, my parents were arrested.
A few days after that, they were dead, and I became a bounty hunter to take care of Jed.
A choice that Gray had never forgiven me for.
If we all look out for each other, we might have a fighting chance of survival. That’s how they win, Raven, when we only look out for ourselves.
His words had started out earnest, an entreaty. But when he saw that something had shifted in me, that I would do anything to ensure Jed’s survival, and his survival alone, Gray had turned cold and distant. It was like he didn’t know me anymore, and I didn’t know him. Like all those years faded into nothing in the face of empty cupboards and overdue rent.
I shook my head to clear the memory. ‘Maybe drunk is the only way I can withstand your company.’
Gray barked out a laugh, wielding a bright smile that didn’t reach his green eyes. ‘Where’d Jed go?’
I looked away from whatever emotion was swimming in his gaze, some combination of sadness and disgust, to examine the
myriad small scars that dotted the tanned skin of his cheeks and hands. Some were faded, like the long gash on his left temple from when he’d fallen through the floor of our makeshift fort in an abandoned factory when he was twelve. Others were fresh enough that he’d likely gotten them from his involvement in a Collective mission. He was as tall as Jed, though no one would describe Gray as lanky – he filled out his worn shirt well enough that I didn’t have to imagine the hard planes of muscle that lay beneath.
‘Stay away from him, Gray.’
I slammed my mug on the bar and waved my wristband at Vern, snatching the pint of ale he was passing to another patron. When he cursed at me, I winked, strolling across the tavern until I reached the door that led to the back room, Gray on my heels.
‘Hetty was killed in the last hunt.’ Opal’s words reached me as soon as I slipped through the door, my eyes adjusting until I could see the woman was speaking to Aggie’s wife, Loria. ‘We need to send in a replacement if we have any hope of getting Kit out. Someone with combat experience, preferably, if we’re going to get her across the Wastes alive. Besides the harsh conditions, we’ve had reports of scavengers stealing from travelers, sometimes even kidnapping them.’
My brows knitted together. Attempting to travel across the Wastes was as much of a death sentence as a stint at Endlock.
Loria’s eyes shifted to me as she held up a hand to cut off Opal’s words.
‘Drinking away your problems?’ Aggie asked in the silence that followed. What was it with this family and their focus on my ale intake?
Aggie sat at the head of a long table, smoking a clay pipe. Loria sat to her right, her arms crossed over her chest, and her eyes narrowed as she watched me. Most of the other dozen chairs surrounding the table were filled with people of varying ages, save the
chair to Aggie’s left and one at the opposite end of the table that Gray promptly slipped into.
A collection of candles brightened the space, casting each face in an orange-hued glow. Aside from the factories that were kept running at all hours, our sector had to resort to candles and oil lanterns after curfew when the electricity cut out for the night. The Lower Sector had the highest rate of criminal activity, which the Council used as an excuse to enforce the nightly curfew. They said the curfew was to protect us, but it was mostly to ensure the Middle and Upper Sectors had access to as much electricity as they wanted from the limited power grid.
The Lower Sector had the highest population – nearly a hundred thousand people, as many as the Middle and Upper Sectors combined – but we were crammed into the smallest section of the city, packed into tiny apartment buildings like colonies of ants.
‘Nothing like a room-temperature mug of ale to chase away the guilt of sending another man to his death.’ I raised my mug and took a large swallow. Besides, Jed was working until dawn. When I stumbled back to our apartment, he wouldn’t be home to see my disheveled state.
Or condemn me further.
When Jed turned eighteen, he’d been forced to pick up a grueling night shift at a water treatment facility. The position paid less than scraps, but it was all that was available, and he didn’t have a choice until something opened up elsewhere.
‘He deserved it, dear,’ came Aggie’s soft reply as she tucked a graying strand of hair back from where it had fallen from her braid. Her face, tanned and heavily lined, held a sad smile. She already knew I’d turned in Torin – she had people everywhere. ‘Come sit with us.’
I did as she asked, nodding to the other members of the Collective as I took my seat and pulled a folded sheet of parchment from my pocket. I slid it across the table to Aggie.
‘Here,’ I whispered so the others couldn’t hear. ‘Tacha Vanil. Single mother. She was left homeless when her apartment building collapsed last year. She’s wanted for stealing a few ration bars from the market. I found her digging through the rubbish bins in the alley behind the facility where Jed works.’
It was an agreement Aggie and I had. In exchange for her providing me with intel on the whereabouts of fugitives who’d committed serious crimes, I helped her track down those who didn’t deserve to be arrested, let alone killed at Endlock. The Collective took them in, and helped hide them. I didn’t know how they did it, and I’d never asked.
Aggie nodded her thanks, tucking the paper into her shawl as she said softly, ‘We’ll take care of it.’
‘So, to what do we owe the pleasure of your company this evening?’ Gray asked from the other end of the table. ‘Leaving the dark side behind to officially join us?’
‘In your dreams.’ I leaned back in my chair, kicked my booted feet up on the table, and watched as pieces of caked mud flaked off onto the scarred wooden surface. ‘I’m only here because Aggs said she had a job for me. One that pays handsomely.’
Aside from my deal with Aggie, I usually stayed far away from the Collective. After all, it was our parents’ involvement with the rebel group that had gotten them sent to Endlock.
And my big mouth.
But Aggie was my mother’s dearest friend, a fixture in my life. Between the payout she offered and the reward I’d gotten for turning over Torin, I might have enough credits to stock our pantry and bribe the overseer at the water treatment facility to move Jed to the day shift.
‘Of course,’ Gray spat, as if he’d heard my thoughts. ‘Credits are the only thing you care about. Your parents would be—’
‘Graylin,’ Aggie scolded her son as if he were still a child and not a man of twenty-five years.
My face grew hot at the mention of my parents, but I didn’t rise to his bait. ‘That’s simply not true.’ I tipped my mug back, taking a large swallow before slamming it on the table. ‘I care a great deal about myself, too, Gray.’
He moved to stand, but stopped short when Aggie held up a hand.
‘Enough,’ Aggie said, taking a long pull from her pipe. ‘There’s enough violence in this world to last a dozen lifetimes. I won’t have any of it here.’ Tendrils of smoke slipped from her lips as she spoke, wrapping me in the floral-sweet smell of the smoldering ironroot leaves she puffed on to keep her joint pain at bay.
Graylin nodded and closed his mouth, but that didn’t stop him from leveling a glare in my direction.
‘Speaking of violence’ – I scanned the table, noting that one face was absent – ‘wasn’t Eris supposed to be here tonight?’
The other cell leaders joined the Lower Sector meetings on occasion to keep up to date on news they didn’t trust messengers with.
‘You really think he’d be here after the news stream today?’ Gray’s words were heavy with condescension.
‘So it’s true, then?’ I’d held out hope that it was someone else. That Eris wouldn’t have gone as far as destroying food.
‘It’s true that part of the harvest was burned,’ Aggie said, lips downturned at the corners. ‘But we haven’t been able to get in touch with Eris to confirm his alleged involvement. Some Collective members believe the Council ordered the fire.’
My jaw dropped. ‘The Council? Why?’
‘To frame the Collective,’ Gray said.
‘The public’s opinion of us has changed in recent months,’ Loria chimed in. ‘For the better. The recruits in the program Gray’s heading have managed to hand out thousands of extra rations, and made it known that they were coming from the Collective. Zael and Opal’s crew have been renovating one of the abandoned factories
to put roofs over more families’ heads. Citizens are associating us with safety and protection.’
I shook my head. ‘It’s one thing for the Council to want to gain back public favor, but another for them to destroy food. We’re starving as it is. And Silas Elder died in that fire. Why would they allow that to happen?’
‘We don’t know that the Council is behind it,’ Opal insisted. ‘It’s just a theory.’
‘They’d rather all of us starve than think we could survive without them lording it over us,’ Gray spat. ‘And nothing could make people hate us more than letting them believe we destroyed their food.’
But that didn’t answer my question about Silas Elder.
‘We’ll discuss this later,’ Loria cut in, casting a meaningful look in my direction before I could question them further.
Aggie already said too much in front of me for Loria’s taste, especially as I’d always refused to officially join the cause.
‘What’s the job, Aggs?’ I asked, changing the subject and cutting through the tension in the air.
Aggie coughed, hacking until Loria leaned forward and slapped her on the back. Eventually, Aggie took a gulp from the mug in front of her, and clasped Loria’s hand in hers before speaking.
‘I need you to intercept Councilor Elder’s communications, specifically the letters she’s been sending to a contact at Endlock.’
For a moment, the only sound in the room came from Graylin stabbing his dagger into the table, over and over.
I laughed.
‘Are you mad?’ I pushed back from the table and got to my feet. The only thing I wanted more than credits was for the Council to know nothing of my existence. ‘I’d be sent straight to Endlock.’
‘Not if you don’t get caught,’ Aggie replied. ‘Councilor Elder hasn’t confided in any of our agents who have made it into her
inner circle. She keeps her cards close to her chest, but she sends frequent communications to someone at Endlock. And all written communications are sent on the daily transport with the new inmates – you’d just need to find a way to get her letter off the transport.’
‘Why is she sending written communications in the first place?’ I frowned, the question forcing its way past my lips against my better judgment. ‘Why not send an encrypted message from her tablet?’
Gray smirked. ‘One of our recruits in Elder’s inner circle was able to hack into the Council’s secure messaging platform. They didn’t see much before they were locked out, but Elder has been sending written communications to Endlock ever since while her team shores up security.’
I shook my head. That was . . . I hadn’t realized the Collective had such major connections. Even still, there was no way I was going through with something so risky.
‘It’s important, Raven,’ Aggie said softly, as if reading my thoughts. ‘My source from the North Settlement said Councilor Elder has been in contact with their leaders, insisting they let her and her entourage visit.’
‘Why?’ I asked, my sense of reason shoved aside by my curiosity.
‘She says it’s to study their crop growth and see if there’s anything our scientists can learn from them to improve our own yield.’
The land around Dividium was dying.
When I was young, my family hadn’t worried very much about food. As far as I remembered, it hadn’t exactly been plentiful, but I’d rarely gone to bed hungry. But ten years ago, something had changed. The soil had revolted – some dormant side effect that arose from the earth’s radiation poisoning during the war. Now, our crops were resistant to growth despite our most experienced scientists and farmers battling against the infected soil.
As food grew scarcer, prices soared, and we were driven closer to starvation.
‘You don’t think that’s what she actually wants from the North Settlement?’ I asked, mulling over Aggie’s words.
Aggie shook her head, but it was Loria who spoke. ‘If she cared so much about making sure we didn’t starve, she’d regulate the waste and overconsumption running rampant in the Upper Sector and pay our people fair wages. There’s more than enough to go around if it’s allocated correctly.’
I didn’t know about that, but there was no use arguing with Loria.
‘What else could she want with them?’ I asked.
‘That’s what we’re trying to find out,’ Aggie mused. I shook my head. ‘Aggs, you know I’d do anything for you, but this . . . this is a death sentence.’
‘If anyone can do it, I know you can,’ Aggie said around a yawn. The ironroot helped her pain, but it was also a sedative. She wouldn’t last at the meeting much longer.
I was silent for a moment, thinking. ‘Bar Jed from joining the Collective, and I’ll consider it.’
The hushed conversation among the other members came to a standstill.
Gray barked out a humorless laugh and opened his mouth to speak, but a glare from Loria stopped him.
‘Raven,’ Aggie said, shaking her head. ‘He’s an adult. You can’t protect him forever. He has to make his own choices.’
‘It’s the only offer you can make me. That and the credits.’
‘Raven . . .’ Aggie started, but her eyelids were drooping.
‘We need some time,’ Loria said, cutting in and nodding in my direction. ‘Go on. We’ll talk tomorrow.’
I was seated at the bar, halfway through my third mug of ale, when the hair on the back of my neck rose. I swiveled on my stool,
scanning the room until I found the source of the feeling – a man seated in a dark booth in the corner, staring at me with no attempt at discretion.
He was young, maybe a year or two older than my twentythree years, outfitted all in black. His golden-brown skin was smooth and unblemished, and he had pulled his long, ebony hair back into the knot that many men in Dividium favored. A few rebel tendrils had escaped the tie that held his hair, and soft waves framed his high cheekbones and defined jaw. Though his shirt concealed his arms and broad shoulders, the fabric was tight enough to suggest that he held a physically demanding position. I guessed he might be a carpenter, or even a farmer, one of the few professions that granted citizens access to the world outside of Dividium’s walls – under the watchful eyes of city guards, of course.
I glanced away, willing to consider that I might be overestimating the intensity of his gaze. But each time I turned in his direction, his eyes were still fastened to my form.
I hopped off my stool, hand going to the handle of the dagger strapped to my thigh, and sauntered across the tavern. More patrons had filtered in since my time in the back with Aggie, and I had to elbow my way through them, cringing away from the feeling of their sweat-soaked skin against mine.
The man’s eyes remained impassive, like my approach didn’t surprise him in the least, though his lips twisted into a slight smirk.
It only made me more wary.
I took a final step and slid into the booth, close enough to the man that our shoulders touched, and then held up my dagger so that he could see the razor-sharp point.
I opened my mouth, but a shout cut through the room before I could speak.
‘Kill the lights. Patrol sixty seconds out.’
Within moments, the lanterns were snuffed out, plunging the room into darkness. The groups of rowdy patrons fell into a hush while the bleary-eyed guitar player in the corner stopped her song mid-strum.
Wedged into the worn booth, startled by the sudden loss of sight, I pressed my dagger firmly against the man at my side.
He let out a low, rumbling chuckle that raised goosebumps on my arms, but he didn’t speak. His warm breath filled the air around me, heady with the perfume of mint leaves and mead.
Outside, the boots of patrolling guards crunched on gravel, their flashlights making passes over the windows above our heads and leaving dancing shadows on the basement walls in their wake.
But then, as quickly as they’d come, the guards moved on.
The tavern staff relit the lamps, the musician croaked out her melancholic tune anew, and the room returned to its usual state of noisy chaos.
‘What do you want?’ I asked the man.
His eyes flicked over my face slowly, lazily, resting on my lips for a beat too long before he met my gaze with eyes like molten honey, fringed by lush lashes. ‘This,’ he said with a grin. ‘Though preferably without your dagger digging into my side.’
‘This?’ I repeated, drawing out the word and arching a brow.
‘Mm-hmm,’ he hummed. ‘A beautiful, dangerous woman pressed up against me in this booth.’
He was flirting with me ? My face heated. An evening of bounty hunting followed by Aggie asking me to interfere with the Council’s communications had put me on edge, and I’d immediately clocked this man as a threat. But maybe he wasn’t. Maybe he was exactly the distraction I was looking for.
I abandoned responsibility, letting my eyes roam his body, taking in the finely stitched fabric of his clothing. It appeared brand new, without a stain in sight. There were no patches covering worn
elbows or knees, and when I glanced beneath the table, I beheld a pair of scuff-free boots. Not a farmer, then.
‘You’re not from here,’ I mused, my eyes narrowing. ‘Middle Sector? What are you doing here?’
‘I was supposed to be meeting someone, but he hasn’t shown up,’ the man said, glancing around the room.
‘I know most people that frequent Vern’s. Who are you looking for?’
He stared at me intently for a moment, rolling his lips together as if weighing the merits of confiding in me. ‘Eris Cybin.’
I forced myself not to react. ‘Friend of yours?’
‘I need to repay him.’
I raised a brow. ‘You’re indebted to Eris? You’re a bigger fool than I thought.’
‘You know him?’
‘I know of him.’
‘Is he here?’ the man asked, hardly breathing. I shook my head, echoing Gray’s words from earlier. ‘You really think he’d show up after the news stream today?’
The man’s face fell, but his lips twisted into a smirk. ‘That’s too bad. But I’d say your company is a generous consolation prize.’
‘A consolation prize ?’ I rolled my eyes. ‘You really know how to make a woman feel special. Please don’t tell me that line actually works for you.’
‘You’ll have to let me know. It’s my first attempt.’
His leg knocked against mine beneath the table, and my breath hitched.
‘Well, I guess that depends.’ I gestured between us. ‘What do you think the outcome of this is?’
‘I was hoping to use my charm to convince you to follow me back to my place,’ he said with a wink.
My pulse quickened.
‘Awfully presumptuous of you,’ I drawled, sheathing my dagger
and letting my shoulders loosen. ‘Just because I’m not going to stab you in the ribs doesn’t mean you’re going to get me naked in your apartment.’
‘Naked?’ His eyes darkened. ‘Here you are, attempting to corrupt me when all I wanted was for you to walk me home. It’s not safe out there alone.’
I snorted and finished my ale, the alcohol going straight to my head and pushing thoughts of Torin and Eris and empty pantries from my mind. ‘Why do I get the feeling there’s nothing left of you to corrupt?’ I breathed, leaning in until there were mere inches between our lips.
The way I saw it, I could go back to my sad, empty apartment and ruminate over the blood on my hands, or I could let a handsome stranger help me forget all about it.
Not a terribly difficult choice.
‘It’s funny,’ he said, eyes not leaving my mouth. ‘I have the same feeling about you.’
‘I’m Raven,’ I told him, wanting him to know something about me before I kissed him.
He hesitated but finally said, ‘Vale.’
I moved forward, a breath from eliminating the last distance between us and shutting out the final remnants of my horrible day, but there was an uproar of raucous laughter beside us, and then I was drenched – warm, sour liquid ran down my face.
I shot to my feet, running my hand over my face to wipe the ale from my stinging eyes.
‘Sorry,’ a man slurred, stepping close. ‘I was only trying to get your attention.’
I took a deep breath in through my nose and let it out through my mouth in a slow whoosh. Just another drunken man. Not a threat.
But then his hand locked onto my wrist.
‘Let go,’ Vale growled as he got up from the booth.
I rolled my eyes at him, my hand going for my dagger.
‘I saw you getting all cozy with him,’ the man said. ‘But if you’re looking for company, I’d wager I have more to offer than he does.’
‘Tempting,’ I got out through my teeth, ripping my wrist from his grip and turning back to Vale. ‘But I’m not interested.’
‘Bitch,’ he mumbled under his breath.
After that, it was hardly my fault he wound up lying on the floor unconscious with a black eye and a broken nose.
I shook my hand out in an attempt to lessen the pain in my knuckles.
‘Like I said’ – Vale’s words tickled the shell of my ear as he leaned in – ‘I’d feel much safer if you walked me home.’
I couldn’t help the laugh that slipped from my lips.
‘Aren’t you going to clean that up?’ Vern called when he saw me eyeing the exit.
‘Talkative tonight, aren’t we, Vern?’ I crooned, making my way over to the broom closet. I braved the cobwebs and roaches to snag a mop and bucket that had certainly never seen the light of day.
I tossed them onto the unconscious man’s chest. ‘He’ll come around soon enough. Make him clean up his own mess.’
Vern grunted, but I’d already motioned to Vale and skipped up the steps and out the door into the slumbering city.
‘ the lower sector curfew is now in effect. Citizens are not permitted to leave their homes under any circumstance until morning. If found in the streets, you will be arrested on sight.’
Councilor Elder’s monotone voice droned from the speakers on repeat, cutting through the silent streets.
‘How much farther is it?’ I asked.
We’d been walking in the dark for several minutes, sticking close to the buildings and scanning the shadows for patrolling guards.
My heart thundered in my chest, and only now, as I was following a stranger down a dark alley, did I realize my stupidity.
The ale and the way Vale’s lips had looked in the lantern light had gone to my head, but now, with the cold breeze slipping its fingers beneath my worn jacket and the threat of patrols, I knew I should be safely tucked in bed back at my apartment.
‘It’s just a bit farther,’ Vale said, reaching out and grabbing my hand. His warm fingers curled around mine, igniting something inside me.
Maybe it would be all right, then.
Maybe, this once, I could take the night off from thinking about Jed and rent and my next payout. I could do something for myself.
A clatter came from the street at the end of the alley, and I froze.
‘I heard something over there,’ a light voice, too close for comfort, called from the street.
‘Just leave it, Glin,’ a rumbling baritone answered. ‘Our shift’s almost up. If we find someone, there’ll be paperwork, and we won’t be home for hours.’
I felt a tug on my hand, and Vale pulled me backward, holding a finger to his lips.
With my next step, I kicked an empty bottle, which shattered against the bricks of the nearest building. I turned to Vale, wide-eyed.
Silence.
And then the sound of quick footsteps.
I took a deep breath, exhaling slowly as I scanned my surroundings for an escape route.
The alley was lined with apartment buildings, but there were no emergency exit staircases or ladders to climb. No lower-level windows to slip through, and nothing large enough to hide behind.
I felt for the dagger strapped to my thigh.
‘A blade will be no use against their guns,’ Vale whispered.
I paused.
If I couldn’t fight, it was over.
The only way out of the alley lay in front of us, or far back the way we’d come.
My throat tightened, and I froze, unable to draw breath.
I was going to die at Endlock, just like my parents.
And Jed would be left to fend for himself.
I clamped my shaking hand harder around the handle of my dagger, pulling it from its sheath. I wouldn’t let them take me alive.
Then there was a hand on my arm.
‘Do you trust me?’ Vale was close enough that I could feel his breath on my cheek.
‘Not at all,’ I breathed.
He walked toward me, and I backed away until my shoulders met brick, and there was nowhere left to go.
‘I promise I can get you out of this,’ Vale whispered. ‘Let me kiss you.’
I nearly laughed at the absurdity of the suggestion, but paused as everything seemed to clarify around me.
My hands trembled, the guards’ footsteps pounding closer as I drew what I knew were my last breaths.
There was nowhere to run or hide.
No chance of making it out of this alive.
But I could decide to live my final moments in pleasure instead of fear.
I slipped my dagger back into its sheath.
‘Okay.’
If Vale was surprised, he didn’t show it. His large hands slid up the sides of my neck until his fingers framed my face, his thumbs beneath my jaw. And then he pressed his lips to mine.
He groaned as my mouth parted beneath his, and his tongue traced over my lips before delving into my mouth.
I pulled him closer, my pulse ratcheting up as I ran my hands up the back of his neck and into his hair until I reached the tie holding the smooth locks back from his face. I yanked the tie free and tangled my fingers in his hair, relishing the softness.
Someone was speaking in the background, but I couldn’t make out their words.
Adrenaline filled my veins, fear merging with lust as I lost myself in Vale, kissing him harder, breathing him in. One of my hands slipped beneath the hem of his shirt and over the smooth plane of the muscles of his abdomen. Molten heat pooled
in my core as I let out a soft moan, and he bit my bottom lip in response.
‘Careful, Little Bird,’ he growled. ‘You’ll make me forget we’re not alone out here.’
I’d already forgotten.
‘Face the wall and put your hands up.’ A flashlight pierced the darkness, momentarily blinding me.
‘Don’t move,’ Vale whispered, running his thumb over my stillparted lips. Then he turned to face the guards, his body blocking me almost entirely from view.
‘I said—’ the guard began.
‘I heard you,’ Vale interrupted, voice low. He was doing something with his hands that I couldn’t see, rolling up his sleeve to show them something on his wrist, a watch or his wristband or—
‘Vale, I think you should listen to them,’ I urged, using his body to shield my movements from the guards as I pulled my dagger free once more. ‘They’ll hurt you.’
But both of the guards had gone quiet, and the flashlight fell from my face.
‘We’re sorry. Please, carry on.’
I froze, knowing I must have heard them wrong.
But the two guards turned and practically ran back to where they’d come from, leaving me in stunned silence, staring at Vale’s back.
Nausea churned in my stomach as I realized what I’d done. Who I’d kissed. Because there was only one thing that would keep someone in the Lower Sector from being arrested after curfew.
I didn’t speak until a minute later when the guards’ footsteps vanished, and Vale finally turned to face me.
‘You’re a guard.’ The words shook as I pushed them past my lips, even though I was sure I was right. Vale hadn’t shown a hint of fear while the guards were rushing toward us.
He was one of the Council’s minions and I’d kissed him. My
hands shook around my dagger, itching to stab him. Only the thought of Jed had me sheathing the weapon instead.
‘Something like that.’ He grimaced at whatever he saw in my eyes.
I reared back and punched him square in the face. I heard a crunch and a grunt, but I ran before I could see how he’d react.
When I returned to my apartment, the building was dark – the electricity was still out from curfew. I stumbled up the stairs with the beginnings of a headache thrumming along the back of my skull, and dug in my pocket for my keys.
I jiggled the broken doorknob, angling it the only way that it would accept my key, but instead of catching on the lock, the door creaked open without resistance, and I had to grip the doorframe to keep from face-planting on the cracked tiles of the kitchen floor.
Jed had forgotten to bolt the door.
I looked around, noting that nothing seemed to be disturbed. That, at least, was a stroke of luck in my shitshow of a night.
I stumbled into bed without bothering to change and woke up on my lumpy mattress a scrap of hours later to a pounding headache.
Or what I thought was a pounding headache, until I heard Aggie slamming on my front door and yelling at me to get out of bed.
The bed creaked as I got to my feet.
‘I’m coming!’ I yelled. ‘Will you stop with the banging?’
By the time I reached the kitchen, Aggie had let herself in using her key and had my kettle heating on the stove. She sat in one of the mismatched chairs that ringed the shaky dining table, her face illuminated by the low light of dawn filtering in through the window above the sink, bringing out the dark circles that framed her eyes.
‘For strike’s sake, Aggs. What are you doing here?’
‘Sit down,’ she responded, ignoring my question.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Sit down,’ she repeated, and my heart dropped. I’d thought she must have come over to convince me to help the Collective, but that didn’t explain why her hands shook at her sides.
‘Okay.’ I held my hands up in surrender and sat on one of the rickety chairs. ‘But keep your voice down. Jed will have just gotten to sleep after his shift. You don’t want to wake him.’
‘Jed was arrested last night, Raven.’
I let out a shaky laugh. ‘That’s not funny, Aggs.’
‘It wasn’t meant to be.’
‘Jed’s sleeping,’ I said, but as I spoke, I noted the empty hook by the door where his jacket should’ve been.
Aggie shook her head at me, and her lips turned down at the corners. And maybe I still wouldn’t have believed her if it hadn’t been for her eyes and the tears that welled in them.
Panic clawed at me as I stood and sprinted for Jed’s room, heart pounding in my throat.
I flung the door open, flinching as it slammed against the wall, and scanned the space.
His bed was still made, the sheets smooth and untouched.
My gut twisted, my insides turning to ice. Jed was clever. Cautious. He always stayed out of trouble and he never came home late. If he wasn’t here . . .
I returned to my chair in time for Aggie to set a mug of steaming tea on the table before me.
‘I saw him at Vern’s right before his shift,’ I whispered, my hands forming into fists and resting on the tops of my thighs. ‘What happened?’
‘Drink,’ she insisted, pushing the mug toward me.
I lifted the cup, breathing in the scent of mint tea and letting the warmth from the mug seep into my hands and chase away some of the chill that had settled in my bones.
‘Tell me.’
‘It was just after curfew. He’d only been on shift for an hour when Torin Bond’s son found him,’ Aggie began, leaning toward me as if she could feel I was barely hanging onto my wits.
‘Torin Bond’s son,’ I repeated numbly, taking a sip of the scalding tea and letting it burn down my throat.
Aggie nodded. ‘Torin’s son is a friend of Councilor Baskan’s son, Roald. Leif told me the two of them walked into the water treatment facility with a patrol guard, and no one stopped them.’
Leif was another member of the Collective. He was the same age as Jed, and they had most of their shifts at the facility together.
‘What did they do?’ I set the mug back on the table before my trembling hands could drop it.
‘They attacked him. Had him arrested as soon as he fought back.’
‘But he was defending himself! That’s not a crime,’ I cried, slapping the table.
‘If the Councilor’s son says it’s a crime, it’s a crime,’ Aggie said, gripping her mug of tea so hard her knuckles turned white.
‘But why hurt him? Why not me?’
‘Leif said they taunted Jed. Told him they came here to your apartment, but when you weren’t home, they figured sending him to Endlock in your place would be the next best thing.’
The unlocked door.
They’d come to find me, and instead of being here to take their wrath, I’d been drinking at Vern’s with the intention of warming a stranger’s bed.
I hadn’t protected Jed.
I stood, reaching for my jacket. ‘We can talk to Captain Flint,’ I told Aggie. ‘I’ll do a few jobs for free. Let him keep the credits in exchange for freeing Jed.’
‘It’s too late, Raven.’ Aggie touched my shoulder. ‘They put Jed on the evening transport. He’ll have already reached Endlock by now.’