Ashes of Merciless Read online

  I saw the man who’d attacked Aden out of the corner of my eye. His gun was raised, and right before it fired, I jumped off of Ben’s falling body, ducking and rolling. I came up behind Aden’s attacker and sliced my sword across his neck. The bullet embedded itself into a nearby tree, and the man looked confused as blood streamed out of the cut on his neck. He fell to the ground.

  I turned to see the barrel of a gun focused on my chest.

  The man’s dark skin glistened with sweat, and his teeth were bared.

  “Fun’s over, little girl. You’ll pay for what you’ve done.”

  I smiled sweetly. “And what about what you’ve done? Killing innocents doesn’t keep you awake at night?” I forced myself to look only at his wild eyes and not at the gun aimed at my torso.

  The man came closer. “Funny thing to say covered in blood,” he remarked. “Drop the sword.”

  “I think I’ll keep it, thank you.”

  The man growled. “I’m not playing with you, little girl. I can bring you back to the Master with a couple bullets lodged in your pretty skin. It won’t hurt his feelings a bit.”

  My smile grew wider. I took a step to my right, and then another step.

  Suddenly, the man backhanded me. In the agonized haze, I hurtled my body close to Aden’s tree. I wiped the blood from my mouth and spat in his direction.

  “Not the sharpest tool in the shed, are you?” I said as I pointed up to where Aden was.

  The man looked up, his eyes widening upon seeing Aden. Half a second later, my sword cut across his throat, and the gun dropped from his hand.

  He made a sickening sound as he fell to the earth, blood staining the ground in a dark pool. I gasped heavily and leaned against the trunk of the tree. Using the ground, I wiped the blood off the sword before I sheathed it.

  “Ashley?” Aden’s voice was wary.

  “Don’t come down yet; there may be more coming this way,” I said wearily as I went and pulled the dagger out of Joyce’s torn throat.

  I wanted nothing more than to fling myself into Gage’s arms. I wanted him to hold me as I cried for hours. The color red was everywhere. The dawning sky, the wet earth, my clothes . . . My hands moved to my knees as I fought the urge to vomit.

  The earpiece in Ben’s ear crackled, and I moved toward it warily.

  “Ben? Have you seen anyone yet?”

  I picked the earpiece up with quivering fingers and brought it close to my mouth. “Ben’s not seeing anyone anymore. You know who this is. Tell your Master I’m coming for him.”

  I threw the earpiece to the ground and crushed it with my foot. Keeping it would have been pointless; they would have just talked about fake positions.

  I leaned over Ben’s body and removed his bulletproof vest, tossing it aside so Aden could put it on when it was safe for him to come down. I went to Joyce and took off her vest, trying to block out her blank eyes as I put it on.

  “Ashley?” Aden called down to me again.

  “Shut up,” I practically moaned as I scaled the tree again. There wasn’t time to search the bodies like I wanted; I only possessed enough energy to swing myself up onto the lowest branch.

  My hands were shaking more than usual, and my heart skipped every other beat. I leaned against the trunk and gulped air greedily, my vision threaded with black. I could feel my thighs bruising from where I’d landed on top of Ben’s shoulders.

  “Are you all right?” Aden insisted.

  “I told you to shut up!”

  “When will they be here?” he asked impatiently.

  I shook my head even though he probably couldn’t see the gesture.

  “That was . . . very impressive,” Aden said in a quiet voice.

  Still feeling nauseous, I used my pants to wipe the blood off of my hands.

  “Don’t say things like that,” I said through gritted teeth. “It’s nothing to be proud of.”

  “You saved our lives.”

  I said nothing as I willed my ears to hear anything and everything. A rabbit running through the brush made me nearly jump out of the tree, and I sat back with a tired sigh as it vanished underneath a rotting log. After about fifteen minutes, I hopped down from the tree. I gestured for Aden to come down as I searched the bodies.

  “What do we have?” Aden asked as he put on the bulletproof vest.

  I handed him Joyce’s rifle, along with some ammo.

  “This should make you feel better,” I said.

  He accepted the items with an unreadable expression. I took Ben’s handgun, swallowing the bile in my throat.

  “This is one of the guys who tried to kill me,” Aden said as he nudged a lifeless body with his foot.

  “Yeah. I know,” I said.

  I reached into the man’s pocket and pulled out a tiny steel container. I recognized the small pile of fine black powder inside. The powder could temporarily blind you when thrown into the air, and it was useful for quick escapes. He also had two grenades. I tucked away the items and kept looking.

  They all had rifles and a smaller gun, along with ammo and knives. I tied one of the knives to my belt and looked to Aden.

  “Hide the rest of their weapons in that log over there. We can’t carry too much, or it’ll slow us down.” I inclined my head to the spot as I kept searching.

  The man I didn’t recognize had a small vial of yellowish-green liquid. Cautiously, I uncorked it and sniffed its contents, quickly sealing it back up.

  “What’s that?” Aden wondered as he gathered the weapons.

  “Acid,” I answered. “This stuff can burn the skin down to your bones. Hurry up.”

  “Where is everyone?” he asked as he stuffed the weapons into the log. The rabbit darted out and flew into a bush, its eyes wide and frightened.

  “I’m not sure. This isn’t how I expected this to go.”

  Aden came to my side, his eyes bright with worry. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean I think they’re playing with us. Or rather, with me. If they really wanted us dead . . .”

  “So what do we do now?”

  I bit my lip. “Be as cautious as possible. They want us alive, and that scares me more than anything.”

  “So now can we use guns?” he asked.

  A ghost of a smile touched my mouth. “Yes. Now we can use guns.”

  He looked down at me. “Then let’s go greet them.”

  Aden and I moved through the lightening trees with slow and quiet steps. Too often we had to stop and destroy a camera, and it made me uneasy to do so. It was like shooting a flare up into the air to signal our position, but it was better than them seeing our exact location.

  Not too far from where we’d ambushed the others, we hid behind a thick tree. I shook my head to try to clear it. I felt dazed and sick, and it was hard to think straight. Sweat kept trickling into my eyes.

  “That’s the woods entrance,” he whispered to me.

  I nodded as I stared at the landmark that was around thirty yards away. Carved into the trunk of a pine tree was a horizontal slash. Hidden underneath the leaves and dirt at the base of the tree was one of the three underground entrances into Headquarters.

  “But we’re not going in yet?” Aden’s voice was unsure.

  “No, we’re not. But that doesn’t mean someone’s not coming out.”

  I motioned for Aden to draw a dagger and pointed to a camera close to him. He nodded and threw the blade, and I did the same to a camera near me. Both machines sparked and cracked at the same time.

  “Stay there!” I commanded as I shot forward.

  “Ashley, no! Wait!” Aden yelled violently.

  I slid to the entrance just as the hatch opened. I didn’t hesitate—I scarcely registered anything except that she was a female with gray eyes, her teeth clenched in anger. Judging by the sounds coming from under her, she was not alone.

  I kicked at her face. There was a crunching sound and a splatter of blood as my boot made contact with her nose. She howled in pain, and
suddenly, there was a hot stinging in my right calf.

  I screamed and rolled away just as Aden darted forward. He shot the woman in the forehead. Her body jolted, and she fell against the other two people climbing out of the hatch to aid her. I heard the impact as they all fell to the ground inside Headquarters.

  “Aden, move away!” I cried.

  I pulled a grenade from my belt. I jerked the pin out and threw the grenade inside the hatch, ignoring the pain in my leg as I threw all of my weight on top of the thick metal lid to close it.

  The explosion shook the ground. The cries were muffled, but there was a part of me, deep in my soul, that shuddered with revulsion.

  I looked down at my leg and saw blood. I dizzily sat up to inspect it, but Aden half-picked me up and started dragging me away.

  “Aden!” I looked around for more enemies as I scrambled for one of my guns.

  “We have to get away from here! Can’t you smell it?” Aden’s voice cut off, and he began to cough at the same time I did.

  Something was choking us. Weakness stabbed my every cell. Blackness swirled my vision. Aden dropped me, and I hit the ground hard. He landed halfway on top of me.

  “What’s happening?” I croaked as I tried to stand up. My fingers dug into the earth as I tried to find a grip on the world that was fading before me.

  “Gas,” Aden choked. “Entrance . . . trap . . . Sleeping gas.”

  “Didn’t say . . . anything . . . ,” I accused.

  “Didn’t know!” he rasped.

  I wanted to tell him that I didn’t believe him, that this was his fault, but I couldn’t find my voice or the will to speak. Through half-closed eyes, I glimpsed someone coming toward us.

  “How could you have been so stupid? Kicking that woman instead of shooting her . . . Where is your head? Has the Flameblood killed all of your brain cells? You’re better than this. Or at least, I thought you were.”

  I wasn’t sure if it was Ash speaking to me or the figure bending toward me.

  Chapter 18 Mirror Image

  Before I opened my eyes, I knew I’d failed.

  I didn’t let despair overtake me the way it threatened to, the way I wanted it to. I told myself there would be time for my emotions to consume me later. Instead, I kept my eyes closed and tried to assess my pathetic position.

  My hands and feet were tied. And with rope, not metal. That was a small mercy. I could feel that my weapons belt was gone along with the bulletproof vest and my morphine.

  All that remained was the vial of acid I’d tucked inside my bra because there had been no room on me anywhere else.

  My right calf hurt, and I remembered the blood I’d seen on my leg. My heart was beating way too slowly for comfort, and my breathing was just the opposite—way too fast. The gas hadn’t been kind to my already poisoned body.

  Very dimly, I wondered if I was dying faster. I certainly had never felt this bad before.

  And wherever I was, it was eerily quiet.

  I waited for at least five minutes before allowing my eyes to open, and the world circled in spirals. Eventually, I recognized the large, open training room I knew so well.

  I looked down at my leg. The mutilated leather of my pants showed a nasty, deep cut that oozed blood freely. My leg lay in a pool of it; I was losing too much.

  I hopelessly studied the room. Ropes still hung from the ceiling. Targets were set up in rows, and the shooting gallery was enclosed in one corner. All of the weapons they kept in here were gone. The damage of the grenade I’d tossed down here was visible. Part of the wall was a jumbled mass of stone, the debris streaked black, and three mangled bodies stained the area in gruesome patches.

  I looked away, feeling sick. Then I saw him.

  “Aden?”

  He didn’t move.

  I painstakingly crawled to him. He was tied up like me, and his eyes were open. Their watery gaze focused on me as I took in the sight of him. His face was so bloodied that I barely recognized him. Blood stained his clothes in dark patches, and the pool of blood underneath him was large.

  So I’d been right for once; Aden was an ally.

  And I hated myself for it, but in that moment, I was so glad it was Aden bleeding before me instead of Gage.

  “Aden,” I said again, at a loss for words.

  He licked his swollen lips and tried to speak. It took him a few tries. “You’re . . . awake. I’m . . . glad.”

  “Who did this to you?” I whispered hoarsely, already knowing the answer.

  “He . . . hates me,” was all he said.

  “How long have you been conscious?”

  “Don’t . . . know. Longer than . . . you. The Flameblood . . . You’re too . . . weak already. So he . . . left you alive. Father . . . hurt me . . . instead. He’s waiting for . . . you to wake up.”

  Of course. The Master wanted me to wake up to a dying Aden. He wanted me as emotionally scarred as possible. That was his game. That had always been his game.

  I reached into my bra with my tied hands for the vial. It took too long, but I eventually managed to pull it out. I moved closer to Aden.

  “Aden, this is all my fault. I’m so sorry. I never should have brought you here. . . . I should have come alone. But I’m going to get you out of here.” I showed him the vial. “See? I still have the acid. We’ll pour it on the rope binding you. And the woods entrance is up there.” I pointed to the ceiling. “I’ll help you climb the rope and get you to safety.”

  Aden chuckled, shocking me. “I’m . . . not going . . . anywhere.”

  I stared at him, bewildered. “Aden, you can’t stay here. You’re dy— I mean, hurt. You’re hurt.”

  “My . . . fault anyway. I’m such . . . an idiot. Should have known . . . about gas. You’re . . . dying too. But you’re so . . . much stronger. I’ll . . . never make it. But you . . . You will.”

  I wanted to slap him. “I’m not leaving you!”

  Aden’s blue eyes were suddenly the most beautiful color I’d ever seen, even more beautiful than the green abyss of Gage’s eyes.

  “Kill him. For me. Then . . . get out of . . . here. Start over. You . . . can do it. Strong . . . enough. And behind farmhouse. I heard Father . . . talk about it. Petals. It’s the . . . petals.”

  “Aden, look at me! Aden!”

  Aden’s eyes rolled up into the back of his head. “Pe . . . tals.”

  Something burned inside my chest. I stared at him, not believing it.

  First I shook him. Then I punched him with my tied hands.

  How many people had to die before my eyes before it stopped?

  My fault.

  My fault.

  My fault.

  I scooted away from Aden and lay on my back. I stared at the ceiling, numb.

  Feeling was fading from my fingertips, my leg. My soul.

  Without thinking, I brought up my tied hands and scraped them along my pants pocket. Disbelief trickled inside me when I traced the small bump.

  I still had my cyanide pill.

  I managed to bring it out of its hiding place. I studied the white capsule, almost mesmerized. This little pill could end everything. All the pain. All the regret.

  I was dying anyway; why not speed up the process and escape whatever fate they had in store for me?

  I popped the pill into my mouth. I brought it between my teeth, ready to break the outer casing.

  And stopped.

  A mirror image sat across from me. It wavered around the edges and was almost transparent, but I knew those silver eyes. I knew that look.

  “Ash?” I whispered.

  She pointed to the floor. “Spit it out.”

  Before I knew it, the pill was on the floor.

  Ash looked at me with scorn. “You were going to give up at a time like this? Don’t you know that’s exactly what the Master wants? That’s the reason why the pill was still in your pocket! He’s testing you. Don’t give him the satisfaction! He hasn’t broken you just yet.”

  I
hunched my shoulders in defeat. “But he has broken me. He has, Ash. And I don’t think I can withstand being tortured again.”

  Ash snorted. “You can, and you will if it comes to it. But you’re not going to let that happen. You’re going to break free and avenge those you love.”

  I closed my eyes. “I’m just so tired, Ash.”

  “So am I. Thanks to those pills, this is the last time we’re going to speak, at least it will be unless you quit taking them. And I don’t think you should ever quit taking them, Ashley. Because you don’t need me anymore. I’m not supposed to be here. . . . I was never supposed to exist. I think I finally realize that. I think I finally have accepted it.”

  “Ash . . .”

  “Believe in yourself, Ashley. I do. I always have.”

  My eyes snapped open. She was gone.

  Something unnamable surged through me. I reached for the vial and uncorked it with my teeth. I sloshed the contents onto the rope binding my hands as carefully as I could.

  I bit my lip to not scream, but a small cry still escaped me as some of the liquid splashed against my wrist. My skin bubbled and turned a fiery red as I shook the rope off. Ignoring the stinging pain in my wrist and leg, I quickly untied the rope around my feet.

  I pulled my shirt off; I wore a black tank top underneath it. I wrapped the shirt around my wounded leg and tied it tightly before limping my way over to a bench. Under the bench, I ran my fingers along the cold stone until I felt the indention.

  I slid the stone back and peered doubtfully inside. I laughed once when I saw the weapons, still not believing even though they were right in front of me.

  “Thank you, Gage,” I whispered.

  I was probably the only one besides the Trainers who knew about Gage’s stash. It contained his favorite weapons; he’d never wanted anyone else to use them.

  There was only one gun, a semi-automatic. I knew without even attempting to open the shooting gallery that it was locked, and I didn’t have any lock picking tools. Gage’s weapon cache was a miracle, but time was against me. There were cameras in here, and now they knew I had weapons.

  I checked the gun, smiling faintly once I saw that it was loaded. I grabbed it and two knives before slinging a crossbow onto my back. I also took his pair of night vision goggles.