Snow Like Ashes (Snow Like Ashes, #1)(75)

But we reach the door, a few sad pieces of old wood nailed together, and Conall swings it open, showing me something that is infinitely more important than words in the dark.

People in the light.

Nessa blows out her candle and I squint in the sudden brightness, one hand up to shield my eyes. She pulls me through and Conall throws the door against the tunnel, closing us inside a great circular room carved into the earth, rocks poking out of the walls and floor and ceiling, too big or cumbersome to move during construction. Candles stand in clumps of long-melted wax, mountains of creamy white that flicker with orange peaks. They’re everywhere, filling every crevice, giving the room a delicate glow. More doors lead out all around the walls, like the room is the center of a wheel and the tunnels are spokes. From those doors, spilling into and filling up the cavernous room, come more Winterians.

“Ow.” Nessa pulls at my hand. My fingers have dug into her fragile arm for support.

“Sorry.” I jerk away. “What is this place?”

“We carved this room to connect to all the remaining basements and cellars.” Conall answers instead of Nessa, his deep voice stoic. “We’re in the middle of Abril, too far to tunnel out under the city itself, so this seemed like the best alternative. Had to keep busy during sixteen years of imprisonment somehow.”

I swallow. “Why are we here?”

He flashes a tight glare at me. “You survived the first few days; they want to meet you. However stupid it is to have so many people down here at once.” He pauses as he reevaluates my question. “But the better question is, why are you here?”

I stare at him, eyes hard, and say the only thing I can. “I should have been here all along.”

Conall pulls back, his brows lifting.

“Is this her?”

The voice echoes through the room, silencing the murmurings around us. All eyes are on me, and I wonder how long they’ve been staring. Probably from the moment they got here. With no soldiers to cower from, no punishment to fear, they’re free to gape and wonder and hope, so long as they’re in the confines of this haven they’ve built.

The owner of the voice pushes through the crowd. It belongs to a woman, her old frame hunched under sixteen years of hard labor. But the moment her clear blue eyes lock on mine, she straightens, throwing off any exhaustion.

“You,” she whispers. Her withered fingers extend when she reaches me, and she puts one hand on either side of my face. She stares at me, through me, seeing something deep behind my eyes that relaxes her face in satisfaction. “Yes,” she says. “You are Meira.”

I pull out of her hands. “How do you know that?”

The woman smiles. “I know everyone who escaped Angra that night. The last ones who came here told us about all of you.”

Crystalla and Gregg. I back up as if I can get away from the pang of memory. The woman’s face is serene, calm. She still hopes for rescue too.

The Winterians around her are not so certain. Most look like Conall, dark and angry, curious about this new visitor but not wasting energy on any hope of escape.

The woman pushes forward. “There were originally twenty-five of you, yes? Last we heard, the number was ten.”

She waits, and I know she wants news of the outside world, of the survivors and how many are left to lead the charge against Spring. Eight, I almost say. But no, it’s seven now. And who knows how many others died in the battle for Bithai? Dendera, maybe. Finn. Greer or Henn. Maybe Spring reached the city and even Alysson is—

My chin falls. “Seven. Maybe fewer.”

Quiet muttering ripples through the crowd. The number makes their frowns deepen, and I can feel their blame flare higher. How we let them down.

The woman lifts my chin, smiling like nothing’s changed. “The king?”

A bolt of agony hits me. Mather. I’ve managed not to think about him too much since I got here. His final, parting scream echoes through my mind, desperate and petrified, as he was dragged back into Bithai while Herod stood over me. . . .

“Alive,” I whisper. “Running for his life, but alive.”

The woman nods. She hooks her arm through mine and turns me toward the crowd, my back to Nessa and a grumbling Conall.

“I’m Deborah,” she says, leading me to the center of the room. We’re surrounded by Winterians on all sides, a sea of white hair, blue eyes, and wariness mixed with some small spurts of hope. “I was the city master of Jannuari. Of the Abril Winterians left, I’m the highest ranking.” Deborah pauses like she’s waiting for me to respond.

I adjust my arm still hooked in hers, fingers stretching through the air. It’s warm down here, too warm, and I can feel all those eyes watching me. So I ask the only question I can. “What do you expect me to do?”

Tell me how to save you. I don’t know what to do.

Deborah is quiet for a moment, her face distant like she’s working through a plan in her head. She looks away from me, toward the crowd, and squeezes my hand.

“This is Meira,” she announces. “She is one of the twenty-five who escaped Angra the night Winter fell. Living proof that his evil is not as absolute as he would have us believe.”

I stifle a moan. It’s exactly what Sir told us. That our lives matter simply because we exist—living, breathing evidence that Winter survived. Sir would love to see this cave they built and know they created some small freedom in Angra’s prison. He’d find a way to turn their hatred into adoration and, better still, find a way to get them out of here.