The Fever King (Feverwake #1)(109)

It had been fear.

Oh god.

Noam had trusted him. Noam had trusted this man, the same one who had murdered all those millions of people. Noam’s own father.

There were words for what Lehrer did to Dara too.

Noam’s stomach knotted in on itself. Dara was still laughing bizarrely. Or maybe he was crying.

Noam made the decision between one half-choked breath and the next. He reached for Dara, hand faltering in the moment before it touched Dara’s arm—all those times Dara flinched away—before he pressed just the tips of his fingers against flesh. Dara didn’t look like he was breathing, shoulders quivering with the effort of holding in his air.

“I . . .” The word broke as it fell out of Noam’s lips.

The next ones, still in his mouth, were as jagged as shattered glass. He didn’t want to think about it—didn’t want it to be true, but Dara was here, right now, looking at him like Noam had plunged his hand into Dara’s chest, past ribs and muscle and sinew to close his fingers around Dara’s still-beating heart.

“I believe you, Dara.”

Dara made a strange, animalistic sound. “I tried to tell you.”

“I know. I . . .” What could he even say? There was nothing that would make this better. Nothing to undo what Lehrer had done: to his own people, his own child.

And if they didn’t leave now, Lehrer would be the one who found them here. He’d lock Dara up again, and it would be Noam’s fault for being so damn naive.

“I’m so sorry, Dara.” And that was grotesquely insufficient, of course. Noam felt sick with himself for it. “But you’re right, we have to—we need to go. Now, before Lehrer manages to quell the riot.”

“The . . . QZ?” Dara’s voice was only slightly unsteady.

Noam still hated the idea. If Dara really was fevermad, how could he survive out there, with magic in the soil and water and air? Only—only Lehrer could have lied about that too. He could have made Dara sick somehow, called him fevermad just to make sure Noam would never believe anything Dara told him—

“Yeah,” Noam said. “Yeah. If we can get past the barricade, if we move fast . . .”

Dara clenched his jaw, a muscle visibly tensing in his cheek, and nodded.

Lehrer’d had men on the street ever since Sacha’s martial law order—Sacha hadn’t seen the coup coming. The barricades must be Lehrer’s men. But that meant Dara’s name would be twice as useful, just so long as no one tried calling it in.

Then again, if Lehrer was listening to Noam’s thoughts right now, they were fucked either way.

Noam tried to keep Dara close as they started pushing toward the barricade. The crowds were crammed in so close Noam had to turn sideways to press between them—but they made it.

The barricade was just barbed wire, roll upon roll of it stacked chest high over a metal blockade. Still, few seemed willing to go within five feet of it. Those who did were quickly shocked back by the soldiers’ magic.

Soldiers wearing blue ribbons.

Noam broke free of the mob and dashed toward the barricade, half dragging Dara in tow. He didn’t dare let go of Dara, just held his free arm up in the air: surrender. He knew what they looked like: two kids in civvies running out of a riot and right at the barricade. The soldiers on the other hand: monolithic, well armed, glaring with flat eyes, resentment setting their jaws. And Noam might pass for white, but Dara sure as hell didn’t, which, yeah. We’re gonna get shot.

Noam opened his mouth to speak, and one of the soldiers lashed out with his power instantly. Noam felt the snap of burning magic in the air a split second before he reacted, dashing it aside with a shield. It sparked and flared against the asphalt, a white firecracker quickly extinguished.

“Don’t shoot,” Noam shouted, power latching on to the guns before the soldiers could point them at their heads. Noam held his ground. “Don’t shoot—just let us through.”

Let me handle this, he thought toward Dara as loudly as he could. Dara’s silence was answer enough.

Noam didn’t let himself entertain other reasons Dara might be incapable of speech.

The two soldiers nearest Noam glanced at each other. One of them spat dip, strings of brown juice dribbling down his chin. “You’re a threat, and I’m authorized to shoot threats.”

“Yeah? Just try it.” Noam had jammed the bullets in their chambers.

He stepped forward again, fighting back nausea and the pounding in his head. One man pulled his trigger, then swore when nothing happened and tossed his gun aside, lifting a hand to use his power instead.

But it was too late. Noam grabbed his wrist, and the electricity buzzing around the man’s fingertips blinked out. It was grimly satisfying to watch fear bloom in the soldiers’ eyes.

“Who the fuck are you?” said the man whose wristbone was in danger of being crushed under Noam’s superpotent grip, struggling and failing to pull away.

“We’re Level IV. Lehrer’s students. Where is he?”

The man gestured mutely over his shoulder. Noam glanced toward Dara, who was too dazed to notice.

Noam turned back toward the soldiers. “Well? Are you going to let us in?”

“ID first,” one of them said, not the one whose wrist Noam nearly broke.

Noam reached back into Dara’s pocket and dug around until he found a wallet. Dara’s name must’ve done the trick because the soldiers let them through, someone’s magnetic power pulling back the barbed wire far enough to let Noam and Dara step over the knee-high steel blockade.