The Gender War (The Gender Game #4)(99)

Owen looked up, the rueful look in his eyes telling me he’d deduced the same thing. “Go get her,” he said, his eyes serious. “I’ll stay here to make sure you aren’t flanked.”

I hesitated to leave him for a moment, my mind screaming at me to find a better way—but there wasn’t one, and I gave Owen a grateful nod. “Be safe, man,” I said.

He nodded, his eyes already watching the hall, waiting for any hint of danger. I pressed on, heading for the sound of gunfire.





37





Violet





Dumb luck. Pure dumb luck. It was the only thing that saved me as I crested the stairs at a full run. I tripped, my foot turning over a frame that had fallen off the wall on the landing, and I fell, just as a warden standing down the hall fired at me. I could hear the bullet zinging through the air over my head as I hit the floor hard.

The egg scraped across the smooth tile floor with me as I rolled—my right hand throbbing—the remaining two feet into the nearest room. Bullets bit into the doorframe just as I slipped inside, chunks of splintered wood raining down on me. I scrambled clumsily to my feet, covered my head, and kept moving forward until I was entrenched in the room.

Looking frantically around, I was relieved to see that it was empty—it appeared to be an office of some kind, probably meant as a waiting room for visitors hoping to gain an audience with the king. It was filled with plush chairs, bookshelves, and a desk with a computer. The room was devoid of enemies, but also of weapons. I leaned against the desk for a moment and breathed; running was much harder carrying this damned egg, and my lungs were burning. I tucked the egg tighter to my chest with my right hand, leaving my left free, and steeled myself.

Slowly, I approached the doorway, my back against the wall. Then I peeked my head out, trying to see whether it was just the one warden. He was waiting for me—I saw his eyes fixate on mine, and I barely had a chance to duck back as he fired, the bullet shooting through the doorway and making a crack as it struck something in the room behind me.

But my quick check had revealed the stairs heading up to be clear. I just needed a moment—just enough time so I could make it up to the next landing. Taking a deep breath, I hugged the egg closer still and then stuck my head out again, a little higher up.

The warden unloaded his gun at me, and I ducked back as the doorframe and a section of the wall exploded into a spray of wood, concrete, and dust that showered over my face. I only bothered to wipe my eyes, and then, as soon as the gunfire stopped, I shot out the door, hoping the man had run out of bullets to shoot me with.

A glance at the warden as I ran toward the landing confirmed my guess: the man was in the middle of inserting his magazine into his rifle. He looked at me, his expression icy as I leapt for the stairs. I took them two at a time, a bubble of relief rising in my chest—until, around the corner, I saw Tabitha already on the next landing. Right in front of me.

My heart plunged into my stomach, but something else drove me forward, a cold, angry pulse of desperation in my veins. I slowed to a walk for the last few stairs. The warden from the hall came around the corner and I froze, but before he could do anything, Tabitha waved him off with a dismissive hand chop. This was just her and me again, apparently. How… fitting.

I kept moving up the stairs toward her, my face grim. “Let me ask you something—how old were you when your sister told you about her plans for all of this? Was it early on, or did she wait until mother dearest was dead?”

Tabitha eyed me as I stepped onto the landing. “What does it matter? What’s done is done—Patrus had no idea what was happening, and now they’ll see us as their saviors.”

I arched an eyebrow and glanced around the palace, my jaw clenching. “This one might be a bit hard to explain. Especially considering that the king is back.”

“Well, you are already considered a terrorist,” she said, taking a step to the left. I did the same, keeping my eyes on her. “And the king can be dealt with… Perhaps he’ll go insane after being kidnapped by terrorists and will have to spend the rest of his life taking his own drugs… Perhaps he’ll get in a fight with the chancellor and fall down some stairs…” Her eyes had gone distant, off on some sadistic voyage imagining the king’s death; now they snapped back to me. “What I don’t understand is why you care so much about these people. You lived here. You spent some time with them. You’ve seen what backward scum they are. Why do you care what happens to them?”

I felt surprised by her question. I took another side step, trying to angle myself toward the next set of stairs. “You’re killing them,” I said softly. I needed to keep her talking, but from my experience, Tabitha liked talking a lot less than she liked brutalizing people.

“So what?” she replied archly, following my sidestep. “They treat women like dirt here.”

“That’s no excuse to kill them,” I replied. Another step. Maybe two or three more and I could make it to the next set of stairs. “And what about the boys? How can you say you’re better than anyone after what you did to them? What are you going to do with all those human lives in your hands?”

Tabitha laughed hysterically, and then shook her head at me, an almost pitying look contorting her features, her face flecked with dust and sweat and blood. “Human lives? Are you talking about Mr. Jenks’ pet project—the one he was using to try to improve our ‘defects’? Those failures are barely real people anymore. They’re just tools. And don’t worry, they’ll be put to good use.”