The Princess Trials (The Princess Trials #1)(99)

“Do you mind?” snaps the Noble girl from across the aisle. “No one wants your Foundling germs.”

The woman at the front twists around and fires a shot into the ceiling. “No talking!”

Screams fill the air, and the gunwoman yells at everyone to be quiet. I duck, expecting bits of debris to rain down on our heads, but the plastic remains intact. When I glance over my shoulder at Berta, the plastic casing from the console rests on her lap, and she pulls out a thick wire attached to a metal box.

“Is that it?” I lean close so I can hear her reply over the screams and shouts.

“One minute,” she hooks her fingernails under a plastic connector and yanks it off the cable, revealing two wires.

“How do I use the electricity?”

Berta flips a switch. “It’s live now, but the voltage is low. You won’t disable her unless you combine your attack with a few sucker punches.”

Light streams through the windows and fills the vehicle’s interior. We’re on a floodlit highway that stretches across what appears to be the foot of a mountain. I turn around to find a tall wall of electrical masts linked with tight rows of barbed wire.

“This isn’t the Oasis,” I mutter.

“We’ve just passed the wall that separates the Harvester region from the Barrens,” Berta moans. “This is the road that leads to the Great Wall’s north gate. They’re taking us out of Phangloria.”

Panic spasms through my chest. There’s toxic wasteland on the outside, wild men, and creatures mutated by radiation. The Great Wall filters the worst of the sandstorms, and its filters remove pollution from the air. We would choke within minutes. My gaze flicks to the two women sitting at the driver’s seat. Now I know why they’re wearing gas masks.

“Where do you think they’ll go?”

Berta winces. “They might be taking us to the aerodrome, which is a mile outside the Great Wall.”

“That’s even worse,” I twist around and glance further down the vehicle. A few rows back, the Guardian girls sit in their seats with ashen faces, looking like they’ve already guessed our fate.

My mind brings up Ambassador Pascal’s rant about having to travel through hoards of wild men to get to Phangloria. I don’t know which is worse—facing what’s out there or being flown on an airship across the continent to the Amstraad Republic.

Shaking off those thoughts, I reach down to the little refrigerator between the seats in front and pull out a bottle of water. My hands are so clammy, they slip over its cap, so I place the lid between my teeth and twist.

Berta gives me an approving nod. I drink half the contents of the bottle, letting the cold liquid slide down my throat. It cools my nerves and leaves me calm as a cornfield on a still day.

My heartbeat slows, and all traces of panic evaporate into the ether. I snatch the bottle from my lips and read a label that says CALM.

A laugh huffs from my throat. When will I ever learn that water is seldom ever water? But this time, I don’t mind. This time, I need all the help I can get.

The second woman rises from her seat and walks down the aisle. It’s hard to see her features through the visor of her helmet, but I’m sure this is the dark-skinned Amstraadi girl who was first to emerge at the beginning of this interim round.

She turns her head from side to side, seeming to watch our faces, but there’s probably a camera somewhere in the visor that’s recording our every expression. When she reaches the back seat, where Emmera still cowers on Vitelotte’s lap, I fill my mouth with water and wait.

My heart pounds as hard as the pulse booming through my eardrums, but at least it’s slowing.

My fingers tremble over the metal box I hide in the folds of my voluminous skirt.

My throat spasms in time with the woman’s approaching footsteps.

As she passes, I leap out of my seat, spit a mouthful of water on her flashing lights, and stick the wires into her collar. With a loud snap, sparks fly from the device, sending a stinging jolt through my fingers and down my arm.

“Ow!” I snatch my hand away and step back, but the woman twists and elbows me on the side of my face. Pain explodes across my cheekbone, and I fall onto my back.

Smoke billows out from the woman’s collar. She turns around and points her gun in my face. I kick her feet, but Berta rears up and rams her shoulder against the woman’s middle.

“Get down, girls,” Berta yells.

Everybody screams. The woman stumbles back, but it’s not enough to make her fall. She points her gun in the air and sprays the ceiling with bullets as Berta pummels her with massive fists.

“Stop!” The driver slams on the brakes, and the gunwoman staggers several steps down the aisle, now with enough space to shoot Berta.

The woman’s entire collar is on fire, and black smoke streams toward the ceiling. She screams even louder than the girls and tries to douse the flames with the hand not holding the gun. Berta ducks behind the seats, leaving the woman and me alone on the aisle.

I scramble onto my hands and knees, and hot smoke sears the scent of melting plastic and burned flesh into my nostrils. Gagging on the thick air that dries my throat, I wrap my hands around the burning woman’s arm and point her gun at the driver. She struggles, but I’m not the one being asphyxiated with a helmet full of smoke.

Flames spread down her back as we wrestle over control of the gun. The side of my face heats and pieces of molten plastic drop onto my arm. She shoulders me in the throat with the arm holding the weapon, and I fall back onto the side of the seat. Someone kicks me in the side—one of the ungrateful Nobles, probably—and I use the momentum to shove the woman onto her knees.