This Shattered World (Starbound #2)(12)

He hasn’t noticed me yet. His square, shadowed jaw is tense, brows crowding together as he calls out in impassioned tones, “How many times are we going to hide in our caves, watching while they take our loved ones away? How much longer are we going to wait for change?” He’s pacing back and forth at the front of the cavern, the nervous energy of his steps infecting the crowd, making them all shift on their feet and itch for action. “On one thing, Flynn Cormac and I agree: violence must only ever be a last resort. We are not the trodairí with their so-called Fury, their imaginary disease, their excuse for the shows of violence supposed to keep us cowed. But I say today we are past our last resort, and we are past the point of no return.”

My own heart beats hard as I listen in spite of myself. He sounds like my sister, except Orla’s eyes never carried that feverish gleam. When she spoke of last resorts, she meant it. But these people don’t see McBride as I do. They’re too desperate for change to recognize the madness behind his words.

“But what about Flynn, you’re saying. He wouldn’t want this. He’d tell us to talk to them, reason with them—but look where reasoning has gotten him! No sign, no word; I’ll tell you where it’s gotten him, why he hasn’t come back. This very moment he’s in a trodairí prison cell. They’ve got Orla’s little brother bound and bloodied, no doubt trying to beat our location out of him. We would betray the memory of his sister if we let them take him without getting an answer from us.”

I stop in my tracks. He’s trying to lead our people in an attack on the trodairí to free me. McBride’s only guessing as to where I am, but all he needs is one spark to ignite my people. And what better to win over the reluctant ones, those who’ve been listening to me, than a mission of rescue? Because rescue or no, once open war breaks out, all of the Fianna will have no choice but to fight for their lives.

The anger that surges up in me would impress even Jubilee Chase. I bow my head, letting my fists curl, riding it out. Waiting until I can be sure my voice will be strong and steady before I call out.

“McBride, I’m touched. I had no idea you cared so much.”

The heads nearest me snap around, voices rising in shock and relief. I push my way into the free space in front of McBride’s platform. He’s stopped in his tracks, staring blankly at me for a half a beat too long. Then relief floods his strong features, and he jumps down off the platform to approach me. “You’re alive!” he exclaims, and though he claps a hand to my shoulder, the eyes that meet mine are anything but warm. “I’d been imagining the worst.”

I’ll bet you were.

I reach for calm. “I had an opportunity to do some information-gathering, and I took it. No way to get a signal back without risking discovery.”

McBride’s brows lift a little. “Taking action, Cormac,” he replies, lips curling. From a distance, it might look like a smile. “Glad to hear it. What’d you learn?”

I can’t tell them I saw a facility that was gone a few hours later; they’ll think I’ve lost my mind. “Nothing concrete yet.” I try not to wince at the weight of his hand on my shoulder. He’s a head taller than I am, and strongly built. If he ever wanted to take me out once and for all, he’d have the upper hand and then some. “But as long as we know nothing’s changed on the base, we know they’re not coming for us. And we can keep looking for a way out of this.”

McBride squeezes my shoulder. “Sometimes the only way out is through,” he replies, raising his voice a little to make it carry farther.

I turn away, using the movement to wrench my shoulder free of his bruising grip. It’s not the time to dance this dance with him, the same steps, the same push and pull. I have a bigger problem in the form of the trodaire in my currach, who I need to move before she wakes up under that tarp and makes a noise. Because one thing is certain: if McBride’s people find her, Captain Chase will be dead by tomorrow.

The energy in the crowd has shifted—with me standing here, the immediate need to fight is gone, but they’re slow to come down, not sure where to turn. I can’t let them latch on to me, not until the trodaire is stashed somewhere safe.

I catch Turlough Doyle’s eye, then jerk my gaze toward McBride, who’s regrouping and turning back for the platform, no doubt figuring out a way to use my return in his rhetoric.

Turlough steps forward before he can get there. “While we’re all here,” he says pleasantly, “perhaps we can talk about the sleeping quarters.” He uses that same encouraging tone when he’s teaching new Fianna how to lay tripwires.

I ghost back into the crowd, slipping out the back to go in search of my cousin Sean.

I find him in the classroom, which is little more than a cavern softened by handmade rugs to sit on and a chest containing some toys and a few precious, battered textbooks from a time when we were still allowed to barter with traders. It’s Sean’s domain—he teaches when he’s not out on patrol or helping plan a raid. I knew he’d be here, keeping the children away from McBride’s anger and the talk of violence in the main cavern. He’s in one corner with his five-year-old nephew, Fergal, in his lap. He’s surrounded by a gaggle of children—and a couple of girls far too old for story time, but the right age for Sean—faces turned up to him.

“Now, as you know, Tír na nÓg was the land of eternal youth, which most people think sounds like a fine thing. But Oisín wasn’t so sure. Do you know how many times you have to tidy your room when you live forever? His girlfriend, Niamh, lived there, and she was the one who’d invited him to stay. He’d moved in pretty quickly, and a decision like that, well…He should have asked a few more questions before he jumped on in. Turns out their gravball teams were arch-enemies, and they both hated doing laundry.”