An Ember in the Ashes (Ember Quartet #1)(87)

She stalks away, and I should be angry, but instead I’m repeating what she said in my head. Even the damn students want out. Even the damn students want out.

“Izzi.” I turn to my friend. “I think I know how to find a way out of Blackcliff.”

???

Hours later, as I crouch behind a hedge outside Blackcliff’s barracks, I’m wondering if I’ve made a mistake. The curfew drums thud and fall silent. I’ve been sitting here for an hour with roots and rocks digging into my knees. Not a single student has emerged from the barracks.

But at some point, one will. As Cook said, even the students want out of Blackcliff. They must sneak out. How else would they manage their drinking and whoring? Some must bribe the gate guards or tunnel guards, but surely there’s another way out of here.

I fidget and shift, exchanging one prickly branch for another. I can’t lurk in the shadow of this squat shrub for much longer. Izzi is covering for me, but if the Commandant calls and I don’t appear, I’ll be punished. Worse, Izzi might be punished.

Did she promise to get you out? To save you?

I promised Izzi no such thing, but I should. Now that Cook’s brought it up, I can’t stop thinking about it. What will happen to Izzi when I’m gone? The Resistance said they’d make my sudden disappearance from Blackcliff look like suicide, but the Commandant will question Izzi anyway. The woman’s not easily fooled.

I can’t just leave Izzi here to face interrogation. She’s the first true friend I’ve had since Zara. But how can I get the Resistance to shelter her? If it hadn’t been for Sana, they wouldn’t have even helped me.

There must be a way. I could bring Izzi with me when I leave this place. The Resistance wouldn’t be so heartless as to send her back—not if they knew what would happen to her. As I consider, I set my sights back on the buildings before me, just in time to see two figures emerge from the Skulls’ barracks. Light glints off the lighter hair of one, and I recognize the prowling gait of the other. Marcus and Zak.

The twins turn away from the front gates and pass by the tunnel grates closest to the barracks, instead heading for one of the training buildings.

I follow them, close enough to hear them speak but far enough that they won’t notice me. Who knows what they’d do if they caught me trailing them?

“—can’t stand this,” a voice drifts back to me. “I feel like he’s taking over my mind.”

“Stop being such a damned girl,” Marcus replies. “He teaches us what we need to avoid the Augurs’ mind-leeching. You should be grateful.”

I edge closer, interested despite myself. Could they be speaking of the creature from the Commandant’s study?

“Every time I look into his eyes,” Zak says, “I see my own death.”

“At least you’ll be prepared.”

“No,” Zak says quietly. “I don’t think so.”

Marcus grunts in irritation. “I don’t like it any better than you do. But we have to win this thing. So man up.”

They enter the training building, and I grab the heavy oak door just before it shuts, watching them through the crack. Blue-fire lanterns dimly light the hall, and their footsteps echo between the pillars on either side. Just before the building curves, they disappear behind one of the columns. Stone grates against stone, and all goes silent.

I enter the building and listen. The hallway is quiet as a tomb, but that doesn’t mean the Farrars are gone. I make my way to the pillar where they disappeared, expecting to see a training-room door.

But there’s nothing there, only stone.

I move on to the next room. Empty. The next. Empty. Moonlight from the windows tinges every room a ghostly blue-white, and they are, all of them, empty. The Farrars have disappeared. But how?

A secret entrance. I’m certain of it. Giddy relief floods me. I found it, found what Mazen wants. Not yet, Laia. I still have to figure out how the twins are getting in and out.

The next night, at the same late hour, I position myself in the training building itself, across from the pillar where I saw the Masks disappear. The minutes pass. Half an hour. An hour. They don’t appear.

Eventually, I make myself leave. I can’t risk missing a summons from the Commandant. I feel like shouting in frustration. The Farrars might have disappeared into the secret entrance before I ever got to the building. Or they might arrive there when I’m already in my bed. Whatever the case, I need more time to watch.

“I’ll go tomorrow,” Izzi says when she meets me in my quarters as the final peals of eleventh bell fade. “The Commandant rang for water. Asked where you were when I took it to her. I told her Cook sent you on a late-night errand, but that excuse won’t work twice.”

I don’t want to let Izzi help, but I know I won’t succeed without her. Every time she leaves for the training building, my resolve to get her out of Blackcliff grows stronger. I will not leave her here when I go. I cannot.

We alternate nights, risking all in the hopes that we’ll spot the Farrars again. But maddeningly, we come up with nothing.

“If all else fails,” Izzi says the night before I’m to make my report, “you can ask Cook to teach you how to blow a hole in the outer wall. She used to make explosives for the Resistance.”

“They want a secret entrance,” I say. But I smile, because the thought of a giant, smoking hole in Blackcliff’s wall is a happy one.