Scarlet

She gripped the sides of Wolf’s face and tilted him back. If it hadn’t been for his fangs and the blood on his jaw, he would have looked peaceful.

“What did you do to him?”

“Scarlet, where’s your grandmother? Is she with you?” said the girl.

This brought Scarlet’s scattered attention back to her. “My grandmother?”

The girl knelt beside her. “Michelle Benoit? Do you know where she is?” The girl’s words tripped over themselves in her rush to speak.

Scarlet blinked. Her memory shifted. She did know this girl. Light bounced off the girl’s fingers and Scarlet realized what she had seen before wasn’t a gun. It was her hand.

“Linh Cinder,” she whispered.

“Don’t worry,” said the man. “We’re the good guys.”

“Scarlet,” said Cinder, grasping Wolf by the shoulder to leverage some of the weight away from her. “I know how it looked on the netscreens, but I swear we’re not here to hurt you. I just need to know where your grandmother is. Is she in danger?”

Scarlet gulped. This was Princess Selene. This was the girl they’d been searching for, the girl her grandmother had been questioned over.

The girl her grandmother had given everything to protect.

Together, she and the man heaved Wolf away, dropping him onto the concrete.

“Please,” said Cinder. “Your grandmother?”

“She’s in the opera house,” Scarlet said. “She’s dead.”

The girl gaped at her, with pity or disappointment—Scarlet couldn’t tell which. Sitting up, she flattened her palm against Wolf’s chest, relieved to feel it rise beneath her touch. “They were looking for you.”

Surprise quickly stole away the girl’s sympathy.

“Come on,” said the man from behind her, stooping and hooking his elbow beneath Scarlet’s armpit. “Time to go.”

“No! I’m not leaving him!” She scrambled out of his hold and crawled toward Wolf’s unconscious body, tying her arms around his head. The strangers gawked at her like she was mad. “He’s not like the rest.”

“He’s exactly like the rest!” said the man. “He was trying to eat you!”

“He saved my life!”

The strangers exchanged disbelieving glances, and the girl gave a baffled shrug.

“Fine,” the man said. “You take the helm.”

He pulled Scarlet off Wolf while the girl grabbed Wolf’s wrist and hoisted him up over her shoulder, grunting with the effort.

The man skirted behind and grabbed Wolf’s legs. “Holy spades,” he muttered, already breathless. “What are these guys made of?”

Cinder started moving toward the opera house at a pace only barely slower than a jaunt. Scarlet ducked in between them, supporting Wolf’s abdomen as well as she could as they awkwardly stumbled across the square.

Past the woman, the gleaming form of a military cargo ship poked out from the next street.

A howl nearly startled Scarlet into dropping Wolf’s body. She could not imagine feeling more vulnerable, her arms wrapped around Wolf’s torso, leaving her stomach and chest exposed, moving at this snail’s pace, sweating, exhausted, in pain. Blood oozing down her side.

“You better have those tranquilizers ready,” the man said.

“Can only … put in … one at a time…”

The man cursed beneath his breath, then gasped. “Cinder! Ten o’—”

There was a snap and a dart lodged itself into a man’s chest on the sidewalk in front of the theater. He had crumpled to the ground before Scarlet even realized he was there.

“Let’s pick it up,” the man behind her said. “How many more of those do you have?”

“Just three,” the girl panted.

“Gonna have to restock.”

“Right. I’ll just … head down … to the convenience store, and—” She didn’t finish, the strain too much.

Cinder tripped and they all stumbled, Wolf’s body landing on the ground with a thud. Scarlet pulled out from beneath him and her heart lurched to see blood gushing out of his wounds, made worse from the trek. “Wolf!”

An eerie howling rose up all around them. Much closer than it had seemed before.

“Open the ramp!” the girl yelled, startling the man.

“We need bandages,” said Scarlet.

The girl got to her feet and grasped Wolf’s wrists again. “There are bandages on the ship. Come on.”

The man ran ahead, screaming, “Iko! Open the hatch!”

Scarlet heard the clicking of gears and the humming of electricity as the hatch began to open, revealing the welcoming interior of the ship. Pulling herself onto her feet, she’d just grabbed Wolf’s ankles when she saw a man loping toward them at a sprint, his nostrils flaring, lips pulled taut against his fangs. He was one of the men who had first taken her to her cell.

A ping, a thunk, as a dart buried itself in his forearm. He roared and increased his speed for two steps before his anger faded and he fell forward, face slamming onto the pavement.

“Almost there,” said Cinder through her teeth, picking up Wolf’s dropped wrists.

More howling greeted them from the roads and alleys and shadows, great loping figures appearing out of the darkness.

Scarlet’s back and legs ached and her palms were slick as she struggled to retain her grip on Wolf’s ankles. “They’re coming!”

“I noticed!”