she felt the metal slide onto her thumb, chafing against her skin like the edge of a dull knife.
Etienne released her hand, and it plummeted to her side like it was weighed down by stones.
“Watch the sky,” he reminded her, nudging his chin toward the horizon.
Chatine blinked and refocused out the window, dragging her heavy, weighted hand back up to the contrôleur. As she stared into the icy abyss of the Terrain Perdu, she could feel tears pricking her eyes, but she couldn’t, for the life of her, figure out where they were coming from. Was she crying for Etienne’s lost father? Or her lost brother? Or sister? Was she crying for the ring? For the original bearer of it? Or was she crying for that look in Etienne’s eyes when he’d slipped it on her finger?
So unassuming. So blissfully ignorant of everything. So prepared to not judge her for her past.
But this was a part of her past that he didn’t know. That she wondered if she would ever be brave enough to tell him about.
“What on Laterre?” Etienne was suddenly leaning over the console, staring out the window. Chatine followed his gaze to the left, where she saw what had snagged his attention. Off in the distance—far below—in the vanishing light of the late afternoon, a small fire blazed. At least, that’s what it appeared to be. Chatine had very little experience with fires. But before she could make sense of the strange spectacle, Etienne started yelling in her ear. “Increase altitude. Now!”
Chatine’s hands dove for the controls, ready to blast them upward. But she stopped herself when she noticed something on the ground a short distance from the fire. A small, glimmering, oval-shaped craft with a giant blue cloth spread out around it that was snapping and billowing in the harsh Terrain Perdu winds.
“What is that?” Chatine asked, squinting through the window.
“Whatever it is, it’s not our concern,” Etienne replied hurriedly. “Increase altitude right now and turn this ship around.”
But Chatine ignored him, pushing the ship closer to the ground so she could get a better look. “I think it might be a crash site.”
Etienne let out an angry puff of air. “Even more reason to get out of here. Anyone flying over the Terrain Perdu is Ministère or at the very least Second Estate, and we’re staying away from both of those. Now get up and hand over the controls. You’re done.”
“No!” Chatine fired back. “They might need help.”
“Then they can call for a gridder to come help them. Now get up before I physically remove you from that seat.”
Chatine held tight to the controls, continuing her steady descent toward the ground. “The code says if we can help without getting killed, then we help.”
“And if we go down there, we’ll probably be killed.”
“You don’t know that,” Chatine pointed out.
“And you don’t know it’s safe. When in doubt, don’t help.”
Chatine shot him a glance. “Is that the community’s code, or yours?”
That shut him up. If only for a moment. “We don’t get involved! That’s a rule!”
“Well, then, good thing you Défecteurs are really good at breaking rules,” Chatine snapped, and guided the ship swiftly and steadily toward the ground.
- CHAPTER 57 - MARCELLUS
AT FIRST, MARCELLUS SAW NOTHING except endless gray clouds. But the sound was getting louder. It rattled the air around them. It shook the ground beneath their feet. It plunged his heart into a frenzied panic.
Combatteurs.
They had found him. His grandfather had tracked the ship, tracked the escape pod, and now he was going to end it all in a rain of fiery, scorching explosifs from the sky.
And they were an easy target. Sitting in wide-open terrain with their blue parachute flapping in the wind like a homing beacon.
Marcellus turned to Alouette and then to Cerise. The fear in both their eyes told him they’d heard it too. They all looked to the sky with puzzled and terrified expressions. But still, there was nothing. Where was that sound coming from? No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t pinpoint its origins. But there was one thing for certain: It was getting closer.
“What is it?” Alouette asked.
Marcellus shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Should we move?” Cerise asked, her eyes darting anxiously to Gabriel. Marcellus knew what she was thinking. How would they possibly move him without injuring him more?
“Where would we go?” Marcellus asked. “If it’s a craft, it’ll move faster than we could ever travel by foot. And if it’s already spotted us, then