The Hunt - Megan Shepherd Page 0,69

were ready for self-governance.”

“We are,” she whispered urgently. “You told me yourself how dangerous the Gauntlet puzzles can be. Isn’t it the definition of being intelligent to find a way around that risk? Self-preservation? I can cheat the Gauntlet, and then, if you’re right about someone tampering with the algorithm’s predictions, there’s a chance we could go home.”

“Perhaps.”

She was surprised he didn’t contradict her, though there was a strangely hard edge to his voice.

“But there would be consequences you cannot foresee,” he added.

“What consequences?”

He didn’t answer.

“Look,” she said, “you would be humiliated, I get it. But a little bruised pride is nothing compared to what you did to me. You—” Her voice hitched. “You gave me hope and then crushed it.”

The wall panel hummed softly, like a trapped insect, and for a while it drowned out all other noise. Then he curled his fingers around hers. “It was all so you, and your kind, could have a better life.”

“Roshian nearly killed me. Is that better?”

He leaned in. “I blame myself for not foreseeing his intentions.” His hands were growing warmer. He glanced at the door, as though remembering the body bleeding out into the savanna sand that, if found, would ruin them both. “Sometimes I think the Council is right when they insist humans are of a lesser intelligence, because that is the only way to explain such a senseless plan to cheat the Gauntlet. And to solicit the Mosca’s help is even more foolish. Just because Leon lives among them does not make them loyal. Everything is a whim for them, whatever they feel like that day, betraying a promise or keeping it.” He shook his head. “Your plan is foolhardy.”

“Maybe the Mosca aren’t trustworthy,” she said. “But neither are you.”

“You said you forgave me.”

She looked down at her hands. “I lied.”

His fingers curled harder around hers. “I’ve done everything for you. I took you from a dying planet. I gave you a world where you could be happy. I gave you a partner who was perfectly matched for you. I’m risking everything to expand your mind, so that you, and all your kind, don’t have to live like animals anymore. I am risking my life and my own freedom—as are Tessela and Fian and many others—because we believe in our mission to free humanity. We are doing this for you.” His hands were shaking now. Try as he might, his emotional cloak was slipping. “Even now, I am bending every rule to find out if your home planet is still in existence, though we both know it would mean that I’d never see you again. And you throw it all back at me like I have done nothing.”

At last, he let her go and stood. “Fian and I will bury Roshian’s body. But I will not let you go through with this foolish plan to cheat the Gauntlet. Either you will agree to run it honestly or we abandon all our plans right here. You can return to the Hunt and survive as long as you can behind bars, until you turn nineteen and they drag you off to an even worse place. Tell me, right now. No lies. No deceptions. What do you choose?”

Cora’s pulse throbbed in her head, too loud to think. In Bay Pines, the guards had always offered the inmates two choices. It was supposed to teach them to make good decisions. Once, Queenie got into a fight in the cafeteria, and the guards said she could either spend free period cleaning the spilled food or be dragged straight off to solitary. Queenie had just smiled and stabbed a fork into her hand, and spent the next two weeks in a cushy bed in the psych hospital watching Friends reruns.

Cora had learned a lesson from Queenie that day, but not the one the guards wanted: just because someone told you there were only two choices didn’t mean they were right.

Sometimes you had to make your own third option.

29

Cora

“ANSWER ME, CORA,” CASSIAN said. “Agree to run the Gauntlet according to my rules. There is still time. It is for your own good.”

“Is it?” Her voice was dangerously soft. “We both know this is about more than the Gauntlet. You can’t stand the thought of your precious pet not obeying you.” She met his eyes with a challenging stare. “You can’t stop thinking about that day in the ocean surf when you kissed me. I bet you even want to do it again, don’t you? Feel