Hope in Ruins Book III: The Fountain and the City of Salt

Chapter 16: Sister of the Stars

ANDA

Gunshots woke her, setting her heart racing and her blood pounding.

For two days, she'd been left alone in her cell in the blue-green water light of the blinds, her visions snapping and guttering like a candle. Guards came with meals and retrieved the empty dishes, but other than that, she'd been ignored. And that was fine with her.

After her conversation with Cassandra, she wasn't sure what to think or do. Her friend had kept her secret all this time. Didn't she owe her something for that trust? But what would Cassandra ask of her and her visions? She'd spent those two days pondering in silence. Until the gunshot started.

At the sound of gunfire, instinct took over, and she rolled from her bed onto the floor, getting away from the window. She knew the Unseen didn't allow guns but were things different in the City of Salt?

More gunshots. Closer.

She scrambled into the corner under the water light and tried to calm herself. Was this Cassandra and her Faction, or was this Loraine? Fear wrapped bony white hands around her neck and squeezed. Maybe it was finally too late to choose a side, and they all would die in this cold and dead city. Maybe they should have fought. If she could only access her visions, perhaps she could figure out what was going on, but the blinds still glowed blue-green in the corners of her cell, and her visions were blurred and hazy shadows.

Yelling in the hallway outside her door. More gunshots.

Quiet.

Anda watched the door from the corner, the light above her turning everything blue, even her fear. When the door slammed open, she realized that she didn't even have a weapon.

Stephen, blue and green and teal in the light of the blinds, strode into the cell. He held his staff in one hand, a gun in the other. He stopped and stared at Anda.

"This is your last chance," he said as he holstered his gun.

"I'm not—"

Shouts in the hallway.

"Anda, are you ready?" he asked. "Are you with us?"

But guards burst through the open door. They held guns and screamed at Stephen to drop the weapons. The two guards flanked him.

"Staff too. Drop the staff," a guard in black said.

Stephen looked down at the staff in his hands but did not drop it.

"I said—"

A whirl of hands and feet and Stephen swung his staff in blurring sweeps almost too fast to see. A deafening crack as the second guard fired, but the gun sailed from his hand as Stephen's staff slammed the weapon from him.

The wet thunk of wood against bone and flesh, and one guard went down, blood pouring from his nose.

The other, the one who'd lost his gun, charged, but Stephen's staff was lowered with prongs ready, and it caught the guard in the gut. He thrashed and spasmed as electricity surged through him, then he fell to the ground and stilled.

Anda watched in shock as Stephen whirled his staff to a ready position and extended a hand to her. Anda had never seen him fight with his staff before, not like this. It frightened her.

"Let's go," he said and dragged Anda to her feet before she could protest. Anda barely had time to pull on her shoes and reach for a sweater as Stephen dragged her towards the door. Stumbling after him, she stepped over the guards and into the fluorescent light of the hall. As she did, that opaque, filmy feeling over her mind disappeared, but she barely noticed.