Page 12 of Red Marked

“As I said earlier, stay away from the ravine,” Pryce says again, walking me to the door. “But you can breathe a little easier. Whoever is out there clearly is capable of taking care of themselves.”

Once we clear the therapy wing and the door shuts behind us, he slows his pace and drops his voice.

“Listen, Flint.” He looks me in the eye. “Don’t put too much trust in what Quake told you. He is a feral. Perhaps not to be trusted.”

Holy fuck! Is he for real?

“Trauma does strange things to a person’s memory. He heard us talking and latched onto what we were saying. It could all be distorted. Let’s wait to hear back from our Council, shall we?”

I trust my own eyes, and I somehow trust Quake too.

Dr. Pryce sounds like he’s playing the political game. He’ll push on us whatever the Mistveil Council is selling.

I won’t be buying bullshit. That’s for sure.

“Bring me more feral males,” he says. “The more we have, the better. Group therapy is an important part of recovery. We can’t start that until we have a group of them here.”

“I’ll do my best.” I head for the pad, already thinking about the sky. “Hoping to hear something about those females by the time I’m back.”

“I can’t promise anything.” He lifts a hand, already turning back toward the therapy wing. “But I’ll do what I can.”

5

Star

Wind cuts under my wings as I descend low into the ravine, close enough that stone blurs past on both sides. If that was a group of feral males, they’re going to be sorry. We’re going to make sure they bleed.

I follow the bend first, then aim hard toward the ledges that cut into the walls above it. Raven crouches at the bend. There is a line of boulders already levered into place, ready to drop the second anything breaches the mouth. She lifts her head at my approach. Several females are spaced intermittently on both sides, with more boulders. They line the narrow ravine.

Perfect.

That should cut a good few of them down.

I fly on.

Lower down, where the ravine pinches to almost nothing, more females wait, with spears propped against the rock and stones stacked at their feet.

That should stop a couple more. Get them worried about continuing to our settlement.

If they make it past this point, we will need to retreat to the caves. Fenn holds the farthest post at the mouth. She meets my eyes and lifts her chin.

At this point, there are spikes stacked on the floor in the crevices. My females will lie in wait and spike those foolish enough to enter without invitation. It’ll give us enough time to fall back to safety, hopefully killing a few more of those bastards in the process.

Further in, the tunnel first narrows before it opens into a wider chamber where we have stashed more spikes.

This narrow section will be easy to defend. Large males will struggle to enter. Smaller males will be killed before they reach the chamber. Within the chamber are woven baskets that line the far wall, three deep. They are filled with dried meat and nuts. Then there are waterskins hanging from pegs driven into the stone. A little further into the cave is an underground river. The skins are just in case the river is contaminated or dammed in an attempt to flush us out. I’m not taking any chances.

If it comes to it, we could hole up in here for months.

Satisfied, I leave the caves, making my way to our settlement. There are wooden and reed houses with carefully laid stone paths. It isn’t much, but it is home.

Scarlet is sitting on the edge of the settlement on her own. She looks deep in thought.

“We’re ready,” I tell her, sitting on the grass next to her. “We’ll kill a smaller group easily and might be able to scare off a big group. If worse comes to worst, we’ll flee to the caves.”

She doesn’t look away from the ravine.

“I hope it doesn’t come to that,” she says. “I half-expected them to be back today.”