Pait felt like she’d spent the entire day hopping from frying pan to fire. Was there no fucking end?

Johnson and a half dozen other guards—Alesha looking guilty among them—had been dispatched to escort these two Ladies somewhere safe, and Pait was along for the ride. Johnson knew enough to slap irons on Pait’s wrists this time. He dragged her, kicking and thrashing, down a section of the street that the guards had managed to cordon off and clear of civilians. They were headed to the East Gate, to the cellblock there. It wouldn’t be Pait’s first time, but she wasn’t eager to go back.

The lady with the hammer was arguing in a shaken voice with Johnson, telling him to let Pait go. But Pait knew better than to think he could be reasoned with. She was going to have to find a way out of this on her ow—

Suddenly, Pait felt an extremely soft hand in hers. It startled her enough that she stopped struggling—and nearly dropped the small, cool object the hand had passed her. Pait quickly resumed struggling as she slid her thumb around the object—a key? She dared to glance sideways at the person closest to her, the odd white lady with all the blonde hair who kind of creeped Pait out. But the white lady just stared ahead, didn’t acknowledge Pait at all.

This wasn’t just any key—it was the key from Johnson’s keychain, still jangling from under his chlamys. The one he’d just used to lock Pait into these shackles. How…?

Pait wasn’t going to question it. Doing her best to hide her shackled hands in the folds of her cloak, Pait unlocked the irons, but held them on. She had to find the right moment.

The fight behind them had grown loud—she was a little curious who that big dude was. And why he wanted a little pebble so fucking bad. Someone had named him a Traitor to the Queendom…

The ground rumbled once again, this time enough to buckle a building behind them with a CRASH, and the weird white lady yelped and stumbled sideways—somehow missing Pait, but falling onto Johnson.

His grip on Pait loosened.

Pait knew an opportunity when she saw one. She shucked her irons and ran, shoving into Alesha (bitch) and dodging around the next guard, but—

The road forward, every building, every side street and alley were blocked by armored bodies. Johnson, who couldn’t seem to get his feet back under him properly, shouted for the guards to seize her, and they closed in.

There was nowhere to go. She would just have to pick the weakest-looking link in the chain and hope it snapped. Off to her right was a big, slow-looking guard at the mouth of an alley. She headed right for them at full speed and dropped—

If the road were smooth stone, maybe her plan to slide between the guard’s knees would have worked. Cobblestone didn’t work like that. All she managed to do was break her assbone and go flying into the guard’s knees, bringing the guard down in a painful metal heap on top of her.

A few minutes later, Pait found herself on the dirt floor of a holding cell in the East Gate, listening to what sounded like one earthquake after another in the distance. She’d been sure the big dude would get eviscerated by Ubika, but it seemed like he was at least holding his own. Who the hell was he?

Of course, Alesha had been left to guard Pait’s cell. She’d been the one to search Pait, looking apologetic all the while, and she’d even let Pait keep the little stone in her pocket, but Pait was absolutely not talking to her.

She was worn. She almost didn’t want to bother examining the lock on the cell door, or watching carefully what Alesha did with the key. The guards had to have their hands full out there—whole buildings were being leveled—so they probably wouldn’t get to her for a while anyway, right? Maybe she could finally just take a moment and breathe.

“...Vigore is assisting with the Traitor Prince’s capture, miss, and gave orders for you to sit in the East Gate’s safety—”

The Traitor Prince? For one wild second, Pait thought they meant Kure—but that didn’t make sense. That fucker was from Monster Island, and he didn’t look at all like the heroic illustrations Pait had seen on the walls of some of the shelters around Luvatha.

Surely that didn’t mean…?

“I understand, Sir Johnson,” came a soft voice, drifting down the hall leading to the cells. “I proved on the road here that it’s no place for my wobbling feet. But I’d certainly name it the place for the Head of the Guard.”

The door at the end of the cellblock opened, and the clamoring of golden greaves announced Johnson’s arrival, followed by the gliding steps of some very non-wobbling feet, and the clomping of steps weighed down by a great hammer.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

The weird white woman continued, “So I’m surprised to find you here. Sitting in the East Gate’s safety, babysitting two ladies from Broken Earth, and a child in a cell.”

Child. It made Pait bristle, but she kept her mouth shut.

“Lord Vigore and my subordinates can handle that, miss,” the guard said dismissively before coming to a stop before Pait’s cell.

A distant BOOM that made the stone walls of the cellblock shudder begged to differ.

“Sir Johnson,” Pait said, tipping her head back to rest it on the wall behind her.

“Aelia Pait,” he replied, smirking.

“It’s Pait.”

“Your name is whichever one I give you, now.”

Hammer Lady shot Johnson a look, her face flushed and fists trembling. “Lushale’s Most Wanted is wrecking your city, and your mind’s stuck on a kid you’ve already locked up?”

Again, Pait ignored the ‘kid’ bit. It was helping her case at the moment. “Locked up for the crime of asking help, too.”

The smirk grew smirkier. “You disappoint me, Aelia. I’ve said it a dozen times—I see your potential, even young as you are, and each time I’ve extended an offer, too. Why turn my job down again and again?”

Without missing a beat, Pait said, “The armor’s ugly.”

Johnson recoiled. “It is not.”

She had to hold in a snort—she hadn’t actually thought that would offend him.

“You’ll wish you’d seized the offer with both hands, Aelia, because it’s beyond your grasp now. There’s not much you can reach with chains holding you back.”

“They never hold me back long.”

“But this one you can’t slip, Aelia,” Johnson said, and the glint in his eye made her stomach twist.

Another distant BOOM. The wall rattled against Pait’s skull, but she kept her gaze on Johnson’s face.

He continued, “Not unless you can slip your skin itself.”

Keeping all fear from her voice, Pait asked, “Speak straight—I can’t follow your words in this twisting path.”

“You’ve been collecting strikes for years, and rejected reformation at every turn. If you’re carrying too many strikes, it leaves you no room left to hold any freedom.”

The white woman’s soft voice took on an edge. “Strikes don’t stick to children.”

“Ask anyone,” Johnson said, lip curling. “Ask Miss Aelia Pait herself. She’s eighteen. Old enough to earn a mark.”

“What?”

Pait scrambled to her feet, heart pounding, at the same time that the two ladies—even Alesha—spoke up, their protests all stumbling over each other. Hammer Lady heaved her hammer head-up and gripped the handle hard enough to turn her knuckles white. Johnson allowed them all to argue for a few moments before he shouted,

“ENOUGH!”

“No, fuck your ‘enough!’” Hammer Lady spat. “You can’t damn a kid to one of the queen’s camps over a bruised ego, you plumed cock!”

Johnson called, “Saxan, Angles, Fiel, Brewer! Remove these women!”

When they came through the door, Hammer Lady was ready. She reared back with her hammer, making the guards scramble for their weapons—but then she nearly dropped it. Its weight threw her off balance and she stumbled into the white lady, who caught her.

“NO!” she shouted, furious. The second time, her voice cracked. “No!” She tried again to swing her hammer, and it simply fell forward and hit the stone floor hard enough to kick up a chunk of stone.

The guards, including Alesha, who sent Pait one last apologetic look (fuck you), moved forward to take the women by their arms and lead them out.

“No,” Hammer Lady’s voice sounded small, but her hammer screamed as it was dragged over the stone.

The white lady tried to argue the entire way. “Lord Vigore wouldn’t want this, Sir Johnson. Wait for her return before you—”

“Lord Vigore isn’t Head of Luvatha’s City Guard, miss.”

“No, but her mother is the Head of the Royal Guard. I advise you wait—”

“I thank you, miss. I’ll consider it.”

When the door closed behind them, Pait felt … nothing. It was funny—she wasn’t scared. She wasn’t angry. Her heart was still pounding, and she felt sweat in her hairline. The bruises across her face, her hands, her sides throbbed, but only dully, like she’d drunk a pain potion and couldn’t really feel her own body anymore. Had she? Was that why she felt so odd all the sudden?

“Didn’t I name it, Aelia? That you’d wish you’d seized the offer?” But she didn’t even hear the words.

“I’m not eighteen,” Pait said faintly. “I don’t … I can’t name my age, exactly. My mom gave me whichever one fit her best at the time. It’s … I think it’s thirteen. Maybe fourteen. I’m not eighteen.”

“Convenient,” Johnson said, but Pait didn’t hear that either.

The door at the end of the hall swung open again, this time with an ominous creak, and another guard entered, clattering down the hall. As they neared Pait’s cell, she saw the tray they held before them—and what was laid out there. A bottle of shimmering black ink and a set of needles.

She could only whisper, “No.”