Page 99 of These Divided Shores
Jakes crossed to the window, frowning.
“Too soon for them to return,” Gunnar noted.
Vex slammed his head back against the wall. “Great. The refugees are rising up?”
Jakes grabbed the window’s bars. A pause, and his mouth dropped open.
The shouting outside broke on a noise Vex knew too well—a gunshot. Another.
Screams, then. Howls of terror.
“The refugees aren’t attacking.” Jakes didn’t move away from the window. “They’re shouting at Argrid. At defensors.”
Ben’s arms dropped, immobile, at his sides.
“Defensors?” Vex was the one who questioned Jakes. “What? No way—the Tuncians keep this place locked down. Argrid couldn’t have—”
But they had expanded the perimeter. They had stretched their raiders thin between patrol and the battle. Elazar would have heard of them stationed here, a haven of raiders.
And he had Cansu submissive to him now.
Gunnar shot up. “Elazar lured everyone away.”
Ben nodded, numb. “A trap.”
How had he not foreseen that?
Vex pushed to his feet. Ben watched him falter, clinging to the wall with a desperate, aching look from Gunnar to Ben.
“I can speak to them,” Ben said.
Gunnar’s face flared red. “Benat—”
“Help me get out of here. I need to get to whoever is leading the charge. I can—”
A wave of gunshots broke over a high-pitched shriek.The door to this hall of cells banged open, and a cry came from their guard.
Ben didn’t have long to reflect on the senseless death—two defensors stormed the hall, weapons out, taking stock of the place and the prisoners.
One smiled. “Príncipe Herexe,” he said to Ben, mocking.
Gunnar dove in front of Ben, flames alive on his arms. Ben put his hands up, sweat dripping down his spine in response to the heat and the panic and the look of feverish delight on that defensor’s face.
“Defensors!” Jakes yanked on his bars. “Defensors—free me. These heathens took me prisoner. I have secrets about them that the Eminence King will want to know.”
Ben shouldn’t have been surprised, but a part of him seized. Was Jakes lying? Did it matter?
The defensors—they must have gotten the keys from the dead guard—unlocked Jakes and Vex’s cell. Vex stayed against the wall, but he was a prisoner of the raiders, too, and the defensors didn’t recognize him—they ignored him.
“What about the prince?” one defensor asked. He cocked a pistol at his thigh but didn’t take aim, and Gunnar’s fire rose hotter.
“He is useless.” Jakes stayed the defensor’s wrist. “The raiders were considering killing him. They will now, especially after this attack. The Eminence King will benefit from raiders executing his son.”
Ben’s heart gave one aching thud when the defensorgrinned at him. It was not untrue, and if Argrid was attacking, then yes, Fatemah would kill him.
“True. Praise the Pious God,” the defensor said, and handed Jakes the loaded pistol.
He left with his comrade. Jakes lingered until their footsteps faded.
