Chapter : 1525

  "What do we do?"

  "We wait for the dawn," Lloyd said. "And we hope Ken is already gone."

  ----

  Five miles away, in the secondary safe house, Ken Park was not gone. He was fighting.

  The escape hadn't been clean. The Chimera prototype, the boy with the mechanical claw, had recovered faster than expected. He had tracked them. He had followed the scent of Risa.

  He had crashed through the door of the safe house just as Ken was packing the final bag.

  Now, the small room was a war zone. Furniture was smashed. The walls were scarred with green fire and claw marks.

  Jasmin was in the bedroom, barricaded behind a dresser with Risa.

  Ken stood in the main room, facing the monster. He was bleeding from a dozen cuts. His left arm hung uselessly at his side, the shoulder dislocated.

  The Chimera stood by the door. His skin was smoking. One of his eyes was damaged, flickering. But he didn't seem to care.

  "Target located," the boy droned. "Obstacle... persistent."

  "I'm not an obstacle," Ken growled, shifting his grip on his knife. "I'm a wall."

  The boy raised his claw. "Demolish."

  He charged.

  Ken didn't dodge. He couldn't. He was too slow with one arm.

  He roared and met the charge. He ducked under the claw and slammed his body into the boy's chest.

  CRACK.

  They crashed into the wall. Plaster rained down.

  The boy grabbed Ken by the throat. He lifted him off the ground.

  "Termination," the boy said. The green fire flared in his palm, aiming for Ken’s face.

  Ken couldn't break the grip. He was strong, but the Chimera was a machine.

  "Jasmin!" Ken choked out. "Run!"

  "No!" Jasmin screamed from the bedroom.

  She burst out. She wasn't holding Risa. She was holding a heavy iron skillet.

  She didn't look like a mouse. She looked like a queen. Her skin shimmered. Diamond.

  She swung the skillet with both hands.

  CLANG!

  She hit the Chimera in the back of the head. The skillet bent around his skull.

  The boy staggered. He dropped Ken. He turned, his mechanical neck whirring.

  "Secondary target," he said. "Hostile."

  He backhanded Jasmin.

  It was a casual blow, but it had the force of a wrecking ball.

  Jasmin flew across the room. She hit the wall and slid down. She didn't move.

  "Jia!" Ken screamed.

  The rage that filled him was cold and absolute. He forgot the pain. He forgot the mission.

  He looked at the monster that had hurt her.

  "You," Ken whispered. "Are. Dead."

  He reached into his pocket. He pulled out a small, red crystal. A Mana-Bomb. A suicide weapon Lloyd had given him for "absolute emergencies."

  He didn't throw it. He clenched it in his fist.

  He charged.

  The Chimera raised his claw.

  Ken tackled him. He drove him to the ground. He wrapped his legs around the boy's torso. He pinned the mechanical arm.

  He held the crystal against the boy's chest, right over the glowing core of runes.

  "Game over," Ken said.

  He crushed the crystal.

  BOOM.

  The safe house exploded in a flash of red light. The walls blew out. The roof collapsed.

  Silence fell over the ruins.

  From the rubble, a hand emerged. It was diamond.

  Jasmin coughed, pushing debris off herself. She was bruised, bleeding, but alive. Her diamond skin had saved her from the blast and the impact.

  She looked around frantically. "Ken! Ken!"

  She saw him.

  He was lying under a beam. He was still. His clothes were burned. His skin was scorched.

  But the Chimera was gone. Blown to pieces.

  Jasmin crawled to him. She checked his pulse.

  It was faint. Weak. But it was there.

  "You idiot," she sobbed. "You big, stupid idiot."

  She grabbed his good arm. She pulled. She dragged him out of the rubble.

  She ran back to the bedroom. The closet had protected Risa. The girl was curled up, terrified but unharmed.

  "Come on," Jasmin said, her voice shaking. "We have to go."

  She supported Ken on one side, held Risa's hand on the other.

  She limped into the alley. Into the night.

  They were alive. They had the girl. But the cost... the cost was high.

  And in the distance, she could hear the sirens of the Obsidian Eye getting closer.

  Chapter : 1526

  The rain in Saber had turned from a drizzle into a deluge, washing the soot and grime of the city into the gutters. It should have been a cleansing rain, but to Jasmin, it felt like the sky was weeping for them. She trudged through the mud of a narrow alleyway, the weight of Ken Park’s massive arm heavy across her shoulders.

  Ken was a mountain of a man, but right now, the mountain was crumbling. His breathing was ragged, a wet, hitching sound that terrified her. The makeshift bandage on his shoulder was soaked through with dark blood, and his skin was gray and clammy. Yet, he kept moving. One foot in front of the other, driven by a will that defied biology.

  Clutched in Jasmin’s other hand was Risa’s small, cold hand. The girl was in shock, stumbling along blindly, her eyes wide and unseeing. Following close behind were the three other children they had managed to pull from the cages—two boys and another girl, all emaciated, all terrified, moving like ghosts in the shadows.

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  "We need... cover," Ken rasped, his voice barely audible over the drumming rain. "Patrols... closing in."

  Jasmin looked around frantically. They were in the lower slums, a maze of rotting wood and crumbling stone. The festival lights were distant memories here. Here, there was only darkness.

  "The backup safe house," Jasmin whispered. "Lloyd rented an attic three streets over. We can make it."

  "No," Ken grunted. He stopped, leaning heavily against a wet brick wall. He tilted his head, listening with instincts honed by a lifetime of war. "Listen."

  Jasmin strained her ears. At first, she heard only the rain. Then, she heard it.

  Thud. Thud. Thud.

  The rhythmic, heavy tread of armored boots. Lots of them. And not just the erratic steps of the City Watch. This was the disciplined march of the Obsidian Eye.

  "They are boxing us in," Ken said grimly. "Sector sweep. They know we are here."

  Jasmin felt a surge of panic. She reached up to her ear, where a small, rough piece of rock was taped. It was another one of Lloyd’s inventions—a communication stone, shaved down and embedded with a vibration rune. It acted like an earpiece, transmitting sound directly into the skull bone.

  "Doctor?" Jasmin whispered, touching the stone. "Doctor, are you there?"

  Static buzzed in her head, followed by the calm, slightly bored voice of Lloyd Ferrum.

  "I am here, Jia. Though currently, I am pretending to be a terrified victim of political incompetence while sitting on a very uncomfortable velvet chair. What is your status?"

  "It's bad," Jasmin said, her voice trembling. "Ken is hurt. Badly. We have the package—Risa and three others. But the streets are swarming. The Obsidian Eye is everywhere. We can't get to the attic."

  "Do not go to the attic," Lloyd’s voice turned sharp. "I am monitoring the city guard frequencies. They found the attic ten minutes ago. If you go there, you walk into a cage."

  Jasmin’s blood ran cold. "Then where? The gates?"

  "Sealed," Lloyd said. "Cassius has locked down the city. Nothing bigger than a rat gets out tonight. They have mana-scanners at every exit and aerial patrols circling the walls. If you try to leave, they will spot you."

  "We are trapped," Jasmin said, looking at the shivering children and the bleeding giant beside her. "We are trapped in the middle of the city with four fugitive children and a dying man."

  "Ken is not dying," Lloyd said, though his voice held a trace of worry. "He is too stubborn to die. Put him on."

  Jasmin pressed her ear against Ken’s. "It's him."

  "Kasim," Lloyd said. "Report."

  "Combat effectiveness... thirty percent," Ken grunted. "Chimera prototype destroyed. But... collateral damage high. I can hold a choke point for... five minutes. Maybe ten. You need to get them out."

  "Don't talk like a martyr, it's annoying," Lloyd snapped. "I am looking at the map in my head. You are in the Tannery District?"

  "Yes."

  "You are surrounded," Lloyd stated flatly. "The net is tightening. They are driving you toward the river, where they have a kill team waiting. You have no exit vector."

  "Then we fight," Ken said, his hand moving to his knife.

  "No," Lloyd said. "You fight, you die. And Risa dies. And then I have to explain to my father why his favorite bodyguard is dead, which will be very awkward. We need a radical solution."

  Chapter : 1527

  Silence stretched over the line. Jasmin could hear the soldiers getting closer. She saw the beam of a mana-searchlight sweep across the rooftops above them.

  "Doctor," Jasmin pleaded. "Please. Tell us what to do."

  "I am thinking," Lloyd muttered. "The gates are closed. The safe houses are burned. The sewers are likely watched. Where is the one place Cassius won't look? Where is the one place he thinks is impenetrable?"

  Jasmin waited.

  "The arrogance of power," Lloyd mused. "He thinks he owns the board. He thinks the safest place is his own fortress."

  A pause.

  "Bring them to me," Lloyd said.

  Jasmin blinked, rain dripping off her nose. "What?"

  "Bring them to the Palace," Lloyd commanded.

  "The Palace?!" Jasmin nearly shouted, clapping a hand over her mouth. "Are you crazy? That is where Cassius is! That is where the guards are!"

  "Exactly," Lloyd said. "It is the eye of the storm. Cassius has deployed every elite unit he has to scour the city and the border. He has stripped the palace defenses to hunt you down outside. He thinks you are running away. He will never, in a million years, expect the fugitives to break into his home."

  "But... how?" Jasmin asked, looking at the towering black walls of the Royal Palace in the distance. "It's a fortress."

  "It is a fortress built on secrets," Lloyd said. "And I happen to be having tea with the girl who knows where the skeletons are buried. Get to the West Cliff. The old drainage outflow. Move. Now."

  The line went dead.

  Jasmin looked at Ken. "He wants us to go to the Palace."

  Ken stared at her. For a moment, she thought he would argue. Then, a slow, bloody grin spread across his face.

  "Crazy," Ken wheezed. "Suicidal. I like it."

  He pushed himself off the wall.

  "You heard the Doctor," Ken growled to the terrified children. "We are going to visit the King. Move."

  ----

  Moving through the city was a game of inches. Every corner was a potential ambush; every shadow could hide a patrol. Jasmin took the lead, her senses heightened by fear and the lingering adrenaline of the fight. She used her small size to scout ahead, peeking around rain barrels and piles of refuse.

  "Clear," she whispered, waving Ken forward.

  They moved in a staggered line. Jasmin first, then the children holding hands, then Ken bringing up the rear, limping but holding his rifle ready. They stuck to the darkest parts of the slums, navigating through alleys so narrow that Ken’s shoulders brushed both walls.

  The rain was their ally. It masked their footsteps and obscured their heat signatures from the aerial mages. But it also made the cobblestones slick and treacherous.

  "My feet hurt," one of the boys whimpered. He couldn't have been more than seven.

  Jasmin fell back. She didn't shush him. She didn't scold him. She knelt down and looked him in the eye.

  "I know," she said softly. "I know it hurts. But we are playing a game. A game of hide and seek with the bad men. And if we win... we get warm soup. And blankets. And no more cages."

  The boy sniffled. "Soup?"

  "The best soup," Jasmin lied. "But we have to be quiet as mice. Can you be a mouse?"

  The boy nodded.

  "Good man," she said. She squeezed his hand. "Keep moving."

  Lloyd’s voice crackled in her ear again.

  "Status update," Lloyd said. "I am currently locked in the Princess's bedroom. Cassius has stationed guards at the door, but he is busy coordinating the manhunt from the War Room. I have... convinced... Seraphina to help."

  "How?" Jasmin whispered, checking a corner.

  "I told her we have children," Lloyd said. "That broke the last of her hesitation. She told me about a tunnel. An old smuggler's route her ancestors used during the civil wars. It hasn't been used in a hundred years. It comes out near the servants' quarters."

  "Where is the entrance?"

  "West Cliff base," Lloyd said. "There is a statue of a weeping angel. The entrance is beneath the plinth. You have to push the angel's left foot."

  "We are close," Jasmin said. "But there is a checkpoint at the bridge."

  They had reached the edge of the slums. Between them and the cliff lay the bridge over the canal. It was guarded by a squad of six soldiers and a mage. A barrier of blue light spanned the bridge.

  "We can't fight them," Ken whispered, coming up behind her. "Not quietly."

  Chapter : 1528

  "Don't fight," Lloyd said in her ear. "I am looking at the city grid. That bridge is powered by a localized mana-crystal. It is on the same grid as the streetlights."

  "So?"

  "So," Lloyd said, "I am going to cause a power surge. Wait for the blackout. You will have ten seconds before the backup generators kick in. Run like hell."

  "How are you going to cause a power surge from a bedroom?" Jasmin asked.

  "I am not," Lloyd said. "You are. Ken, do you still have the spare Mana-Jammer?"

  Ken patted his pocket. "One left."

  "There is a junction box on the wall of the bakery to your left," Lloyd instructed. "It feeds the district. Jam it. It will cause a feedback loop that should trip the breaker for the bridge."

  Ken looked at the bakery. He saw the metal box.

  "Distance is fifty yards," Ken grunted. "I can make the throw."

  He pulled the Jammer out. It was the size of an apple. He primed it.

  "Ready," Ken said. "On my mark. Three. Two. One."

  He threw it.

  The Jammer sailed through the air, a dark blur in the rain. It slammed into the junction box.

  CRACK-ZZZRT!

  Sparks showered down. A loud pop echoed through the street.

  Instantly, the streetlights for three blocks died. The blue barrier on the bridge flickered and vanished. The guards shouted in confusion, their night vision blinded by the sudden darkness.

  "Go!" Ken hissed.

  They sprinted. Jasmin grabbed the children and pulled them forward. They ran across the wet bridge, their footsteps masked by the shouting guards and the thunder overhead.

  "Who goes there?" a guard yelled, swinging his torch wildly.

  Ken paused. He picked up a rock and threw it in the opposite direction, smashing a window.

  "Over there!" another guard shouted. "They're flanking us!"

  The guards ran toward the noise.

  Jasmin and the children slipped past them, disappearing into the shadows of the cliff path. Ken followed, limping heavily, his breath coming in ragged gasps.

  They reached the base of the cliff. The statue of the weeping angel was there, covered in moss and ivy.

  "Left foot," Jasmin muttered.

  She pushed on the stone foot. It didn't move.

  "Help me!" she whispered to the children.

  Together, they pushed. Ken added his remaining strength.

  With a grinding noise of stone on stone, the plinth slid aside. A dark, narrow hole was revealed. The smell of stale air and ancient dust wafted out.

  "You're in?" Lloyd’s voice asked.

  "We found it," Jasmin said.

  "Good," Lloyd said. "Now comes the fun part. You have to climb. It goes up. A long way up. And there are rats. Big ones. Sorry, Jia."

  Jasmin shuddered. She hated rats.

  "Get in," she told the children. "Quickly."

  They slid into the hole. Ken squeezed in last, pulling the statue back into place just as the searchlights from the bridge swept over the area.

  They were in the tunnel. Inside the rock. Beneath the palace.

  "We are safe," Jasmin whispered, though the darkness felt suffocating.

  "No," Ken said, leaning against the damp wall. "We are just in a different kind of trap. Now we are in the viper's nest."

  He coughed, and Jasmin heard the wet sound of blood in his lungs.

  "We have to hurry," Jasmin said, fear gripping her heart. "Lloyd is waiting."

  "Lead on," Ken said. "I'm right behind you."

  They began the climb into the heart of the enemy.

  The tunnel was a claustrophobic nightmare. It was barely wide enough for Ken’s shoulders, forcing him to move sideways in places, dragging his injured arm. The floor was slick with slime, and the air was thin, tasting of rust. And Lloyd hadn't lied about the rats. They skittered in the shadows, their eyes reflecting the faint light of the glow-crystal Jasmin held.

  "I hate this," Jasmin whispered, kicking a rat away from Risa’s foot. "I hate this so much."

  "Think of it as a historical tour," Lloyd’s voice chirped in her ear. "You are walking the same path as the legendary Smuggler King of the Second Era. He allegedly hid a fortune in gold down there."

  "I don't see gold," Jasmin grumbled. "I see rodent droppings."

  "Keep moving," Lloyd said. "You should be approaching a vertical shaft. There is a ladder. Iron rungs. Check them before you put weight on them. They are old."

  They found the shaft. It went straight up into the darkness. The rungs were rusted and wet.

  "Children first," Ken ordered. "I will go last. If I fall, I don't want to crush anyone."