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Noel hesitated. They wouldn’t, would they? He automatically shook his head, mainly to keep Grey pacified, but that little inkling of doubt spread through just as the woman pointed to the horizon and dismissed one of the vehicles.
Grey nudged him. “What is she doing?” Panic rose in his voice. “Why are they leaving?”
Noel suppressed that instinctual reply of ‘I don’t know’ in favor of sitting up straight and craning his neck as the woman moved to the people waiting in front of them. Another car sent packing. Grey clutched a chunk of Noel’s denim jacket, tugging on it as they were approached and the shadows of dusk set in.
“Traveling?” the woman prompted without preamble. “Unless you’re here for work, in which case, there aren’t any jobs available.”
“Traveling,” Noel said, settling back into his seat with relief.
She hummed and flipped through a couple papers with her mumbled next request for their names and marks. The glimpse of Grey’s shaking forearm in the corner of Noel’s vision turned into a domino effect of the woman scowling and her two assistants exchanging looks.
“We don’t normally allow hemomancers inside. Too much of a liability.”
Grey’s arm dipped with Noel’s heart plummeting in his chest. “He won’t cause tr?—”
“That’s what they all say,” snapped one of the guards as he uncrossed his arms to reach for the holster at his hip.
Anger bubbled up within Noel, his hands curling into fists. But before he could open his mouth to argue otherwise, Grey had already grabbed a chunk of his sleeve. “Let’s just go,” he whispered. Defeated. Afraid. Every emotion that slid smoothly and cleanly through his ribs before feeling that sharp sting.
His hesitation to argue gave way to a shift in the woman’s features—her scrutiny ebbed into remorse—concern.
“Is he your partner?”
Noel blinked with surprise as he heard Grey sputter. His hand shot back to latch onto Grey’s knee, immediately feeling guilty for how quickly he went tense. “Yes,” he blurted. “Sorry, we’re just really exhausted. Not a lot of places take hemomancers without some sort of caveat, so we’ve been trying to survive on the outskirts of the woods where we can. We won’t be around for more than a night to catch our breath, I promise.”
One of the guards pursed his lips, but the woman’s brows knit together in sympathy before she scribbled something onto her clipboard. She released two sheets of thick paper and held it out for him. “Don’t lose these. If someone asks for your papers, you’ll be required to show that you’ve been allowed admittance. Don’t go over the allotted timeslot either, understood?”
Noel nodded. “Thank you so much. We promise not to cause any problems.” He slid the documentation from her grasp, and she stepped aside, ushering them into their temporary haven before the last gasp of daylight was snuffed out.
24
GREY
The fifth-floor motel room they snagged was a barebones thing—every piece of furniture constructed of black pipes and planks with thin mattresses and minimal décor. It boasted cleanliness from the distinct lack of dust and the scent of lemons, but when they shut off the lights and drew the curtains, the clangs and whirrs of machinery pried apart Grey’s mind with the undulating shadows of hanging cars zipping up and down nearby buildings.
Cold and mechanical.
The quiet, rhythmic breathing from Noel in the other bed wasn’t soothing enough for him to drift off, not when this felt more like a prison than the one they’d escaped from the night before. His head turned to see Noel’s arm tucked under his pillow and his face half-buried, all while Grey replayed the last few days over and over again in his mind.
He’d done nothing but slow Noel down from one place to the next, sinking him like a stone with Grey’s hemomancy jerking them to a halt every other step in this journey. And that didn’t even include Doctor Cavan’s furious chase or Reign’s crazed hunt. He tried to push down that overwhelming idea that he should’ve left yesterday instead of allowing Noel to draw him back into that unspoken promise of protection that Grey couldn’t repay.
Guilt nagged at him until he finally slipped out of bed and tugged on his shoes, his stomach gnawing before he reached the motel room door. So, he tucked one of Uncle Atticus’s small chunks of rations in his pocket and set out onto the metal catwalk outside.
The crisp night air stole the breath from his lungs with its chill. As the city ebbed and flowed in the dead of night, Grey climbed. Every step to the next landing brought a gentle breeze to ruffle his hair and nip at his face. Each rung of the ladder to the roof of the monstrous metal contraption brought an ache to his arms, but it was worth it when he stood among the tallest structures of the city and drank in the world beyond.
Tall trees, hulking mountains, and ominous cliffsides through the jagged Old Trail made him feel so small in the grand scheme of things—a speck in a stolen world that showed no mercy to the creatures fighting within it. He dropped to sit on the edge and tapped the heels of his boots against the steel siding, cheesecloth-covered chunk of dried fruit and granola in hand under the soft light of the moon and stars.
The bite of cranberry tasted of home: a harsh place carved out for caring people who sugar-coated their little nooks to combat the unforgiving reality beyond their walls. Tart but savory—palatable. His vision blurred as he thought of his loft overlooking the place he loved—a place he’d likely never see again without putting everyone he cared about in danger. His heart squeezed at the memory of Atticus and Ingrid’s arguments that the wrath of the machromancers he’d been rescued from might destroy them all.
And here he was, running from something that would absolutely demolish so much more.
His chewing slowed, all the sweeter notes going sour as he began to fold up the cloth again. How much more destruction and strife could he bring before people would spit at him for not surrendering because he was too selfish and fearful? Didn’t that categorize him as a monster? As monstrous as the fair folk that pursued him?
He swallowed and closed his eyes, trying to focus on the amplified white noise of the city around him, but every sound rang hollow with its lifeless tune of the artificial comforts humanity had constructed. So Grey focused on the more melodic sounds of rustling leaves, imagining himself when he was much smaller and trying to catch frogs in a pond with the quiet chuckles of his mother warming him with every attempt.
A sudden squawk pitched him forward, and he quickly rocked back with his heart hammering in his chest as he twisted to take in the gleaming, purple-glinting feathers of a raven beside him. The creature’s head tilted before opening its beak to complain again.
“Are you hungry?” Grey whispered, subconsciously unfolding the cloth to break off a piece. He crumbled it between his fingers and dumped it in front of the bird like he was letting sand slip through his fist.
