LITMIR.BIZ

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three-quarters of the Blight is overrun or abandoned.

      The drop light flicks from red to green. Kallio lets the crates go. One by one they rumble backwards to the open ramp and tumble out. Their drogue chutes snap and fill.

      The view swings right.

      I twitch big time as I see Prime itself, crouching there high on the hill above the Blight, like a gigantic, stone-walled toad. Within those walls, metal towers gleam like mercury, flinging the dawnshine back at Kallio’s helmet-cam. It’s his stronghold.

      The Saviour. Warlord. Lawmaker. Despot. Ruler of Wrath.

      Our enemy. And . . . my father.

      So hard to believe, even now. So wrong. So unfair.

      His fortress too – that was where they once dragged me and sucked my nublood out to pump into him, to heal his crippled, failing body. The memories reach inside me through my eyes, grasp my guts with ice-cold fingers and start to squeeze.

      I’ve seen enough. I hit stop, yank the buds from my ears.

      ‘Wow,’ I say, fighting to keep my voice level. ‘Blight’s a mess.’

      ‘Did tell you,’ Sky says, without looking up.

      With the sun on the canvas all day, it’s still warm in the tent. She’s peeled her jumpsuit top off and knotted it round her waist. I put the screen down and watch her sadly, the way her shoulder bones slide under her T-shirt with each stroke of the stone in her hand. Muscles stand out like cables in her skinny arms. A crescent of pale skin uncovers at the small of her back as she leans forward. Tempting. I could reach her with my toes and give her a tickle. Would do a while back, without thinking. Not now.

      I’ve been shrugged off enough. It’s no fun.

      Anyway, we’re not alone. Others are off duty and taking it easy too. Colm’s on the upper bunk above us, reading something. I bet his ears are flapping.

      Sky coughs. She’s got another cold.

      ‘This peace deal,’ I say to her back. ‘What do you think?’

      Finally, she quits with the whetstone, holsters the knife and squirms around to face me. ‘It’s only a rumour.’

      ‘What if it turns out to be true?’

      ‘Even if it is, we both know it won’t be worth squat. Slayers are snakes. The Saviour’s the biggest snake of all. You don’t make deals with snakes, you just stamp on their head.’

      A man struggles inside through the tent flap. Sky darts a glance at him as he heads for his bunk, and looks disappointed.

      ‘Still no word from Ness?’ I ask her.

      She shakes her head. ‘Still working on it. He’ll crack it soon.’

      ‘And if he doesn’t?’

      ‘He’d better. For his own good.’ She pats her knife.

      I’m working on a scowl when she winks. Not funny though. Here we are, with what could be a miraculous peace breaking out. We could have a future, for the first time in our lives. But that doesn’t interest Sky in the slightest. Course not.

      Wood creaks above us. Colm’s upside-down face appears.

      ‘If this peace deal does come off,’ he says, ‘maybe we’d do a prisoner exchange. You could ask for your sister.’

      Sky sneers. ‘You think that’s likely?’

      Colm, his upside-down face reddening, shrugs at her.

      ‘More likely than you rescuing her. And you’re forgetting something, Sky. Right now there’s a ceasefire. Screw that up by trying to bust your sister out of wherever she’s being held and Ballard will skin you.’

      ‘Any deal will just be a trick,’ she snarls. ‘Of all people, you should know that, what with being raised a Slayer .’

      She stresses the last bit. Deliberate. Nasty.

      Is this why Sky can’t stand him? Rona said it was jealousy, me having Colm, her missing Tarn. I’d thought it was my brother saying that going after Tarn was dumb, that our cause comes first.

      ‘Colm didn’t choose that,’ I say through my teeth.

      She rocks back and holds her hands up. ‘Okay, okay. All I’m saying is no way am I hanging about here, waiting on some peace treaty that might never happen. Soon as Ness comes up with the goods, I say we go looking for Tarn.’ Her eyes find mine and drill into them. ‘That was the deal. Remember?’

      We go looking for Tarn . I roll the words around my mouth, not saying them aloud, just tasting them. They taste of ashes.

      But I did make that deal. ‘Sure.’

      Colm lets out a disgusted sigh and rolls out of sight.

      ‘You’re always moaning about wanting to fight. Going after Tarn with me is your chance to see some action,’ Sky says.

      My face goes hot. ‘I do want to fight, but –’

      ‘Yeah, yeah,’ she cuts in. ‘Ballard says you’re too valuable.’

      ‘He is too valuable,’ Colm says.

      ‘I’m not,’ I say. ‘Sky’s right. I stopped being valuable after I led Gemini to the Facility.’ The truth is, Ballard and the rest of the rebel council are only worried I’ll get myself captured. We’re sure the Saviour was hurt bad in the raid. They don’t want Slayers getting their hands on my nublood and healing him again.

      Sky nods. Her eyes go narrow and sly.

      ‘Ballard’s not here to stop us, is he? What about it, Kyle?’

      Before I can say anything Colm jumps down from his bunk. Never have I seen my brother look so fed up, which is saying something because he tends to the grim and serious.

      ‘Don’t be crazy,’ he says, almost spitting.

      Sky laughs her bitter laugh. ‘What’s your problem?’

      He curses. ‘You are. You think you can do what you fraggin’ like, and to hell with everybody else.’

      Her face, always so pale and bloodless, goes white. She hops off the bed and faces him, hand on the hilt of her knife.

      ‘That what you think, huh, Slayer-boy?’

      I scramble up and get between them. ‘Don’t call him that.’

      She shoves me back a step. ‘Tell your gom of a brother to shut it.’

      But my brother isn’t done arguing yet. ‘Don’t listen to her, Kyle. She’ll get you killed, for nothing.’

      Sky’s lips twitch. ‘Nothing? My sister’s a nothing?’

      She snatches up her cleverbox and stalks off.

      I curse and close my eyes. When I open them again, Sky’s long gone. Colm looks at me and slowly shakes his head.

      ‘Don’t,’ I tell him, as his gob opens. ‘Just don’t, all right!’

5

       THE FIREFIGHT

      I love my new-found brother. I do. We share everything: we like the same stuff, make the same jokes and laugh at them. Sometimes I wonder how I ever got along without Colm.

      Now though, I need a break from him slagging off Sky.

      Not that he’s all wrong, but I’m not in the mood to hear it. I slip away, leaving him chuntering away to himself on his bunk. Soon as I’m outside the tent I stand up straight and suck fresh

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