Violet City by Page Morgan

Author:Page Morgan [Morgan, Page]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-05-02T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

The crash pounds through my bones and muscles, knocking my skull with such ferocity I can feel the roots of my teeth shift. Air drives out of my lungs. My ribs scream when I try to gasp in more. It hurts too much. Blinding pain seals my eyelids shut.

The transport rocks to a complete stop, but the vibrations from the crash still work through my body.

“Penelope.” Rowan’s voice is at my ear, breathless and urgent. Warm hands cradle my cheeks. “Penelope, open your eyes.”

When I do, a sheen of sweat glistens on his forehead and across the bridge of his nose. He blinks rapidly, his irises churning and sparking like an electrical storm in miniature.

“Can you move?”

I test my feet. Next, my legs. They ache, but they work. Rowan slides his arm underneath my shoulders to help sit me upright. My vision spins, and there are two, no three, of him crouching beside me.

“We have to leave. I’ll carry you if you can’t walk.”

I push at him. “I’m okay.”

Besides, how is he going to carry me? His arm is bleeding. My vision is still blurry, and sounds aren’t coming through just right, but it’s not the time to sit and recover. Not with the warden on our heels. I stand and stumble to the side. Rowan tries to pick me up, reaching down to hook the back of my legs with his arm. I wrench away.

“I said I can walk.” And the less he touches me, the better.

He lets go, and I nearly topple to the side. “Then walk,” he commands, before slamming his hand against the black and orange disc again. The door slides open, only this time it squeals with effort and gets stuck three quarters of the way to completion.

We hobble outside, into the sickly wash of an ultraviolet light. The sky glows with it, and I realize it’s coming from the belly of the cityship. It’s a giant nightlight, hanging there in the sky. The transport is no longer cloaked. It’s also half-buried in someone’s backyard. The scent of newly turned earth mixes with chemical fumes.

“We can’t be far from my neighborhood,” I say as Rowan leans heavily against the downed craft. He clutches his side with his hand, but his palm isn’t large enough to hide the gaping black hole in the abdomen of his suit. Smoke trails up from it, and his deep purple, nearly black blood stains his fingers.

“You’re hurt.” I reach for the hard exterior of his suit but pull my hand back just before I can touch the scorched material. “The warden shot you.”

“I’ll be fine. We need to move. Fast.” A series of clicks and pops follows, like air decompressing. He’s shedding his suit like he had on the ship, in his room. The chest opens and spreads, each arm splitting and springing apart. The legs of his suit also crack and spread until he can step out of it. I catch him as he stumbles.

“It’s traceable,” he explains. We leave it behind and start across the lawn, toward a line of hedges.

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