“What?”
“The dome is shattering,” Levi says, just as Alcide ducks back in for safety’s sake. “There must have been a fault in the glass from before. The explosion Adam set shattered it!”
Glass continues to rain down as the dome creaks so loudly that I feel as if the girders will fall in and smash us beneath their weight. I hear screaming coming from the royal end of the promenade, and shouts of confusion sound before us. Whoever is out on the street is at risk. The glass tinkles against the tank, and we hear the guys whooping for joy inside.
This is more than I ever dreamed of when Lyon said we would break the glass. I cautiously look up and see the sky above me. For the first time in two hundred years the sun will touch the buildings and the streets. Dawn will truly come to the dome, and I will be here to see it.
Finally the glass stops falling, and we move out, looking up to make sure there is nothing left to fall. The tank moves forward again. We scrape the glass off the seats of the cycles and climb back on.
The people who live above the shops are now sticking their heads out of their windows and looking at us and at the sky in shock. Some come out. “What’s happening?” a woman asks.
“You’re free now,” I say. “Free to go outside.”
“Where are the flames?” she asks.
“There are no flames,” I say. “Look up! Look at the sky!” She does and her jaw drops open in shock and she covers her mouth. We move on. What she does next is up to her.
We hear another gunshot and it ricochets off the tank. “This is it,” Pace says. A line of bluecoats comes into view, all with weapons. Twenty, maybe more, it is hard to tell as things get really confusing all at once. They fire at the tank and bullets whine around us. We are in danger of being hit, not from the bluecoats but from the bullets that bounce off the tank. David points down an alley. “Go around them,” he yells. Pace and Levi nod. Levi follows David, who goes left, and Pace and I go right, and the tank keeps on moving, even though the bluecoats fire repeatedly at it.
“They’re just following orders,” Pace says. “You’d think they’d just lay down their guns and go outside.”
“My father won’t give up, because giving up means admitting he’s wrong.” Pace doesn’t answer and I suddenly know why. I realize what I said. My father won’t give up. He won’t give up Zan, and he won’t give up his position, because he has staked everything he has on keeping the people on the inside from knowing that the outside is safe. He would rather die than admit he is wrong. Giving up is not an option.
We have got to get to Zan. Pace must realize it too because the cycle suddenly speeds up, and we zip through the alleyways and across the streets, daring anyone to get in our path. I loop the crossbow over my shoulder and wrap both arms around Pace’s rock-hard stomach.
Pace takes a corner on two wheels and I see the fountain ahead of us. I also see a cow. “Watch out!” I say in his ear as we come to another corner. Pace slams on the brakes and we slide sideways into the intersection. There are cows coming toward us. And pigs. And goats. They lumber awkwardly with the whites of their eyes showing. They’ve never run in their lives, much less walked, and they are in a panic. Pace puts the cycle in gear and the wheels spin as we get out of the way of the animals.
“We better try to get across on foot,” he says. “We might have a better chance.” We dismount and peer around the corner. The remaining animals are milling about more than running. Behind them I see a mass of people coming our way. I hope Adam and the rest are safe.
“It’s the workers,” I say. “We’ve got to move before they get here. There is no telling what they will do.”
Pace draws his pistol and takes my hand with the other. I take a good grip on the crossbow. “Let’s go,” he says, and we dash out into the street. A cow bumps into me, and I stagger a step but manage to keep my feet as we reach the fountain. The workers are getting closer. We duck low and continue on. In the distance I hear the engines of the steam cycles and the heavy clanking of the tank. We are all about to converge on my father’s building. I wonder what we will find there.
We dash down another alley and turn a corner, taking the same route we did when we surrendered a few weeks earlier. I press my hand to my wound and gasp for air as we arrive at my father’s building.
My father stands on the top step. His arm is around Zan and he holds a pistol to her head. Her hands are tied and her mouth gagged, but her eyes speak volumes. She is angry. Very angry. My heart sinks into my stomach. This has got to stop.
Lyon and James both stand on the steps below him. Pace slows to a walk as we come closer. Levi and David both arrive on their cycles. They dismount. Levi draws both his pistols, and we all four walk to the building and join Lyon and James on the lower steps.
“I should have known you couldn’t leave it alone,” my father says when he sees me. “Why couldn’t you just go away?”
“You sold me into slavery,” I say. “You expect me to just live with that?” I put my foot on the next step and something in his eyes tells me to stop. “Do you know what he wanted to do to me?”
“It was better than burning, wasn’t it?” he says.
“You are one sick and twisted man,” Levi says.
“Just let her go,” Lyon says. “None of this would have happened if you’d left my daughter alone.”
“None of this would have happened if you hadn’t come snooping around. The rovers would have taken them.” He moves the gun away from Zan’s head momentarily to wave it in my direction. Levi flinches and it immediately goes back to Zan’s temple. “We could have continued to live as we were. In peace.”
The workers are getting closer. Their footsteps fill the air. For some reason we can’t hear the tank anymore. That worries me, but not as much as Zan’s and the rest of our situation does at this exact moment. I really believe my father has gone insane. How could he not be? He’s told so many lies and manipulated so many people that he could not possibly keep up with it.
He looks haggard and old. He looks beaten. Yet he does not know it. He will not accept it. We have got to do something before the workers get here. There will be another riot. Where is Findley? Surely he can make my father see reason. Surely he can do something.
“Let her go, and we will leave,” Lyon says. “Just let her go.”
The workers pour into the street and run when they see us. They run right for us. They begin yelling and screaming and shaking their fists in the air. Some of them carry stout pieces of wood. We immediately turn around, all six of us, and form a barrier between my father and Zan and the workers. We aim our weapons outward.
My father needs us now. Yet he will not let go of Zan.
The crowd presses closer and we move up a step. And then another one. The area is full and more people are coming. Royals and shopkeepers and scarabs all converge into the alleyways until they are full, and they keep pressing toward us. The noise is deafening. Everyone is shouting. I see the king in the crowd, along with Jilly’s father. They try to force their way through to the steps without any luck. I cannot help them. All I can do is watch as the king is shoved to the side. I feel sorry for Jilly’s father. Hopefully he will know soon enough that Jilly is safe.
We need the tank, and we need Findley to bring the bluecoats. We need more weapons to keep this mob from rioting.
Where are Adam and Jon? Colm and Joe? Please let them be safe. Please God, help us. I look out over the angry and confused crowd and wonder how we are going to get out. The tank is the only thing that will convince these people to let us go, because right now they see us as the enemy.
Maybe I was wrong. Maybe they didn’t want to be free because they are not taking advantage of it when it is right in front of them. They are angry, and I can feel their anger like the heat from a flame. They want someone to pay for the misery they’ve experienced. And that someone is my father.