Only it’s a play pointer, made of braided wildgrass for the shaft and bark for the tip. It bounces harmlessly off his left breast.

“Bullseye,” I say. “Oh blaze, you shoulda seen your face. Better check your britches, make sure you didn’t grizz yourself!” Lara’s cracking up, which makes me crack up.

I put up with Hawk’s bullying for so long it’s nice to see the tents turned on him every now and again.

“Ha ha. Hilarious,” Hawk says. “If Lara’s staying up and taking my shift, then I’m getting some shuteye. Perhaps you should, too, Skinny.”

I ignore the parting shot, his old nickname for me. Somehow, it doesn’t hurt the way it used to. We also ignore his advice, talking and laughing and catching up like the old friends that we are, reminiscing ’bout our days spent training with the Wilde Ones, back when it was new and exciting.

We talk until the hole in the cave roof starts getting lighter, the sky above it split with streaks of red and gold. Lara wakes Hawk for his watch shift. Only then do we flop down next to each other and sleep.

~~~

I awake to a scream.

“Holy freakin’ son of a—”

I’m on my feet and blinking away the sleep and grabbing my bow ’fore I even have the slightest clue what’s going on.

Tristan and Adele are on their feet too, staring at their tugskin mats like they’re covered in fire ants. Beyond ’em, Skye’s practically going into convulsions, laughing her head off. What the scorch?

Then I see it.

The ’zard. Rough, gray skin with green spots. A pink tongue that’s flicking out, almost like a snake. Sitting right on Adele’s blanket. I start laughing too.

“You ain’t scared of that little thing, are you?” I say. “It ain’t even full grown yet.”

Adele looks at me, at the ’zard, back at me. “What is it?”

“What? You don’t recognize it? You gobbled it up last night right quick.”

Tristan looks ’round Adele, a look of horror on his face. “Not the soup,” he says.

“The soup,” I say, holding back another laugh. I rub my belly. “And guess what’s for breakfast?”

The ’zard, as if suddenly realizing we’re all staring at it, takes off, running right at Adele. She leaps aside and it passes by, scurrying out through the camouflaged skin that apparently didn’t fool it for one second.

Although the cave is already heating up from the morning sun, Adele shivers, her face all screwed up like she might be sick. “I can’t believe I ate one of those,” she says.

“Well, not a whole one. Just pieces of one, all chopped up. The tail, the legs, the eyeballs…” I trail off when Wilde, who’s awake now, too, gives me a look.

Adele’s hand is over her mouth. “There were eyeballs in that soup?” she says through her fingers.

“Quit messin’ with her, Sie,” Lara says, rolling over and rubbing her eyes. “There were no eyeballs, just the meat. ’Zards give you long-lasting energy.”

Adele doesn’t look convinced, but she manages to keep the prickler salad and soup down, so I give her credit for that.

“Do we want to know what pricklers are?” Tristan asks, one cheek scrunched up. Even with the weird expression on his face, he’s a good looking guy: wavy, yellow-sand colored hair, sparkling blue eyes—though he’s got nothing on Circ, who’s smokier’n a bramble fire.

“We passed ’bout a hundred of ’em last night, but in the dark you mighta missed ’em. Some are green, some gray, some brownish. Each one looks a little different, like people, I guess. But most every one of ’em have these nasty little prickles coming out of their skin. Trust me, you don’t want to run into ’em. Once, when my baggard father sent me to Confinement, I managed to break out, but not without running smack into a searin’ prickler. It hurt like a thousand fire ant bites, but later I found out the prickler’s name was Perry, and we sorta became friends, or at least acquaintances, and I mostly liked him ’cept when he ragged on me, which was most of the time…”

I stop when I realize everyone’s staring at me with the strangest expressions, like maybe I’ve caught the Fire, and it’s eating away at my skin. I check my arms, my hands—my skin looks normal. Brown. Just brown. Like always.

“You made friends with a prickler?” Hawk says, standing just inside the secret opening, apparently having come inside during my story.

“I’m confused,” Adele says. “At first I thought pricklers were some kind of plant, but are they an animal? Or some weird kind of person?”

“We ate your friend?” Tristan says, his handsome face screwed up even more.

Some things you just can’t explain, so for the first time since I sprang outta bed, I keep my mouth shut tighter’n a Killer’s mouth on a bone.

~~~

When the whole thing ’bout Perry the Prickler blows over, and Adele and Tristan have had a chance to peek outside to see what pricklers look like—they’re sticking to eating plants from now on; ’zards are out—we have a real meeting, which is the reason we came in the first place.

As usual, Wilde kicks things off, and she doesn’t waste any time with small talk. “You’re not going to last long up here breathing this air.”

Adele and Tristan nod in unison, their faces even.

“I believe your story. I believe you,” she adds. I glance at Skye, whose eyes flick to mine, ’fore returning to Wilde’s. Ain’t she gonna say something? “Skye and I have talked it over, and we agreed we can’t hold you here against your will.”

“You have?” I blurt out, once more looking at Skye. She doesn’t look at me this time.

“Yes,” Wilde says. I raise my eyebrows. I guess Adele saving Skye’s life went a lot further with her’n I first thought.

Adele and Tristan exchange a look. “We’ve talked things over, too,” Tristan says. They have? When has all this talking been happening? And where was I? I like talking things over, too. “We don’t want to go back yet.” I stop breathing. What? “We’ve got as much to gain as you do from seeing Lecter defeated. We’d hoped there might be a chance to talk to him, to understand his point of view, but it’s clear now that he’s set on violence. We want to help you.”

“But you’ll die!” I say, unable to hold it in any longer.

“If we don’t help you, you all might die. And we won’t die right away,” Adele says. “We’ll last long enough to help you.”

I shake my head. “You can go back down and get more of your people to help.” You can do anything but stay up here and die! Even as I’m thinking it, I’m wondering why I care so much. I barely know these two. They could be enemy spies for all I know. But something deep inside of me knows they’re not, that they’re good, that they’re really on our side.

“There’s no time,” Tristan says. “This war is happening now. And if we go back there’s no guarantee anyone will follow us. We can’t make them. They have enough of their own problems to deal with. We will stay. We will help.”

“Sorry to interrupt,” Wilde says, an unexpected smile creasing her face, “but we may have a solution to the whole toxic air thing. Show them, Lara.”

Then, to my amazement, Lara unfolds a blanket on her lap. And inside are five of the strangest looking objects I’ve ever seen in my sixteen-year life.

Chapter Twelve

Dazz

“No!” I say, not caring that my voice is raised.

Curly Mustache Man looks incredulous. “No? Last time I checked, young man, you’re not a member of the consortium. You’re here to inform, not to decide.”

“This is wrong,” I say, pleading. “I’ve already discussed this with one of the leaders of the Tri-Tribes—Wilde. She’s the one who helped save my sister, who helped my mother…but that’s not what’s important. The point is, we came to an agreement. The Unity Alliance. Us and the Tri-Tribes. It’s our only hope against the Glassies. Strength in numbers.”