Melissa la Cruz - Frozen

Brendon’s parents were among the smallkind who had commandeered one of the small motorboats. They pulled up next to Wes’s ship.

“Donnie! Donnie!” his mother cried.

“I’m all right, Mum, come on, I’m okay.” Brendon laughed.

“Take the lifeboat to the port of New Crete. My people will find you, and lead you home,” Liannan told them.

“Right then, hop on board, boys,” Cadmael said.

“We’re going with our crew,” Roark said.

“Don’t worry, Mum, we’ll be right behind, I’m their new navigator,” Brendon shouted. “I can’t leave my ship.”

“What!” his mother cried, but his father looked proud. “We’ll see you in Vallonis.” He nodded. “Magda, let’s go.”

Roark and Brendon helped the rest of the team scramble back onto Alby. Nat stumbled as she fell on board, Shakes revved the engine, and the boat began to pull away.

“Wait!” she cried. “Where’s Wes?” She turned to see Wes still on the deck of the Van Gogh. He’d stayed behind to make sure everyone got on board safely.

“Shakes! Turn back!” Nat yelled. “Wes is still back there!”

She saw Wes making a run to leap on board when someone grabbed him from behind and he fell back. Avo Hubik and a dozen other slavers surrounded him. Seeing Alby return, the pirates began firing on them, bullets whizzing through the air, pummeling the ship’s hull.

Brendon yelped as a bullet grazed his arm, and another plugged Shakes in the shoulder. Wes’s crew tried to return fire, but they were badly outnumbered.

“WHAT ARE YOU GUYS DOING? GO! GET OUT OF HERE!” Wes yelled, even as Avo held a gun to his temple.

The slaver laughed. “Surrender, or I will make him eat his own fingers when I send him to the flesh markets.”

Shakes hesitated and killed the engine, unsure what to do.

“GET LOST! TAKE THE SHIP AND GET OUT OF HERE! NOW!” Wes screamed in fury, as the bullets continued to fly, one dangerously close to hitting Nat in the head. There was little cover on deck from the shower of gunfire.

“We can’t save him,” Farouk said. If they stayed any longer, the slavers would overtake them, and they would be back where they began, but in worse circumstances. The slavers didn’t take too kindly to slaves who tried to escape.

“No,” Shakes said. “No! We’re not leaving him.”

“But we’ll all get captured.”

“SURRENDER!” Avo screamed.

“GO ON! MOVE, YOU IDIOTS!” Wes yelled again.

That did it. Shakes tugged at the wheel and gunned the engine.

Nat remained on deck, her eyes fixed on Wes, surrounded by slavers.

“Bring the acid. Get him ready for the knives,” Avo ordered.

Wes shook his head at her. “Remember our deal,” he mouthed.

She knew what was in store for him. The flesh markets. The flaying. He would die slowly and horribly, as they skinned him alive, as they stripped the skin from his body; they would force him to experience every second of his own terrible death.

Nat felt tears spring to her eyes. No. No.

The slavers were upon him now. Three of them held him back as he stood on the deck, while another brought the bucket of acid to blind him, the beginning of the torture.

Alby was pulling away as the slavers kept firing on the ship. Nat had only a moment to act, a moment to decide.

Wes kept his eyes on her the whole time. “What did I say, Nat, I told you it wouldn’t come to this.” He smiled. There are worse things than getting shot, worse things in the world than dying quickly.

She knew what he was asking her to do.

But he was right. She wouldn’t let it come to this. There was a way she could save him and save them all.

Nat grabbed a sidearm from one of the boys. She remembered what Liannan had said the other night. She could feel the otherworldly strength rushing through her spirit as she locked eyes with Wes.

Her eyes filled with tears of hope.

“Do it,” he mouthed. “Hurry.”

The slaver held a bucket of acid over his head.

There was no time and no other way to find out.

Please, let this work. Please let them have been wrong about me.

Then she shot Wes through the heart.

CHAOS EXPLODED ON THE DECK OF THE Van Gogh. Avo Hubik stared at the fallen body of Ryan Wesson as if he couldn’t quite believe what had happened. The slavers looked stunned, and the pirate holding the bucket of acid dropped it on his own foot, causing more confusion.

Aboard the Alby, Nat collapsed to her knees, shaking, and the smallmen howled in grief. “What happened? What happened?” Shakes yelled.

“She shot him—Nat shot him—” Brendon whispered.

“WHAT?” Shakes turned white. “WHAT DID SHE DO?”

Farouk stood next to him, stunned. “Wes is dead?” he whispered.

“ICEHOLE!” Avo said, kicking Wes’s body overboard. “WHAT ARE YOU MORONS WAITING FOR—GET THEM!” he yelled, and the slavers reloaded their guns and resumed firing on Alby.

“Help me,” Nat said. Wes’s body was floating facedown in the water by their ship, and she leaned over to reach for him. The smallmen lent a hand, holding on to her as she pulled him out of the water.

“Got him?” Shakes yelled.

“Yes,” Nat said, cradling Wes in her arms. He was already cold and stiff. “Let’s go, Shakes!”

The team ducked for cover, and it looked like the slavers would take their boat, but Shakes finally got the engine running and they sped away.

When Alby was out of range the slavers’ gunfire stopped, and the Van Gogh headed back toward its course to the Blue. On the deck, Nat cradled Wes’s body in her arms. “Wes, wake up, wake up,” she whispered. “Wake up, come on, wake up!”

“Wake up? You shot him in the heart! He’s dead!” Farouk exclaimed.

“No,” she said. “No,” she whispered when Wes did not stir. He was so very cold. “This wasn’t what was supposed to happen.”

Liannan knelt next to her and put a hand on her shoulder. “I think he’s gone,” she said quietly. “I’m so sorry.”

“NO!” Nat screamed. This was not the way it was supposed to end. No. Not like this. Not now. Not after everything they had done to survive. After everything they meant to each other.

“Let’s get out of here,” Liannan told Shakes. She looked sorrowfully at Nat. “It wasn’t meant to be.”

“What’s going on?” Shakes asked.

Liannan shook her head. “I’ll explain later.”

Nat held Wes in her arms and continued to sob. She’d believed she could save him. She had thought she could save them all. She hadn’t meant for this to happen . . . She hadn’t meant to kill him . . . She had thought . . . she had thought she was saving him . . . that she was saving them all . . .

They were right about me, then , she thought dully.

Subject has no heart.

That’s what they told her at MacArthur.

She was only a weapon, a vessel for fire and pain. She had no heart. There was a cold, dead space where it was supposed to be. She was not human. She was marked. She was a monster.

Subject is unable to love. Unable to feel. Subject is perfect for our needs.

She had believed they were wrong. She had believed her feelings for him were real, that what she felt for Wes was true . . .

She had believed she could save him as he had saved her. When he had kissed her before the traders came, when he had saved her from the white priests.

But she was wrong.

Subject unable to love. She did not love him and so she could not save him.

Brendon handed her his handkerchief, and Roark put a hand on her shoulder. Both of them were crying quietly.