Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
WHEN THE NEXT HOUR CAME, THE CORNUCOPIA WAS EERILY SILENT.
Rockie was right — she did know where the supply cache was. The city was a big circle, she'd insisted, so all they had to do was go the opposite direction of the forest and they'd end up where they started — which was totally and completely correct.
Now they were holed up in an old office building, with crumbling walls and old, overturned desks, sitting right on the edge of the cornucopia's courtyard. The blown out windows were facing the cornucopia, and not a single soul had gone into it in the ten minutes the trio had been there. Avani had been staring out the window like a hawk waiting for prey, her knife clutched tightly in her hand, but nothing had moved. Not in the slightest.
Ryder was getting steadily worse. He'd thrown up twice more, and his fever was raging now. It was strange — unlike any infection Avani had ever read about. Fast acting, very sudden, very severe. She vaguely wondered if the acid rain had something to do with it, but quickly abandoned all thought when they'd arrived at the city courtyard.
The approaching sunset was bathing the cornucopia in a bright yellow light, illuminating the concrete and buildings around it. All of the bodies from the initial bloodbath were gone, but the bloodstains were still there, tainting the white-ish concrete with old, dried crimson. The cornucopia looked the same as it had when they started — housing bags and supplies. There were five drawstring bags in total right in the mouth, each with a large number crafted into the plasticky material: Two, Five, Six, Eight, and Ten.
There was a large quiver sitting strangely close to the bag with the Ten on it. Too tall to hold arrows, with large, sharp projectiles sticking out of them. Each one was crafted to near perfection, all a burnished silver with huge, deadly heads on the tips. Nearly as tall as Avani.
Spears. Four of them.
"When should we go?" Avani whispered, glancing over at Rockie, who was staring out another window to her left. Ryder was on the other end of the room, hidden beneath some stairs, behind a few desks. His instructions were explicit and simple. Stay silent, and don't move.
Rockie's eyes moved almost mechanically across the courtyard, like a robot. "I don't see anyone."
Avani nodded slightly, staring at the bags, spinning her knife.
"We run in, grab the stuff, and duck back out. No pausing, no hesitating. If someone comes up, run, if they fight you, kill them," Rockie ordered, like a general preparing her men for war.
Avani sucked in a breath, fiddling with her jacket as her heartbeat grew increasingly loud in her ears. Rockie had given her eyedrops again, and her vision was basically back to normal, but it still didn't ease the nerves coiling around her lungs like poison vines. Running into the cornucopia during a feast was insane, deadly, downright ludicrous.
... but essential.
There was still a huge chance the Careers would show up. Then what would they do?
"Twelve," Rockie ordered, and Avani looked back over at her. Their blue eyes met, Rockie's expression serious and completely focused. Deadly. "Do not hesitate to kill. All you have is a knife, so they might be quicker on the draw. If you have the faintest of inklings anyone is going to come for you, you have to strike first, with no mercy."
