War Paint

Run

The guard is strong, but he can't breathe. I can feel his neck straining against my forearms, the smell of smoke on his clothes. My only advantage is that I have caught him off guard, and before we know it, Kade and I have gotten the pair of them silent and unconscious on the floor.

We drag the men's bodies into the forest quickly, not wanting to stay out in the open longer than we have to.

I feel bad for harming another person, but they will only be disabled for about twenty minutes before waking up. Before we left our prisoners tent, I taught Kade a mechanism on how to temporarily disable someone's nerves without severely hurting them, previously taught to me by Beatrice. Sometimes hospital patients can get out of hand, Beatrice explained, and we don't have anesthesia. The vagus nerve, located on both sides of one's neck, can cause someone to go unconscious if enough pressure is applied.

Kade and I manage to acquire two guns and a knife from the Other's bodies, and then we are back to tip-toeing around the outskirts of the camp buildings.

The rest of the nerve wracking journey goes by as smoothly as possible, with no words exchanged between Kade and I until we reach where Andres and Camillo are being held.

"We did it." Kade breathes out in relief.

"Don't thank me yet," I warn him, not fully sure that we'll actually be able to escape this easily.

Cloaked in darkness, Kade and I are just two outlines within the sleepy camp, going around the front of Camillo and Andres' hut to unlock their door with my bobby-pin.

The lock takes a whole two scary minutes to get open, but as soon as it unlocks, Kade and I get inside quickly. The tent is the same as Kade and I's - bare except rocks and gravel that coat the floor. Both my brother and Camillo are in the middle of the room, and they stand up in shock at our entrance. To my relief, the both of them look fine, give or take a couple of bruises.

"Adeline!" Both of them shout, running toward me.

"Wow. I feel loved." Kade complains sarcastically, a hand over his heart.

I shake my head as my brother hugs me tightly. "You're okay," I whisper, just loud enough so that he can hear me.

"How did you guys get here?" Demands Camillo, studying us. "Andres and I couldn't figure out how to remove the damned padlock."

I hold up my bobby pin for them to see, and then put it inside of my pocket along with the secret letter I am still carrying for safekeeping.

"You've always been good with those." Andres smiles a little, probably remembering the time when I was a little girl and had snuck into our father's office to play with his metal trinkets.

"Okay, guys. Enough talking. Let's get out of here." They all nod in agreement, so I put my finger over my mouth to motion that they should stay quiet.

Kade and I lead the group outside and into the night, heading for an unguarded gap between two large tents that will take us out of the camp and into the forest. However, just as we make it to behind the large building, a voice from behind halts our movements.

"Going somewhere?"

We were so close.

Turning around, Kade and I hold out our stolen guns in front of us for defense. I have never used a gun before, so my hands shake as I come face to face with both Slim and the general who had questioned us earlier.