Breaker (Unmasked #3)

25. Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Breaker

15 Years Ago, September, Age 13

A chilly wind snakes through the trees, making the leaves shiver. Night fell a few hours ago and with it the temperature. We’re used to the cold, but this chill feels different. It’s a little wet, like it’s sticking to us, seeping under our skin.

We walk close together, eyes darting around until we reach a thin clearing. Animals come out at night, and we’re unarmed. The last thing we need is to come across a bear or wolf.

“This is as good a place as any to set up camp,” Striker says.

After we heard the buzz of a small plane, then saw it flying west over a break in the trees, we started in that direction, following the impression of the tire tracks in the dirt until they disappeared, and we weren’t able to locate any more. Viper said they must not travel out here often enough, or use a different route each time, since the tracks faded.

“The plane means a landing strip, and that means the truck was left,” he says, hands on hips, looking up at the night sky.

He would know more than us, since he’s at least had some training. Also, Cook tends to trap him in conversation about his hunting days before he came to the school. Which, as bored and annoyed at Viper looked every time we managed to slip away and leave him, I’m glad he got stuck there because at least he knows something.

Striker drops to the ground in front of me, pulling his knees to his chest. “We need a fire,” he says, “to keep the animals away.”

“Doesn’t fire attract animals?” I ask.

“No clue,” he says with a shrug.

God. We’re so fucked.

“Do you know how to set up a snare?” I ask Viper, who’s now sprawled out on the ground, leaned back on his elbows, so relaxed and uncaring, you’d never know we were sent out to the wilderness unprepared and years too early.

“Yes,” Viper says. His eyes meet mine. “We’ll be fine.”

“The fuck we will,” I say, sitting down. “Reap and Hunter got months to train for this. We have had zero. Do any of us know how to hunt?”

“We know how to make snares,” Viper offers. “And Strike can hit a moving target from several yards away.”

“If he had a rifle,” I snap, absently digging my fingers into the tightness squeezing my chest. “We just have a knife.”

Striker’s shoulders stiffen as he props his chin on his arms crossed over his knees. He’s staring blankly at his feet, wearing hopelessness like a cape. I know he’s worried, not about food, or how we’ll acquire it. Not even about water or how to find it.

He’s worried about which one of us won’t make it out of the wilderness.

Hunter’s words ring in my head. They make my gut churn, so I shove the them away, my gaze moving back to Viper.

“Why do you think he sent us early?” I ask him. He’s four years older than us, so he ought to know more. Strike’s only fifteen. He knows about as much as me, which considering I know nothing, isn’t helpful. I’ve only been in training for eight years and the first five were spent learning language and math and history. The last three I learned how to hold a knife and shoot a gun. I’m not supposed to be out here until I go through combat training like Reaper and Hunter and received at least a crash course in survival training like Viper.

Thank fuck we have him. We’d be screwed. We wouldn’t have to decide who makes it out of here alive, nature would do it for us. Natural selection would choose me and I’m well aware of it. I’ve not even finished with my growth spurt Fallon swears will make me bigger than everyone. Like some secret wave of manhood to wash over me and magically make me stronger. Beefier like Viper. Grow muscles and height like Strike. Strong and mean like Reaper and smart like Hunter.

“We’ll be fine,” Viper says again, and I wonder if he actually believes his lies.

How he can be so calm? I’m about to start punching something, breaking something, lose my mind.

He sent me out here to die.

The thought scalds through my mind like acid, eating away at all logic. I’m worried Fallon sent me out here so he wouldn’t have to deal with keeping me a secret anymore. Father warned me never to tell my brother’s about Nanny. Now he’s going to get rid of me because he must regret even bringing me to the school.

I’m a pain in the ass, he says. Can’t listen. Always breaking rules. And the day I was named…

He has to regret that. Letting me be who I am on the inside. Unleashing that part of me Nanny always said was living in my chest. In my heart.

“Panicking won’t help,” Viper says, sitting upright and pulling his knees to his chest. He’s one to talk. He’s bulky and fast and mean. Nothing out here would be stupid enough to attack him. “If we stay calm, we’ll survive the week, find the lodge, and then we go home.”

Striker makes a sound that is almost a laugh. “You know we all won’t.”

“Yes, we will,” Viper barks out, so much anger in his voice Striker stiffens. “I refuse to let anything happen to either of you.”

“Who says it’s going to be one of us?” Striker asks.

Viper’s gaze slips to Striker, the dark night flooding his blue eyes with shadows, making him look deranged. Then again, I think maybe he is a little. He’s the only one of us three who remembers who he was before the school.

“You going to slit my throat in the middle of the night?” he asks the tic in his jaw just as intimidating as his tone. “Do I need to worry, brother?”

Striker rolls his eyes. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

“You know only two return,” I add unhelpfully, which gains me a lethal glare from Viper. He’s almost as good at giving them as Reaper.

“And I said, we all go home,“ Viper snarls. “This isn’t the test.”

Striker leans forward. “I wondered the same thing.”

“What do you mean?” I ask. “We’re here. In the wilderness.”

Striker shakes his head as Viper says, “Maxy dear sent us out here. Not Father.”

I scrub a hand down my face, letting his words sink in. “Why? Why would Maxim send us out here?”

“No fucking clue.” Viper lies back, propping his head on his arms crossed under his head and stares up at the night sky.

I look up too, taking a deep breath. The stars gleam, like thousands of tiny gems turning the world around us a shimmering blue.

“Do you ever wonder why we’re here?” I ask, leaning back on my hands, then crossing my legs and sitting upright, too restless to be still.

“Because God is cruel and ruthless,” Viper says. “Because we had the misfortune of being born in this world, right at the wrong time, in the wrong place and picked by the wrong man.”

I glance over to find Striker watching me, his mouth pulled down into a frown. “I wonder all the time.”

I nod and look down at my hands. They aren’t rough or as callused as Viper’s, but they’re nearly as big. Reaper says I’m going to be a big mother-fucker but I think he is just trying to make me feel better for being so young.

“Does it matter why?” Viper asks. “We’re here and we either survive or we don’t. And survive is what we’re going to do.”

Striker nods, but I can tell he’s unsure. Maybe even more than me.

“We stick together,” Viper says. “No matter what.”

A scream breaks the night, turning my skin cold.

My gaze snaps to the dark trees looming around the clearing. “What the fuck was that?”

“Fox?” Striker says and we all hear the panic making his words catch slightly. “That could be a fox right?”

Another scream and my bones turn to ice.

“That’s no fox,” Viper says, going deadly still. His eyes meet mine. “That scream came from a woman.”