“What’s going on?” someone asks blearily, and I can’t tell who because blood is rushing past my ears and bile is rising in my throat and there’s a pressure in my chest that’s familiar and comforting and terrifying all at the same time because it means I’m about to lose control of myself.
“Stay out of it!” growls Beto. “This is none of your business. It’s between us and Red.” He kisses me on the forehead; his hot, wet lips feel like slugs against my skin. “Isn’t that right, little mula?”
Mula.
The pressure in my chest becomes a maelstrom. Tears leak from my eyes.
“Aw, poor Red, are you cry—”
With all my strength, I bite down on the fleshy part of his palm. Beto yelps, lurching backward as wonderful, glorious air fills my lungs.
The others are startled enough to loosen their grip. I fling myself over the side of the cot and onto the floor. I’m on my feet in an instant. “Get her!” Beto yells.
Beds creak as everyone around us wakes. I’m trapped between bunks, my back to the wall, as Beto and two ducklings approach. In the dark, they are looming shapes, like the shadow monsters from my nightmares.
Hold back, a tiny voice says. Don’t hurt them. But the maelstrom has me firmly in its grip now, and I’m helpless against it.
A shadow shoulder swings back, priming for the punch. I dodge left, grab his forearm as it sails past, use his own momentum to slam his fist into the wall.
He doubles over in pain, cradling his fist. I take the opportunity to grab the back of his head and smash his face against my swiftly rising knee. He shrieks as his nose shatters.
I lift my heel, shove it into his broken face, and send him reeling backward into the arms of his friends.
“Who’s next?” I say, advancing. I am fire. I am a thunderstorm. The remaining two shadows start to back away.
Someone grabs me from behind, squeezes my neck, pins my arms to my sides—a fourth person I didn’t notice before. The other two shadows see their opportunity and attack, fists flying.
Pain explodes in my abdomen. In my cheekbone. Everything freezes. The bunk room disappears. Instead, I see blue-stained fingers and iron ladles.
A glass heron sitting on a fireplace mantel, poised to take flight.
Distantly, I know I’m being pummeled. I should defend myself; someone taught me exactly what to do. But I’m helpless, because the blue-stained fingers are coming closer. They hold a vicious-looking quill; no, it’s a needle. I’m about to get a tattoo.
“Please,” I whisper. “Not again.”
Someone screams. Not me. The pressure against my throat lessens.
“Red!” someone yells.
The pain in my cheekbone sharpens to a brutal here and now because I am Red. I am Red Sparkle Stone of Joya d’Arena and a Royal Guard recruit, and someone is attacking me.
I raise my leg and slam my heel into my attacker’s instep, crunching bones. I whirl on him before he can recover. He reaches feebly for my neck, but I’m faster. I send the heel of my palm up into his chin. His head snaps back and his teeth crunch. He staggers, disoriented, and I fell him with a swift kick to the groin.
I don’t bother to watch him writhe on the floor. I turn to discover that the two remaining shadows are grappling with someone else. I reach for the one on the left, grab a handful of hair, and yank backward with all my strength. Hair rips from its roots as his neck kinks backward. I sweep the back of his leg with my foot. He topples; I step aside and let him fall, his head cracking against the edge of the cot.
When I look up, the final shadow is subdued. He sits huddled on the ground, cradling a broken arm. Above him looms my ally, tall with gangly shoulders, but somehow as steady and large as a mountain. It’s Iván.
He turns to me. “I think that’s all of them.”
The maelstrom is slowing. As my heartbeat approaches normal, the pains in my rib and my cheekbone intensify, making it hurt to breathe. My stomach roils, threatening to toss up my cornmeal sludge. Everyone is awake now, their shadowed bodies sitting up in their cots, watching us.
My limbs are shaking. They always shake after the maelstrom leaves.
I say the first thing that comes to mind. “I didn’t need your help, Iván.”
Iván has a split lip and disheveled hair, but he doesn’t seem bad off. As usual, he’s frowning at me. “I didn’t want to help you.”
“You didn’t? I mean, good. I don’t need saving.” Blood drips wet and warm from my nose to my upper lip. I wipe it with my sleeve before remembering that I’ll have to wash the blood out of my shirt before morning.
“I know you don’t,” Iván says.
I give him a perplexed look. “Then why—”
“Red, I don’t even like you. But what they were doing was wrong. It wasn’t about saving you. It was about stopping them.”
“Oh.” It’s the kind of thing Rosario would say. Bad men need stopping.
“What’s going on here?” It’s Guardsman Bruno, standing in the doorway with a torch. Several other Guards are right behind him.
I let my gaze fall to my recent attackers. All four are on the floor. I recognize Sancho in spite of his smashed face; his breathing makes an odd whistling noise. Beto is collapsed against the wall cradling a broken arm; the torch flame casts light on his hands. His cuticles are stained black. He’s the one who spilled my hair dye.
Two of the other ducklings are curled up like babies in the cradle—one is still protecting his crotch, the other is blinking oddly while blood seeps from his head wound.
Aldo sits up in his bunk, looking down at me, eyes wide. “I’m sorry I didn’t help, Red,” he whispers. “I panicked, and . . . I was afraid . . .”
“I was just about to jump in,” Pedrón says, trying to look gallant. “I really was. In fact, these boys are lucky I was slow to wake up, or I would have—”
“Shut up, Pedrón,” I snap.
“I’ll ask one more time,” Guardsman Bruno says, his gaze sweeping over the injured boys. “What happened? Who started this?”
I’m not sure what to say. If I blame the ducklings, everyone might hate me even more. If I don’t, maybe other boys will think they can get away with the same thing.
In the distance, the latrine cricket chirps and chirps.
“Fine,” says Bruno. “Tomorrow morning all of you will run—”
“These recruits started it,” Aldo says, gesturing toward Beto. “They attacked Recruit Red while she slept, all four of them at once. They said something about her being Empress Elisa’s favorite and then started pummeling her. They attacked a defenseless recruit, Guardsman. It was awful.”
I blink up at him. I don’t remember that part about being Elisa’s favorite. Maybe he’s altering the story on purpose, reminding everyone that I was sponsored by the empress herself.
“And you stepped in to help?” Bruno asks, indicating Iván and his busted lip.
Iván remains silent, but Aldo says, “Yes, but she didn’t need Iván’s help. She took care of them on her own. In fact, they’re lucky they didn’t get themselves killed. Frankly, anyone who attacks Red is an idiot.”
And now Aldo is warning all the other recruits not to come after me.