me already and I suddenly found that I couldn't add another. I grasped the barrel of the gun instead and used it to slam the butt hard against his fingers. Index finger first, then the ring finger – two slams to dislodge that – and finally the last two. He let out a roar of rage and pain, and disappeared into the waves.
I fell back into the boat, allowing the penetrating ache in my joints to sweep through me as the rush of adrenaline swept out. I felt as if every bone in my body had been broken and reset, sparks of electric pain still firing off randomly in the neurons of my brain.
Around us, the sea was choppy and restless, waves in ragged white-tipped ranks. The sky was just pinking with the first light of dawn at the distant horizon. The other ships were dark blots in the water around us, some already lost to distance. Ahead of us, a larger, darker blot.
Cuba.
I'd always assumed that Queen M would be able to get her ship back under control before it ran aground on the Cuban coast. Now I wondered. The island couldn't have been more than a mile ahead of us, maybe less. The humps and mounds of its mountains looked enticing in the growing morning sunshine, glints of gold catching off patches of sand on its beaches. Like pretty much everything seen from a distance, it seemed harmless. But it wasn't.
The rest of Queen M's fleet was heading out to open water, fleeing the island with all the speed the wind offered. Most of them were sailing boats and they could go where the wind went. None of us knew how to sail and we'd been forced to steal ourselves a motor boat. There was enough fuel in it to take us to Cuba – or to leave us stranded in open waters. No other land was in reach.
Another problem we'd anticipated but hadn't been able to avoid.
I was so focussed on looking at the shoreline that it took me a moment to register that there were four figures standing behind me where there should have been two. The first thing I saw as I turned was Haru, his face frozen with fear. To the other side of him was Ingo, looking startled and a little annoyed, that anything could have interfered with his neat little plan.
Between them were Kelis and Soren. They were each holding a large gun, and both of them were aimed at me. Soren smiled, an expression that was more like a snarl. Behind him, the tarp they'd been hiding under was flung carelessly aside, so obvious now it was too late.
'So,' Kelis said. 'I guess you weren't expecting us.'
CHAPTER FOUR
Kelis looked hurt, as if everything we'd just done had been a personal slight. 'Yeah,' I said. 'This is certainly a surprise.' I tried edging a little closer to her, a millimetre shuffle forward of each foot, but a quick twitch of her gun stopped me in my tracks.
'We told you not to do this,' Soren said in a dull, heavy voice. For the first time, in the bright morning sunlight, I noticed the strands of grey in the ash blond of his hair and the fine wrinkles raying out from his mouth. There was something a little off-centre in his pale eyes. We'd broken something he never thought could break and now he wasn't sure about anything.
I shrugged. 'You told me I wouldn't be able to. Not the same thing.'
Kelis stepped forward until the barrel of her gun was pressed into the thin material of my t-shirt.
I carefully didn't look at it, only into her eyes. 'As a matter of academic interest, how exactly did you find us?'
'A boat with no keys and a full fuel tank. You're not that subtle.'
'No, I guess not. But you're free too now, you know. That's a good thing, isn't it?'
Soren frowned. 'Maybe we didn't want to be free.'
'The sea round here is full of people who did,' I said. 'So are the islands. I wanted to be free, and I'll die before I let you make me a slave again.' With a confidence I didn't feel, I pushed my fingers against the barrel of the gun pressing into my chest. There was a moment of resistance, then Kelis let me brush it aside. Soren shot her a look and didn't let his own barrel drop. I ignored him and turned back to the wheel of the boat.
'And how many people did you kill to get free?' Kelis asked. 'How many of my friends?'
That hurt more than I thought it would. I was sure she could see the sudden tension in my shoulders, but I kept my voice light. 'I don't know, I didn't keep count. Did you?'
I felt Haru's sharp intake of breath, but I thought I knew Kelis now. She didn't need things sugar-coated. She didn't like them that way.
'You could come with us, of course,' I said when there'd been a moment without either a reply or a gunshot. 'We've got the brains covered, but now we're out we could do with some muscle.'
'That's one of the least flattering offers I've ever received.' I risked a look at Kelis and saw that she was almost smiling. 'What makes you think that we won't just take this boat ourselves and push the rest of you overboard?'
'I don't know. Maybe the fact that you haven't already?'
'No, they cannot come' Ingo said suddenly. He seemed completely unconcerned that two very large guns being held by two pretty pissed off people were now being pointed right at him. He just frowned, as if mildly annoyed that they couldn't see it for themselves. 'Their tracking devices are still functional. Once the computers are back on-line, Queen M will be able to find them.'
'Yeah?' I said, before Kelis could actually shoot him. 'And how is Queen M going to get the network back up now her entire crew has fled?'
'Fled from the ship,' Ingo said. 'The islands are still hers. And there is nothing to say that the loyal will not return to her once the danger of Cuba is passed. It is that, not freedom, which drove many away.'
In the time we'd been talking, the prow of the boat set on a straight course, the island had grown larger, the details of its coastline clearer. I could see individual palm trees now – and there were people, streaming towards the golden beach. To starboard and slowly drawing ahead of us was another vast bulk between us and the sun: the flagship, still on a collision course.
'If the danger of Cuba does pass,' I said.
'But taking them remains an unnecessary risk,' Ingo said stubbornly, and I wanted to punch him.
To my surprise, Soren just laughed. 'Yeah, well, it's a risk you're going to have to take.'
Ingo opened his mouth to protest some more and this time I did stop him, grabbing his arm hard. 'They're with us. Accept when you've lost and move on. Besides, they'll be useful. I hear it's a dangerous world out there.'
There was a moment of peace as Kelis, but not Soren, holstered her gun. A warm salt breeze blew up and the boats all around us bobbed on the waves, and it almost felt like we were pleasure cruising, somewhere where nothing could harm us. But plenty of things could and some of them were heading right towards us.
'Those aren't our boats,' Kelis said, eyes straining against the brilliance of the Caribbean sun.
Haru squinted short-sightedly. 'How can you tell?'
Kelis gave him a look of contempt. 'How about because they're heading straight from Cuba?'
They were. The sea ahead of us was suddenly dark with vessels, small and fast, darting across the waters towards the refugee fleet. The other boats were beginning to realise the danger. The fleet began to split, no longer a unified shoal, now just a series of individuals, happy to leave everyone else behind if it saved them from the predators. Soren put his beefy hands on the wheel, ready to swing us around and join the panicked flight.
The swarm of Infected was gaining fast, five hundred meters and closing. The wind was in their sails, working with them and against us. Even if we turned we had little chance of outrunning them.
I held Soren's hand firm against the wheel. 'No. Keep course – straight for the shore.'
He looked at me like I was going crazy and he wasn't the only one. Maybe I was, but I didn't need the Voice to tell me that this was the right thing to do. 'They're all in the water,' I said. 'They'd have to turn into the wind to follow us – and why would they, when all the other ships are straight ahead?'
'She's right!' Kelis said. 'Straight on, full throttle.'
Soren obeyed her without question. We powered forward and now we were three hundred meters from the Infected.
