The vehicle’s horn screamed, deafening. It wasn’t a car, Clare realised. Just twenty feet from the tower was a minibus, modified with angled slabs of metal attached to the front like a crude snow plough. The windows were covered with plyboard bolted to the vehicle’s metal.
The door burst open. “Get in,” a voice yelled.
Clare tried to look through, to see the driver, and had the impression of a blank, featureless face. They’re wearing a mask.
She tried to slow so that Dorran could go in first, but he shoved her ahead of himself. Arguing would have risked them both. Clare leapt up the raised front step then turned and hauled him in behind them. The hollows were close on their heels. He wrenched the door shut behind them.
Clare and Dorran stood in the narrow walkway beside the driver’s seat, panting and staring at the creatures as they tried to claw through the door. The driver put the minibus into gear. Clare staggered as the vehicle moved, then she caught herself on the back of one of the seats.
Their rescuer was dressed all in black and wore a beekeeper’s helmet with extra fabric taped over the mesh to hide their face. Gloved hands expertly turned the wheel as the bus skidded around. Clare felt it rise onto two wheels and gasped. It touched down, facing one of the main streets running through the city. A channel had been carved through the banks of cars. Probably using the makeshift snow plough contraption to clear the road, Clare thought.
“Sit down and get your seat belt on,” the driver snapped.
Clare obediently sank into a chair beside Dorran. A sense of unreality washed through her. She’d heard that phrase at least a hundred times from someone very dear to her. Even though the voice was muffled by the mask, the inflection felt painfully familiar.
She’d grasped at unfounded hope so many times in the past days that it felt wrong to reach for it again. She looked up at Dorran. He’d already fastened his buckle and watched her, brows raised in a silent question. Clare turned back to the driver, her heart fluttering like a frantic bird. “Beth?”
They hit one of the cars on the side of the road. The minibus kept moving, but the jolt was enough to nearly throw Clare out of her seat. She grabbed the chair ahead of herself with a grunt.
The driver twisted around and pulled off their mask. The face underneath held scars Clare had never seen before. But the tilt of the eyebrows, the fire in the eyes, and the exasperated angle of the lips were all beautifully, wonderfully familiar.
“So help me, Clare, put your seat belt on before I strangle you with it.”
“Okay.” Clare knew she was grinning like an idiot. She also knew she was crying. She couldn’t stop. Numb hands hunted for the belt and dragged it into its lock as Beth slammed on the accelerator, taking them away from Helexis Tower and out of the city.
The End
Keep reading: the story continues in Whispers in the Mist.
