Firestorm

“You aren’t with Coal anymore. I heard that through the grapevine.” He reached out and touched a hanging bunch of grapes to the right of us, a smile on his lips. I laughed softly.

“Stop. You’re right I’m not with Coal . . .”

He raised an eyebrow but didn’t let go of me with his other hand. “But?”

I didn’t know what to say or how to explain Ash, because even I didn’t really know what was going on there. “I’m just not . . .I have to focus on getting Ash and me out of here. And I need your help.”

His eye green eyes lowered then slowly rose to mine. “And we can have this conversation after?”

I couldn’t help the laugh with those puppy dog eyes he was laying on me. “Fine. We’ll have this conversation after.”

He let go of me and glanced to the floor. “What are you doing with the bad luck cat?”

Peta let out a low growl. “I’m her familiar, prick.”

His eyebrows shot straight up. “Truly?”

“Yes. Listen. I need you to focus. Can you do that?” I asked, hoping I could get him to be serious for at least a few minutes.

“For you, Larkspur, princess of the Rim, of course.”

“Princess?” Peta spit out the word with enough shock to make me blush.

“”Bastard child,” I said.

Cactus grunted. “The only bastards in the Rim were your siblings and Cassava.”

Taking me by the hand he drew me deeper into the house. The greenery he’d been growing wasn’t any thinner the farther back we went. If anything, the walls were thicker with the growth. “Cactus, how are you hiding this?”

He stopped in front of another door and slowly pushed it open. “I have to get out of here too, Lark. Whatever you’re planning, I’m in. Because if I don’t escape soon . . . Smoke is right. Fiametta is a hard ass and the fact I can do this much with the earth will either make her want to kill me or use me more than she already is.”

I followed him into what I belatedly realized was his bedroom. “Cactus, I said we’d discuss our relationship later, but I didn’t mean a few minutes later.”

He held up his hands, finally letting go of me. “It’s safer back here. Less chance of someone listening in.”

Peta trotted forward, the white tip in her tail twitching several times as she sniffed the room. “He’s right. The green stuff blocks the echo of voices the queen’s spies could listen to through the rock.”

Too much information at the same time made my head hurt. “Echo through the rock?”

Cactus flopped onto his bed, the woven vines and thick moss giving under his weight. He tucked his hands behind his head, his lean muscular body a rather inviting picture. He gave me a wink as if the fool knew what I was thinking. I fought the heat that rose in my cheeks. He spoke as though he hadn’t noticed though. “Echo in the rock. The queen has Listeners who use the residual fire molecules within the rock to spy on her people. The plants muffle our voices.”

I sank to sit on the bed beside him. Peta jumped into my lap and I put a hand on her, finding once more a comfort in her presence I hadn’t expected. She looked to my face. “Dirt Girl, you can’t save them all from their own queen. If you want to get your fellow Ender out, then that’s what we need to focus on. What Brand asks of you could work in your favor.”

Scratching one finger under her chin, I watched as her eyes closed and a low purr rumbled out of her. Her eyes popped open and she glared at me. “No amount of chin scratches will change what I suggest.”

Cactus sat up. “If you need to get Ash out, then we need to play by the rules. Fiametta is a stickler for them. Which is why I hide this.” He waved his hand as if to encompass the room. “She has stated that half breeds can only exist here if they don’t touch their other half without her permission. Which isn’t an issue for most since there are very few who can actually do anything.” He ran a hand through his slicked back hair.

“But when did you find you could reach so much of the earth?” I found myself dropping my voice. Knowing Fiametta could be listening in was downright creepy.

“When I hit puberty. It was like something inside me opened and suddenly I could make things grow. And as you can imagine, a talent like that is valuable here.”

“So Fiametta probably wouldn’t banish you.” I frowned, running the possibilities through my head. “But she’d force you to work for her, like a Planter?”

“Worse,” Peta said softly. “She’d tell everyone he’d died and then keep him for herself, deep within her palace.”

I stared down at Peta. “You know that for sure?”

She nodded. “You remember Loam? That was why he was in the Deep, to find weak Undines he could bring back with him for Fiametta. They draw the water up through the earth, bringing us the clean water we need. Same with the Sylphs, they funnel the fresh air and oxygen that the mountain and lava devour.”

“Mother goddess,” I breathed out, the enormity of what Peta and Cactus were telling me overshadowing the fact I had to find a way to get us out of the Pit. Fiametta was using slaves? The Undines used human slaves, but that was . . . different. Maybe it wasn’t. I squeezed my eyes shut. Slavery was forbidden amongst all four elemental families. How in the seven hells was Fiametta getting away with this?

“They aren’t slaves,” Peta said. “They sign a contract stating they will be cared for if they do as they’re asked. If they don’t then they will be killed.”