Dara's Arc

Chapter 7 of 10

Four minutes. Dara held Kael against her chest and did the math. She could not carry him through the tunnel before the count ended. When the guards reached the empty cell, every door would seal. She needed the count stopped, and she could not do that from the cellar. But she had one thing the regime still trusted. The stolen broadcast keycard hung inside her jumpsuit, warm against her ribs. "The broadcast desk," Dara said. "Above the tunnel mouth. Who reads the morning count?" Elara's eyes went wide. "Wren. She calls the numbers over the speakers so the whole camp hears." She gripped the clipboard tighter. "If the count doesn't come, the guards wait." Dara knew the name. Wren Joss, the thin woman in the red jacket who read the regime's lies every dawn and pressed her shaking hands flat to keep them still. Wren had once steered Dara toward a hidden lamp when it cost her everything to do it. She was scared. She was also on their side. "Get Kael to the grate," Dara said. She set him in Elara's arms. "Wait for me there. Don't move until you hear the speakers." Dara ran. Up the stair, down the cold corridor, into the stone room where the tunnel opened. She climbed. Her filter rasped with each breath. At the top waited the broadcast desk, wedged into the dark mouth of the entrance. Wren sat there, red jacket bright against the rock, a microphone crackling under her hands. Wren looked up and did not flinch. "They're counting," she said. "I read the numbers in ninety seconds." Dara pulled the keycard free and set it on the desk. "I have the last musician. He's below. If you call the count, they seal the doors and we die down there." Wren stared at the card. Her hands lay flat on the wood. They shook. "If I read a false count, they'll know it was me." "I know," Dara said. She did not soften it. Wren pressed the microphone switch. Her voice went out over every speaker in the camp, steady and clear. "Morning count complete. All prisoners present. Cells secure." She read it fast, the way she always read the things she could not bear. Then she lifted her thumb. Above ground, boots that had been moving toward the cellar stopped. The camp settled back into its dawn routine. No lockdown bell rang. Wren picked up the keycard and pushed it into Dara's hand. "Take it. When they check the tape, my voice is on it. I can't broadcast here again." She stood and shed the red jacket. "I'm coming with you now, or I'm caught alone." Dara understood. The count was dead. The doors stayed open. But Wren had burned her cover to buy it, and now three of them had to reach the tunnel before anyone reviewed that tape.