CHAPTER 12

Skiddleywag

     When the Elderclock chimed six bells, the woman Fjerdan guard who had stuck her fingers into Brynn's mouth came back. Her eyes were sharp and her hair pulled back tightly.

"Shimkopper," she said in Fjerdan. At the confused looks she got from the other women, she sighed, trying again in Kerch, her Fjerdan accent thick. "Piss bucket? To empty?" Shrugs and more confused glances were given in response.

She rolled her eyes, but shoved a bucket of fresh water into the cell and slammed the bar shut behind her, muttering something about "useless" and "pillock" in Fjerdan under her breath.

Brynn was closest to the bucket, so she claimed it first, ignoring the glares given to her by the other prisoners. She took a big gulp from the cup tied to its handle, making sure it splashed on her shirt. When she handed it over to Inej, she did the same, and Nina after her.

Nina hiked up her pants, fingers feeling around the thin skin over her ankle. She then popped open her skin, taking out a pellet about the size of a raisin and slick with her blood. She winced, but didn't make any noise as the blood ran down her foot.

The three of them pulled their shirt up over their mouth as Brynn reached under the bench to grab the waste bucket she'd stashed there. Nina nodded at them, then dropped the pellet into the bucket.

Brynn remembered when Kaz told her about the plan. At first, she didn't want her friend to have to split open her skin just to knock everyone else in the cell out, but the more Kaz spoke, the more it made sense.

Friend. Brynn never would have imagined she'd be able to say she had one of those.

A cloud of mist bloomed from the water with a hissing sound. In mere seconds, the air a milky green, the women around them toppled to the ground, some of their thumps louder than others.

Brynn waited for a count of sixty, like Nina had told them to, before dropping her collar and taking a sniff in the air. The air had a sickly sweet smell that made Brynn feel like she needed to sit down for a few seconds, but that was the worst of it. The prisoners laid in heaps on the floor around them, a few snores rising up from the ground.

Now all they had to do was wait.

Jesper should have been making picks for Kaz from the iron bars with his Fabrikator abilities now, revealing his secret to the rest of the boys. Nina would be the only one who didn't know, then. Brynn only knew he was Grisha because he told her himself one day when she was fixing him up after a bad run-in with another one of the gangs in Ketterdam. He offered to tell her something about himself in exchange for her telling him something about herself.

"I'm a Fabrikator," blurted Jesper as soon as she reluctantly agreed. Brynn had raised an eyebrow. "Seriously! I'm not very good at it, but I swear I'm a Fabrikator."

She nodded. "Alright, I guess that means I have to tell you something about myself, then." Brynn paused, thinking. "I had a sister. Her name was Sasha."

"What happened to her?"

"I agreed to one thing for one thing, Fahey," she told him. "Unless you want to tell me two more things about yourself that not a lot of people know, we're done here."

"Two?" he had exclaimed.

"I told you her name, too. That's two things."

He'd left her room grumbling, but when he smelled the pastries from the bakery downstairs, he grinned and winked at her before rushing down to get something to eat.

The sound of footsteps neared their cell and the girls stood up straighter, squinting in the dark hallway outside of their cell to find two figures—one limping and the other with curls that bounced everytime he moved—coming their way. Kaz and Wylan emerged from the shadows, a grin on Wylan's face and two picks in Kaz's bare hands. Brynn clenched her own ungloved hands as she stepped away for Kaz to do his magic.

The padlock on the cell door clicked and Kaz swung the bar open, letting the three of them out. Brynn closed the cell behind her.

"Nina, you're going with me to search the upper cells," Kaz said.

Brynn frowned. "What? Jesper and Matthias were supposed to go with Nina."

"Change of plans. Wylan, Inej, Brynn, you meet up with Matthias and Jesper in the laundry room in the basement." Kaz turned around to go back the way he came with Nina in tow, when Brynn's voice stopped him.

"No."

Kaz looked over his shoulder at her, his glare deadly. "Brynn, we don't have time to argue about this."

"I'm not arguing. I'm insisting that I come along with you guys," she said.

"You're just going to get yourself killed."

"Well, it's been a nice seventeen years."

"You're insufferable."

"And you're arguing with a dead girl."

Bickering with Kaz was certainly not the smartest thing Brynn could have done, but she really needed to blow off some steam. He glowered at her, and Brynn almost wished she could know what he was thinking. Then she thought against it. No one would ever wish to know what Dirtyhands was thinking.

"Go with Inej and Wylan, Brynn. Now."

Brynn frowned. "I don't remember crowning you king over me."

Inej set her hand on Brynn's shoulder. "Brynn, let it go." She shrugged the girl's hand off of her.

"You are a Grisha in a Fjerdan prison," Kaz said. "I don't think you have much room for negotiation."

He turned his back to her and started walking, but Brynn wasn't done yet. "Turn me over, then! If that was a threat, then what's stopping you from pushing me into the line of fire?"

"You put yourself in the line of fire when you burned down your village."

Brynn stared at him, taking a step back. She hadn't told him that. So how did he know?

"You know what you lack, Brekker?" Brynn said.

"Empathy?" said Inej.

"Love?" guessed Wylan.

"A good haircut," muttered Nina.

"Pray tell," said Kaz, ignoring their commentary.

"You lack purpose, Kaz," Brynn finally answered. "You always say you never do something for nothing, but you're the only one who knows what that something ever is! You always do something for yourself. You're selfish."

"Nina, let's go," said Kaz.

Brynn rolled her eyes as Nina joined him, and soon, they were out of sight. She could still hear her shouts echoing through the corridor.

"What just happened?" Wylan whispered.

"Be quiet," Inej told him. "Come on, let's get to the incinerator."

Brynn followed them silently, mulling over Kaz's and her own words. First Matthias, now him? How did they connect the dots so perfectly? And now Inej and Wylan knew. Brynn trusted Inej enough to keep her secret, but she wasn't so sure about the merchling Van Eck.

A new sound filled the silence. At first, Brynn thought it was a fight coming from the higher levels, with banging and yelling coming from the prisoners in the female sector. Then her ears picked up on a familiar tune.

She stopped, Inej and Wylan halting a few feet in front of her. Ignoring their puzzled looks, Brynn tiptoed toward the stairwell from where the sound was coming from.

"Brynn," hissed Inej. "What are you doing?"

Brynn held up a hand, silencing her. She opened the door leading to the stairwell and the song became louder than before, loud enough to where Brynn could hear the song they sang.

In the rain, past the clouds

In the dark, past the shadows

We are connected forever

And I will find you

Climbing the steps, Brynn ignored Wylan and Inej as they tried to get her to come back. This should have been impossible. There were only two people who knew that song. And now an entire floor was singing it.

Summer is gone, Winter is here

She loves to play

When the snow has clouded your vision,

I will still find you

She was almost to the door now, the song sweetly sung by each of the female prisoners on the level. Brynn could also hear some of them banging against the prison bars to the slow tune, some of them snapping or adding unnecessary riffs.

Beyond the trees, where the world is black

Past the end of our forever land in our imaginations

The future and past is present

We might be just kids, but we will never be torn apart

Brynn pushed the door open, eyes wide and searching. Lanterns hung from the walls, but shadows filled in the spots where there was no light. The cells were closely packed together, with one woman in each cell. The prisoners nearest to the door glanced at Brynn, but continued singing, the oldest of them snapping along to the beautiful symphony of female voices.

Should I be the one to whisper goodbye,

To send your body to that place,

To cry and mourn in your absence,

Become lost without your guidance,

Send me a blessing from the afterlife

Because we will be together again in that golden, trouble-free land

No matter what

No matter what

Brynn rushed over to the first cell on the right. She couldn't see the prisoner through the shadows, but she sounded like she had been singing it loudest of all. Then she caught sight of red hair from the light and her breath caught itself in her throat.

"Sasha?" she whispered, stepping closer. "Sasha, is that you?"

A figure emerged from the shadows, but she looked nothing like Brynn's sister. The woman eyed Brynn as she stood up and put her hands through the bars to lean on it.

"Who are you?" she asked nonchalantly in Kaelish. "And how'd you get out of your cell?"

"Where did you hear that song?" Brynn demanded, switching to Kaelish, as well. "The one you were just singing. Where'd you hear it?"

The woman grinned. "The girl you would be looking for is a few cells down on the opposite side. Sweet little thing, I think she's done almost all of her time already. She answers to the name 'Ilddrüsje'." She frowned. "Fjerdan is such an odd language."

Brynn had rushed off before she finished the sentence, eyes searching fruitlessly in the damp and dark cells for her sister. "Ilddrüsje?" she called, trying not to be too loud for the guards to hear her. "Ilddrüsje?"

"I believe I'm the one you should be looking for."

Brynn stopped at the croaky female voice in Kaelish coming from the cell on her left. She could make out a brief outline of a girl sitting on the bench that doubled as a bed through the shadows. Then the girl stood up and into the light.

She hardly looked like Sasha. The skin that Brynn could see was blistered and burned nearly beyond recognition. She wore the same bland prison uniform as everyone else, her feet bare. Her hair was just as fiery and red as Brynn remembered, almost down past her mid-back, now.

When she stared at Brynn with her electric blue eyes full of confusion, Brynn realized that she didn't recognize her. She looked like a Fjerdan, not her sister.

Brynn rushed forward, as close as the bars on the cell would allow her to get. "Sasha, it's me, Brynn."

Sasha's eyes narrowed and she crossed her arms. "I don't believe you."

Brynn racked her brain for some way to get Sasha to know it was her. "That song everyone was singing, we made up that song ourselves. We'd sing it to each other at night and when we were alone so that no one could ever take the lyrics from us."

"Everyone here knows that," Sasha said. "You're going to have to try harder than that."

Pushing aside her hurt at the fact that all the prisoners here knew the lyrics to their song, Brynn frowned. What would only the two of them know, that Sasha never would have told anyone here? An idea flickered on in Brynn's mind and she stood up straighter, a smile upon her foreign face.

"Sasha," she started, "when you were born, I wanted to name you something. Later, when you were old enough to remember, I told you what I wanted to name you and we vowed never to speak about it again."

Sasha's brows furrowed, her interest piqued. "Even if you did know it, that would be breaking our vow."

"There's no other way for you to believe me," explained Brynn. "We never told anyone because it was so embarrassing, for the both of us."

"Don't say it."

Brynn took a breath. "I wanted to name you Skiddleywag."

A moment of silence before Sasha's guarded expression broke out into a relieved grin. She moved to the bars of her cell, holding out her hands. Brynn took them in hers. They were unnaturally cold.

"Brynny," breathed Sasha, a tear in her eyes. "I thought you were dead."

"I thought you were dead," Brynn told her. "Why are you here?"

Before Sasha could respond, Inej's voice came from the door to the level. "Brynn! We have to go now!"

Brynn had nearly forgotten they were in a prison and there was a plan in motion that relied heavily on them sticking to the timing of said plan. "I'll be right behind you guys!" she said back, then turned to Sasha. "You might want to step back."

Sasha frowned. "What? Why? What are you going to do?"

She curled her fingers around the lock on the cell bars, taking a deep breath. "Something I really hope works." 

a/n— Whaaa? Her sister's alive? Plot-twist! Let me know what you guys think so far!