Ignition Point by Kate Corcino Page B

the human misery of their prisoners, but she could still see it. She could imagine it. The only things moving down there, other than the guards, were the shadows hunched in the cages. One of them was her companion’s brother. She looked at Ghost.
    There was a tension to him now that hadn’t been there before. While he crouched beside the tree in a mirror of her own posture, he gave the impression of a snake coiled, watching. One of his hands curled into the coarse bark of the tree while the fingers of the other rubbed a slow circle over the spot where his wound had festered. He’d have no pain lingering there, she knew. It was the memory. She recognized the motion as a promise to himself to repay the pain in kind.
    He turned his face to her. She nodded, ready. With the curt return movement of his head, they began.
    Ghost slid forward, close to the ground and silent. He made no noise, drifting across the area between Lena and the camp like his namesake until he eased into position behind a huge bushy juniper. Lena focused on the guard closest, allowing him to move forward, closer, his patrol bringing him within feet of Ghost’s hidden position.
    Lena exhaled, air sighing out long and slow as she reached with her mind.
    Hello, little friends. Hello. Listen: hold your host still for me. Please? So still—no movement, no breath, no sound. Lock his muscles for me, little friends?
    The Dust inside the man stirred at the touch of her mind then exploded into answering movement. The Dust wanted to help.
    She’d warned Ghost to look for the stillness. Now, as the Dust stole the man’s movement, stilled his heart and lungs, Ghost paused. His wide eyes swept over the man once, then again, before he slipped out from his hiding place to wrap his wiry arms around the big man, tip him back, and drag him away behind a gnarled desert willow.
    Lena knew the moment his knife spilled the Scavenger’s blood onto the hard earth of the desert. She felt it as a sudden surging movement of normally quiet Dust. Most of the Dust, feeling the host’s energy dying away until the forces of nature changed it again, swept out with the flow and joined the Dust in the ground.
    A moment later, Ghost reappeared. He stared at her where she crouched beside the tree, her fingers mindlessly tracing the jagged rocks embedded in the dirt at her feet. His head tilted in the direction of the other guard.
    Lena rose. They moved together to skirt the camp, slip into position, and repeat the tactic they’d used before: disabling of body, slashing of throat.
    Sentries disposed of, they approached the sleeping camp. At the perimeter, far enough back she had an overview of the camp, Lena held back. She knelt in the rocky sand, tuning out the sharp edges pressing into her knees, the smell of woodsmoke, and the stink of unwashed humans that the wind carried to her now. She focused on Ghost.
    He made his way into the Scavenger camp, sliding in past the wagons. She waited for the horses to stir in response, for any dogs the Scavs might have to alert, but the young Neo-Barb lived up to his name. He moved among them like a ghost, a promise of death, though none of them knew it. Yet.
    Lena’s gaze flicked to the opposite end of camp, to the two big cages holding the Scavengers’ haul of human treasure. Whether the people inside were now sleeping or simply exhausted and hopeless, they were also still.
    Ghost made his way to the first of the four rough tents, ran his hand up the opening, and slid inside.
    For several long moments, there was only the quiet of the wind in her ears. Her eyes wide, Lena leaned in, waiting. Ghost reappeared, slipping out from between the tent flaps. He glanced back at her, holding up a hand with three fingers raised.
    Lena’s brows rose. She might have thought he meant three altogether, including the two sentries, if he hadn’t been delayed so long in the tent. Instead, she understood that he’d just disposed of three men. There were seven