Page 4 of The Infinite Glade (The Maze Cutter #3)

CHAPTER TWO

Second-Sight

S oldiers decided their trust in two ways:

By someone’s character, and their competence.

And Alexandra had already proven to have neither.

“I don’t trust her.” Minho looked over his shoulder to Orange after he watched the shape of Alexandra’s cloak disappear into the woods.

Minho knew enough to identify a liar in his opponent, and the way she squinted when she said the word Hollowing was suspicious.

“A Godhead, someone of the highest order, would never walk into a brutal ‘carving and gutting of a human’ alone. They always had guards. Tons of them. . . .” The Remnant Nation’s Orphan soldiers were taught just as much about the Evolutionary Guards and how to circumvent them as they were taught about the Godhead. “I bet she never even saw a Hollowing.”

“Claims she did.”

“She’s lying. She’s going to get a weapon or something.” Minho adjusted the gun strap on his shoulder.

Dominic scoffed. “She doesn’t look like she even feeds herself, let alone ever handled a weapon.”

“Funny. I thought the same about you when we first met.” Minho lightly punched the kid. “I’ll be back in a few.” He motioned a hand signal to Orange that meant he’d meet her at the rendezvous—the Maze Cutter . Orange kept one hand on her weapon and nodded.

Orphans. Always on the ready.

“No, no, wait a minute here.” Roxy held her palm out to Minho.

“We should really stick together. There’s explosions over there and who knows how many half-Cranks might be left in the woods.

” She shook her head. “I’m not letting you out of my sight.

I can’t lose you.” Then she looked at the others. “Not any of you.”

Minho felt something weigh upon him, heavier than all the steel arm and ankle training-weights from the Remnant Nation put together.

He felt the fear in Roxy’s eyes. Scared of losing him.

He never had someone he wanted to do right by before, but he sure as hell wanted to do right by Roxy.

“I’ve got to go alone. I promise I’ll be back.

Soldiers promise. I’ve got to see what it is she’s?—”

“Why don’t you trust her?” Sadina asked, never sounding more naive. “We came here to find the Godhead. Well, she’s it.”

Minho came for a different reason, unbeknownst to the others: he wanted to join the Godhead . . . but not anymore. Definitely not anymore. “A Godhead wearing a Pilgrim’s cloak.”

“So?” Sadina countered. “It’s colder up here, they have cloaks. Big deal.”

“So, she’s either a Pilgrim who’s deceiving us , or she’s a Godhead who’s deceiving her people .

” Minho motioned back to St. Petersburg and the black smoke trailing in the air.

“If a Godhead is so powerful, where are the other members and why is she out here trying to escape her city like a coward? Any true Godhead would stand with their people. They would stand with their city.” He didn’t know how else to say it, but either way, Alexandra Romanov wasn’t a good person. He trusted his gut.

Miyoko suddenly spoked up. “What does the cloak matter? You’re wearing the clothes of a Remnant Soldier, so maybe we shouldn’t trust you!” She pointed at Minho’s and Orange’s uniform.

Minho had never really felt like he belonged in the Remnant Nation.

Even as an orphan, he knew he’d rather die alone than die standing beside them in battle.

Every bite of gunfire and explosion echoing in the distance of Alaska, north of where they stood, felt like a hammer in his chest. “It matters,” was all he could say.

He wouldn’t waste time explaining all these things to Miyoko or anyone else.

All those years training to be a soldier taught him how to kill, how to fight in battle, how to die honorably .

. . but he left the walls of the Remnant Nation so he could learn how to live .

“Listen,” Orange said, and with that one word Minho knew what would come next.

Anytime the Grief Bearers wanted to sell their lies as truth or their disappointment as opportunity, they’d start by saying listen .

“We left the Remnant Nation because we believe in the Godhead. We didn’t want to kill her like the others.

We’re on your side.” Lies, of course. But Orange calmed things down, and Minho could have left it at that. Probably should have.

But he didn’t want to lie and manipulate the first friends he ever had. He had to say it . . . “Maybe she’s not the Godhead. Maybe she’s just some crazy woman who we found living on the outskirts of the city . . .”

Orange gave Minho a cringed look of exhaustion.

Everyone got quiet.

Sadina took a step back and held her heart as if Minho had just pushed a knife right into her chest. Did she really believe this much in the Godhead? Had they been brainwashed?

She proceeded to let Minho have it. “We didn’t leave our homes, get kidnapped after watching Kletter’s throat get slit, get separated from Isaac, my mom, and Old Man Frypan to listen to you complain about what the Godhead is wearing .

We left our homes, our loved ones, to come here and try to do what we can to help those we can, and if what you came here for is different—then go do whatever it is you came here for.

Go fight the Godhead and the city with the rest of your people and die in those flames for all I care—but don’t mess up the good we’re trying to do to help find a Cure. ”

She turned swiftly away and continued walking down the coast toward the Maze Cutter . Trish, Miyoko, and Dominic—he with a whatcha gonna do shrug—followed in support, but Roxy waited behind for Minho.

As they stormed off to the Maze Cutter , it had definitely become clear that something about Sadina had changed from the moment they anchored the ship in Alaska.

Desperation and death. With every half-Crank they had killed, their perceptions had changed.

Minho knew the human-looking things, chained together, were probably the first real threat the islanders had ever seen, let alone had to kill with their own hands.

He brushed off Sadina’s dramatic exit. Every time he’d had to kill a trespasser back in the Remnant Nation, he felt like he had to prove something afterward—that he didn’t kill for nothing.

“Come on.” Roxy waited.

Minho shook his head and looked back to the woods where the Pilgrim cloak disappeared. “I’ll catch up to you.”

“No, no. I’m not having that.” Roxy pleaded, “The only thing in those woods is danger, and I cannot lose you. Who cares about the Godhead, if she’s the Godhead or not.

Let her go. If she comes back, we’ll deal with it all then.

” She took two steps and then another toward the Maze Cutter . “Come on, son.”

The Godhead who Minho refused to call a Godhead, or a God, or a Goddess, traveled into the woods alone for a reason . . . and Minho needed to find out why. “I’m sorry.” He knew it would disappoint Roxy terribly, but he needed to know.

“I’ll come back, soldier’s promise.”

“Come on, we’ve got to see who it is.” Jackie locked eyes with Isaac, and he knew what that look meant.

Hope. He couldn’t say it out loud but he knew exactly what his friend was thinking.

What if something happened to the Maze Cutter and the others never made it to Alaska?

What if around that fire up ahead sat Minho, Orange, Sadina, Trish, Miyoko, and Dominic?

Hope needed every question and every curiosity answered, or hope would only multiply itself before turning into what ifs .

Isaac nodded to Jackie. Sometimes hope is what made you take the next step.

The smoke rising up into the sky wasn’t far from where they stood. “You both can stay here.” Isaac turned to Ximena and Old Man Frypan, still parked on the log. “Jackie and I can reach there before it gets too dark and come back to you.”

But Frypan leaned hard on his walking stick and stood up. “Can’t sit here just stirring on it. I’ll go with you. They were all in agreement . . . except for Ximena.

“You’re kidding, right?” Ximena asked, then mumbled something else that Isaac didn’t catch.

“What?” Isaac asked.

“La verdad quedará enterrada. Extranos nos enterraran. The truth will remain buried and strangers will put us in the ground. ” She said it with so much confidence that Isaac felt dumb for wondering what it meant.

“Strangers will put us in the ground?” he repeated.

“Just say what you’re trying to say!” Jackie shouted at Ximena. “We don’t know every last one of your stupid Village riddles!”

Isaac stood between the two in case another fight broke out.

“Second-sight . . .” Ximena sighed. “Your elders didn’t teach you?” She looked to Old Man Frypan as if he were responsible for everything they did and didn’t know. And in a way, he was.

“We taught them well . . .” Frypan cleared his throat. “They’re good kids.”

“Yeah,” Isaac said defensively. “We may not have the same history as your Village, and we’re not going to know all the same things, but I bet there’re things the Gladers of Old taught us that you don’t know.”

Isaac had heard every legend of the Gladers of Old, how they had their memories wiped and were left to learn everything all over again in the Glade.

There were a few times Isaac wished his memory could be erased, but that was before he found the forge.

Forging gave him steps to remember, things to learn, a reason to have memories again.

He imagined that’s what the surviving Gladers who established the island communities went through as well, all those years ago after their nightmare ended.

And whether Ximena thought so or not, the islanders knew things—Most important of all, they knew how to survive.

He tried to sound conciliatory. “Look, there’s a chance the fire up ahead could be our friends, that maybe they never made it to Alaska. We have to find out.”