The constant crash of waves to her left made it impossible to listen for the furtive scurry of footfalls or breaking twigs as bodies moved through the forest. Her imagination supplied the sounds, twisting them up with the real noise of the waves and her companions and the snapping torch until she’d almost convinced herself she was hearing footsteps, that the guards were pacing them.

“What if I can’t do it?” Maris asked, and even though she kept her voice low, Serina still jumped at the sound.

“Do what?” Helena asked.

“Shoot someone.” Maris’s hands gripped the firearm so tightly her knuckles had gone white.

Helena rubbed a hand down her back. “Then you shoot in the air to signal the others, and we’ll take care of the guards.” She glanced at Serina, who nodded agreement, and added, “We’ve been fighting without firearms for a long time. We know what to do.”

Maris heaved a sigh. “This is so strange. I feel like I’m in another world.”

Serina grimaced. “You are. Our world.”

The path arced away from the cliffs and into the trees not far from the entrance to the cave. It was strange to think of it now, empty and abandoned, nothing but a few rusted chairs and the remains of the cook fire to show that it had once been inhabited. Serina hadn’t been back since the night of the fight with the Commander.

“Hey, Tremor,” she said, a thought niggling at her. “When Cave crew moved down to Hotel Misery, you brought all the supplies and weapons, right?”

“Most of it, I think,” Tremor responded after a moment. “Cliff sent the girls up to grab their pallets and personal belongings. I think they collected the food and weapons too.”

“But you’re not sure.” A heavy weight settled in Serina’s stomach. Probably the guards had gone to one of the watchtowers or the stream. They’d have gone somewhere familiar. But what if they’d decided to raid the abandoned camps? What discarded weapons or food might they find?

“I think we better go by the cave first,” she decided. “If there’s anything left we’ll take it with us. The last thing we need is Nero or Diego getting their hands on a boar spear or someone’s dropped knife.”

As Serina left the path for a small trail that passed through the forest to the cave, her heart beat faster. The thought that the guards might have found their way to her former home, that they could even now be huddled in the dark cavern where so many of the women they terrorized had slept, made her ill.

And yet, part of her hoped they were there.

It seemed a fitting place to remind them they had no dominion here.

Oracle would have approved.