Sara

The air in the Slags tasted like pennies. Like old blood and wet iron. If you breathed too deep without a filter, you could feel the heavy metals settling in your lungs, coating the alveoli until you drowned on dry land.

I adjusted the strap of my rebreather, ignoring the way the rubber bit into the bridge of my nose, and dug my gloved hands into the pile of refuse.

"Come on," I muttered, my voice muffled by the mask. "Give me something shiny."

The heap I was standing on was a geological layer cake of the city's history. Bottom layer: concrete and rebar from the Before times. Middle layer: plastic and glass from the Collapse. Top layer: the good stuff. The cast-offs from the Chrome City floating above us.

My fingers brushed against something cold and smooth. Not the jagged bite of rusted steel, but the sleek, arrogant curve of alloy. I yanked it free.

It was a servo-motor. Probably from a servant droid or an automated carriage. In the city above, this was trash because it had a hairline fracture in the casing. Down here? This was dinner for a month.

"Jackpot."

I shoved the part into my rucksack, the weight of it a comforting thump against my spine. I didn't linger. In the Scrapyard, lingering got you mugged, or worse—it got you Rusted.

I scrambled down the trash heap, my boots finding purchase on shifting debris. I moved like water—or as much like water as you could when you were wearing steel-toed boots and a utility belt heavy with pry bars.

"Yo! Sara!"

I didn't stop. I didn't even look back. I knew that voice. Jinx. A scavenger with more ambition than teeth.

"I saw that!" Jinx scrambled down after me, sending a cascade of tin cans rattling down the slope. "Split it with me, or I tell the Warden you're holding out on the tithe."

I stopped then. I turned slowly, letting my hand rest casually on the hilt of the jagged pipe I used as a baton. "Jinx. You couldn't catch a cold in a plague ward, let alone catch me."

He stopped ten feet up, panting. He looked bad. His skin had that gray, sickly sheen that meant he hadn't seen the sun in weeks. Or the Rust was setting in.

"Fifty-fifty," he wheezed. "I need credits, Sara. My mask filters are shot."

I looked at him. Really looked at him. His filter cartridge was blinking red. He was breathing raw smog.

I sighed, the sound harsh in my own ears. I hated my conscience. It was an expensive liability.

I reached into my belt and pulled out a spare filter. It was used—scrubbed clean with vinegar and hope—but it had a few days of life left in it. I tossed it to him.

"Catch."

He fumbled it, nearly dropping it into a puddle of toxic sludge. He stared at it, then at me.

"Keep your mouth shut about the servo," I said, turning away. "And wash your face, Jinx. You look like death warmed over."

I didn't wait for a thank you. I didn't want one. Gratitude was just another debt I couldn't afford to collect.

Home was a shipping container stacked three high in a swaying tower of corrugated metal. It wasn't much, but it had a lock I’d modified myself and a ventilation unit I’d stolen from a decommissioned factory.

I climbed the rusty ladder, the familiar creak of the rungs the only welcome I ever got. I keyed the lock—a triple-tumbler mechanism that would confuse most pros—and slipped inside.

The air inside was cleaner. It smelled of lavender and ozone. Elara’s smell.

"Sara?"

The voice came from the pile of blankets in the corner. My chest tightened. She sounded worse today. The rattle in her chest was deeper, wetter.

I stripped off my outer gear—the heavy coat, the utility belt, the boots—dumping them by the door. I washed my hands in the basin of recycled water before I went to her.

"Hey, bug," I said, kneeling beside the cot. "I got a servo. A big one. We eat real protein tonight. Maybe even get some of those lyophilized strawberries you like."

Elara smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes. She was seventeen, three years younger than me, but she looked frail as a bird. She sat up, the blankets falling away from her arm.

I froze.

The silver patch on her forearm, the one that had been the size of a coin last week, was now the size of a saucer. The Rust. It wasn't just a disease; it was a colonization. The metal spores in the air settled in the blood, replacing organic tissue with living iron. It started on the skin, looking like beautiful, filigreed jewelry.

Then it went internal. It calcified the lungs. It turned the heart into a paperweight.

"It barely hurts," Elara lied. She pulled her sleeve down quickly, wincing as the fabric snagged on the jagged edge of the metallic scab.

"Don't," I said, my voice shaking. I reached out and gently pulled her sleeve back up. I traced the edge of the silver patch. It was cold to the touch. "It's spreading fast, El."

"It's fine," she whispered. "I'm fine."

"You're not fine. You're turning into a statue." I stood up, the anger flaring hot and sudden in my gut. Not at her. Never at her. At the world. At the Chrome City floating above us, casting its shadow over our slow deaths. They had the cure. The Elixir. They drank it like wine at their parties to keep their skin soft and their blood red, while we scrapped for filters to keep from turning into tin cans.

I walked to the small table where I kept our stash of credits. It wasn't enough. Even with the servo, it wouldn't be enough for a single dose of Elixir on the black market.

My eyes landed on the flyer I’d crumpled up in my pocket earlier. I smoothed it out on the table.

THE IRON TRIALS For the Glory of the Crown. Winner receives: A Place in the Royal Guard. Unlimited Credits. One Wish.

One wish.

Everyone knew what the "Wish" meant. It meant access. It meant the King’s personal vault. It meant the Elixir.

"Sara, no," Elara said. She was watching me, her eyes wide and terrified. She knew what I was looking at. "You can't. It's a slaughter. They feed Slags like us to the beasts just to warm up the crowd."

"I can fight," I said, staring at the stylized drawing of a knight on the flyer. "I'm better than half those pampered knights. They fight for honor. I fight dirty."

"You'll die," she said, her voice cracking. "And then I'll be alone. Please, Sara. I'd rather rust out with you here than live without you."

I turned back to her. I sat on the edge of the bed and brushed the hair back from her forehead. She was burning up. The fever was the body's last ditch effort to burn out the metal. It never worked.

"You're not going to rust out," I said fiercely. "I promised Mom I'd look out for you."

"Mom died," Elara said softly. "Dad died. That’s what happens here, Sara. We die."

"Not us." I leaned down and kissed her forehead. "I'm going out. I need to sell the servo."

"Sara—"

"Sleep, El. I'll bring back strawberries."

I didn't go to the fence. I went to the workshop.

It was a small alcove in the back of the container where I did my tinkering. I pulled my boots over to the light.

They were standard issue scavenger boots—heavy leather, reinforced toes. But the heels were special. I grabbed a screwdriver and popped the false heel off the left boot.

Inside lay my inheritance.

It wasn't money. It was a set of lockpicks made from aerospace-grade titanium. My father had taught me how to use them before the Rust took his fingers, and then his lungs.

“Locks are just puzzles made by men who are afraid,” he used to say. “And every man is afraid of something.”

I checked the picks. Tension wrench, rake, diamond, hook. They were slim, deadly, and illegal in three sectors.

I slid them back into the heel and snapped it shut. I wasn't going to the Iron Trials to win a duel. I wasn't going to defeat the King’s champions with a sword or a spear.

I was going to cheat.

I stood up and caught my reflection in the polished steel of the ventilation duct. Dark eyes, messy hair tied back with a grease-stained ribbon, a face that was too sharp angles and not enough softness. I didn't look like a hero. I looked like what I was.

A rat.

And rats survived where lions starved.

I grabbed my coat. The Trials started at dawn. The line for registration would already be forming at the base of the Elevator.

I took one last look at Elara, sleeping fitfully, the silver creeping up her wrist like a beautiful, deadly vine.

"One wish," I whispered to the empty room.

I stepped out into the toxic night, leaving the door unlocked for the first time in years. I wouldn't be needing it tonight. Tonight, I was going to the Palace.

And I was going to tear it down, brick by gilded brick, until I got what was mine.

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