“Gloves?” I say, confused.
“Touch,” replies Luther, “is one of our most important senses. It allows us to feel the world around us and to connect with one another. It is used between mother and child to form a bond. Why do you think all newborns are taken from the breeders the moment they draw their first breath?”
“Why would anyone do all of this?” asks Chase.
Luther leans back in his chair, and the back legs creak as the front ones lift into the air a little.
“Humanity is a weakness. Love is a weakness. Empathy is a weakness. These are not people that you see but resources, entities meant to serve and function as deemed necessary by society. Once their usefulness is used up, remove them the way you would remove a diseased limb,” I say, repeating a lesson taught to me while at the training facility, stopping when I realize the words I have spoken.
“There is your answer,” Luther says to Chase, allowing the front legs of the chair to thud on the carpet. “If you can remove the idea that we are human, make people forget they are talking to another person, you can prevent people from connecting with one another and finding commonalities for which to form a bond. Fear of death. Fear of falling ill. That is what was driven into people’s minds, until that fear turned into anger toward any who did not comply with the new rules, thus dividing them even further, and when the time was right, another event happened, and reports about its injustice bombarded the people, until they were so filled with rage that they decided to act, but not against those who manipulated them, but against each other. And as the people destroyed one another in the streets, until chaos reigned, the puppet masters steered that chaos, until the mob destroyed those who refused to obey the new dictates. They weren’t hard to find. Once they were destroyed, the mob was steered in the direction of those who were too afraid to take a stand, but chose to cower in their homes, hoping that things would just magically improve, forcing them to hunker even further, until they begged for the madness to stop, until they were broken and had no will of their own.
“And, so, enters a savior,” continues Luther, “A man promising to end the chaos, but only if the people put him in charge and vow to accept the new normal, knowing full well that, tired as they are from all the mayhem, they will do as he wishes just to have some semblance of peace, but they will never get it. And the life that they had before becomes forgotten to the point where it cannot even be called a distant memory.”
“So, people were just manipulated into destroying themselves?” asks Chase with doubt.
“Is it that hard to believe?” asks Luther. “You are manipulated every minute of every day. Do you dare look a citizen in the eyes? Do you dare speak up for yourself? Whenever there are grumblings of discontent, does something always seem to happen to put the people in a state of fear? Do you find yourself pondering thoughts that you never knew you had?”
“What happened next?” I ask.
“What always happens when there is complete chaos. War in the streets turned into a war in the countryside, until it swept over the entire nation. Once everything had been reduced to rubble, the power hungry gathered the survivors and promised peace and prosperity, so long as you played by their rules. All the people had to do was destroy the mob that was used to initiate the chaos in the first place. In the end, the survivors divided themselves into small city like states, trusting no one and despising any who were not like them, and from what I can gather, it was at this time that Arel was officially formed. Our first president of Arel saw an opportunity and took it, convincing people to follow him. He set about a series of laws that were to right the wrongs imposed upon certain people and you are living in the culmination of all that has happened before.”
Silence ensues after Luther finishes speaking, while I ponder all that he has said. A mob? That is what met me on the shuttle car. “A puppeteer,” I murmur to myself. “That explains the railcar.”
“Railcar?” Luther looks at me with inquisitive eyes.
I look at both him and Chase. Chase knew there had been an incident, but I didn’t tell him everything, and I should have. “I was on a shuttle car on my way back to the eastern sector when a voice broke over the intercom and said something about how arbiters have abused their authority. I don’t remember the exact words, but what he said turned the people on the car against me.”
“They attacked you?” asked Luther.
“Yes. But there was also an explosive device on the track and it blew the car off the rails. I managed to get away, and only me. Arbiters executed anyone else who managed to escape as well. And… I’ve been seeing this symbol everywhere I go.”
I draw it on the table, tracing it with my index finger, and Luther’s eyebrows scrunch together in concentration as he rubs his chin with his left hand, deep in thought. The feeling that he knows this symbol washes over me; so, I prod him. “Do you know it?”
“You need to practice extra caution, Noni,” he says, evading my question.
“You say that like you care about me. The abrasive individual who has no love for anything Arelian, now shows compassion to an arbiter.”
“Don’t get too used to it,” says Luther. “There are forces at play here; this you know, but they do not come from Arel.”
“But why turn people against her?” demands Chase.
“A test,” says Luther. “There are cameras on those railcars. If someone was able to temporarily hack into the intercom system, they would have had access to the cameras, seen you”—he points at me—“alone, among citizens, and decided to see if he could convince them to do something they would not do under normal circumstances. And it worked.”
There is something Luther is not telling me. Those eyes reveal a network of thoughts, questions, and considerations all firing through his intelligent mind, but unwilling to tell me for some reason or another.
“What…” I begin.
“I think it is time for you both to go.”
“But…”
He cuts me off again. “We can’t have either of you be discovered out past curfew.” He hurries to the door and motions for us to follow.
“I need to know if there are more tunnels,” I say.
Luther stops. “You planning to sneak more people out of the city?”
“Maybe,” I say. “I don’t know, it’s just…”
“It’s time for you to leave.”
Knowing that I will get no more information from him, I turn the knob on the door and stop. “You say that puppeteers helped orchestrate the creation of Arel.”
“It seems so. During times of peace, people will not willingly fight amongst themselves. So, conflict must be created.”
“So, is everyone a manipulator?”
“A manipulator preys upon your emotions, most notably anger, hopelessness, the feeling of being inadequate, and the desire to belong to something. A liberator plays to your ability to reason and does not fear you as an individual. When it comes to deciding how far you will go to achieve something, you have to decide where you will draw the line.”
Before I have time to respond, Luther opens the door and shoves both Chase and me outside in his usual unceremonious way, leaving us in the darkness.
“Well, that went well,” Chase quips. “Did you find out what you were looking for?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “It sounds like certain events happened which created Arel, and now, the same thing is happening all over again, forcing us to…”
“Trade one master for another,” Chase finishes.
“While giving us the illusion of choice.”
I hold him close before leaving back through the hole in the fence and navigating our way back to the manor, hoping to get us back before anyone notices our absence, unable to get the staticky voice from the train out of my head. It toyed with me, used me and the others to achieve some sort of end,—what, I do not know—but because of him, people are dead, and I will see the face of that woman for the rest of my days.
I think
of Mandi and how she has met with Natalie in secret. Is she a part of this? Does she know something? She must, and I intend to find out what.
Chapter 28
A Plan
The pillow curves around my head as I open my eyes to another dreary day of rain and clouds, gray and emotionless, like the life of an arbiter, like my life. I roll onto my back and glance at the only closet in the room and almost jump when I spot Chase seated on the floor, watching me with those gray eyes of his, but unlike the outside world, his eyes are full of compassion, mercy, and something else… love? I don’t not know love. Love is not permitted in Arel, and forbidden to all arbiters. We are the strong, the powerful, the ones who are worthy of being in Arel and having what it offers, though I have been wondering what that is of late. Forced compliance, death if we fail, no thoughts of our own—all must adhere to the mandates of Arel or perish. Individuality is considered a stain upon the purity of Arel and is stamped out wherever it arises. And love? Love is weakness and weakness is death. But can love be a strength? I shake my head. Such a notion is contrary to Arel’s teachings and therefore, forbidden, just like everything else.
“I didn’t mean to startle you,” Chase says in a soft, warm voice.
“What are you doing here?” I ask, afraid that he might be neglecting his duties and will pay an immense price for it. “How’s Gwen? Is something wrong?”
An uncomfortable heat courses through me at the thought that he might lose his sister, the one person he has spent his life protecting and who means more to him than the world.
“She’s fine. She and Sheila are on laundry detail.”
My shoulders slump a little, as though a great weight has been lifted off them for the first time, relieved that they are both okay.
Chase gets up and sits on the edge of my bed with me, wrapping a strong, muscular arm around me, and I bury myself into his embrace, feeling the smoothness of his skin, wishing that we could just stay like this, that such a thing was allowed. Memories of people flash through my mind as their faces come into view only to be replaced by another, before landing on the woman that was executed just yesterday.
“What’s wrong?” Chase asks, noticing the change in my demeanor.
“People keep dying,” I say. “I try to help them, and they die anyway. It’s as though I am a curse; from the moment I touch them they are doomed to the fate that awaits us all.”
“SHH,” he says, holding me closer. “You can’t think like that.”
“But it’s true,” I say.
He wipes a tear that has settled on my cheek, and the rough edges of his calloused and dry skin scrap my soft cheek, but the gentleness of his actions outweighs the scabrousness of his finger. “Arel makes slaves of us all. It eats away at us, until we have no humanity left, but you have managed to keep yours. I never saw it before, not until the wilds when you could have killed that barbarian who helped us, but you didn’t.”
“But that woman… I wasn’t able to stop her from being executed.”
“You can’t save everyone. All you can do is helps the ones you can to the best of your ability, and let nature takes its course. Most people will run into someone and not give that person a second thought, especially when it is a plebeian, but you… you do think about them, you concern yourself with them, even if they are a plebeian, despite the risks.”
“I feel so alone,” I whisper.
“You’re never alone,” Chase hugs me tighter. “I’ll follow you anywhere.”
I allow Chase to hold onto to me, not caring that I do have to be on duty within an hour. What did I do to deserve his loyalty, his trust?
“When Mandi brought Gwen and I here, I never thought it would change my life. But I am glad she did.”
Mandi. Mandi meets with Natalie a lot, and always in secret. During the banquet, Mandi seemed upset over the way Molers treated that plebeian girl, not the sort of anger at having a momentous occasion interrupted, but genuine disgust toward the treatment of another human being. When I was at the medical center and tried to steal the medication for Gwen, someone put it in my pants’ pocket with instructions on how to administer it. Was it Natalie who did it? Either way, she and Mandi are up to something, something they do not want others to find out about. What are they up to?
“Mandi,” I repeat in a soft whisper, but Chase loosens his hold on me, allowing me to sit up straight and look him in the eyes. “When I stopped that suicide bomber, I saw Mandi and Natalie meeting and acting as though they didn’t want anyone to notice what they were up to, and it wasn’t the first time. Why did she bring you and Gwen here? Did she know your former mistress personally?”
“No,” answers Chase, “I don’t believe so. When my mistress died, there was talk from the others about how Gwen had certain qualities that some find pleasing. She was…”
Chase’s voice trails off as though he wants nothing more but to forget that time, but I urge him to continue.
“What?” I prod.
“There are rumors that there are these places some children are sent to entertain certain members of Arelian society…”
The brothels. Anger rises within me at the thought that Gwen was to be sent there, and the fact that they even exist to begin with, and the desire to burn it to the ground intensifies, threatening to possess me.
“…and I couldn’t let that happen. So, I snuck us out that night. I didn’t know where we would go, I just knew that I needed to get her away from there and keep her safe. Our absence was noticed, and we were being chased by arbiters when we ran into Mandi. I was afraid she was going to turn us in. She could have, but she didn’t. She told the arbiters that she was taking us to our new assignment, and apologized for not letting anyone know. I was surprised that they believed her.”
“She outranks them. Questioning an outranking officer is forbidden and the punishment severe.”
“Soon after, we were brought here. I don’t know why.”
“This might have been the only place at the time that could take in two more plebeians, and Commander Vye probably wasn’t in a position to argue.”
Mandi. What is she up to? A few moments of silence pass between us before I break it. “I need to get a message to Mandi and Natalie.”
Chase looks me in the eyes. “For what?”
“I keep seeing them together, but in secret. I want to know what they are up to, but…”
“Stay here.” Chase gets up and heads for the door.
“Where are you going?”
“Just trust me,” he says in a soft voice.
I nod. I have no reason not to trust him. Too many times he could have left me for dead, but chose not to.
“Write a message to her. Something that will get her to meet with you. Have it ready by the time I get back.” The door opens and Chase peeks out into the hallway, making sure no one is there, before slipping out. I’m not sure what he is up to, but I decide to trust him. He’s earned that much, and so much more.
I rip open the drawer to my desk, searching for paper, something that is difficult to find in Arel, since almost all communications are electronic, but digital communications can be traced, and I need something that is untraceable. Nothing. Frustrated, I search my sparse room, (just a cot next to the wall, a desk under the window, a single chair that makes rocks seem comfortable to sit on, and the closet) but find nothing. I need something. Anything. I don’t know what to do, but…
Something skitters across the floor when my foot touches it. I pick it up, examining it, realizing that it is a piece of charcoal. How did it get up here? My boots. Where else? Sometimes, sticks, mud, rocks, and I guess even bits of charcoal, get caught in the ridges of the soles of my boots and get tracked inside, for which, I am very thankful right the moment. But, now, I need something… A speck of white catches my eye. I’m not sure why it didn’t earlier, because it sticks out worse than a sore thumb amongst the dark-colored floor and grimy walls that are more gray now than white, but perhaps it is the lone ray of gold
sunlight poking through the window and caressing the speck of white that makes me notice it, almost as though it is planned. I pick it up, realizing that it is a towel, one I had dumped in the far corner of the room earlier, having been too tired to fold it and put it out to be taken to the laundry. It is perfect.
I rip the towel in half and use the bit of charcoal to pen a message to both Natalie and Mandi. Nothing elaborate. Just something short and to the point, with each pretending to be the other, and asking to meet in person in a building that had been searched by arbiters a week ago, so it won’t be under surveillance and is still empty.
Chase walks into the room with both Sheila and Gwen just as I finish. I open my mouth to protest—they could get killed—but he stops me.
“They both know Arel well.”
“But if they get caught…”
“I won’t get caught,” says Gwen in a stern tone, desperate to prove herself. “I know this city, and no one pays much attention to a small plebeian girl like me.”
“She can deliver one of the messages and….” begins Chase.
“And I will deliver the other one,” interrupts Sheila.
“She overheard me talking to Gwen and insisted on coming,” Chase says.
“What about their chores? They’ll be missed,” I say.
“I will finish the laundry,” says Chase, “and Sheila is being sent out to get a few supplies for the manor.”
Still uneasy about the entire thing, but knowing I have little choice. If I deliver the messages, it will ruin what secrecy I have, but if they deliver them, both Mandi and Natalie will have no way of knowing that they come from me, and that it is a trap, or so I hope. Either way, it puts the odds in my favor.
Ensnared (Enchained Trilogy Book 2) Page 44