Guardians

by Susan Kim

  Gideon did not know how to reply. He too had been infuriated by Esther’s cunning. Although it seemed impossible, she had somehow deflected what could have been a dangerous, even deadly situation and used it to serve her own ends. But he had never been one to express extreme emotions; to him, revealing your anger made you all the more vulnerable to others. He realized that perhaps this was why Saith had sought out a place where she could vent her feelings in private. He was beginning to be in awe of the girl’s unbridled fury and, for a fleeting moment, was glad she was not his enemy.

  “Nobody,” she said, “laugh at me. Nobody.”

  Gideon had relit the firestarter. Saith’s nose was pink and her face shone with tears; the boy noted that she displayed no shame about it. Instead, she held her chin up high and kept her tiny fists clenched by her side; her black eyes glittered like coals.

  “So what do we do?”

  “I know,” she said at last.

  “What?”

  “You see.” Saith smiled and in an instant, she was transformed once more back to the little girl she was. To Gideon, the sight was even more unnerving than her rage. “Then she sorry.”

  The first new law went into effect the following morning. It was insignificant, Gideon noted, a simple extension of what had already been in place. As a result, few commented on the new regulation even as word of it spread throughout the mall.

  Before, only the guards had bowed to Saith when she passed. Now everyone was required to do so, and not only when they approached her at her altar or thanked her for her prophecies. Whenever anyone saw the young seer in the District, he or she was to shield his eyes by touching his forehead with the fingers of both hands, lower his gaze, and duck his head.

  In short, no one was to look at Saith directly.

  In addition, Saith had started walking around accompanied by armed guards. Although the two boys did nothing, their silent presence reminded others of the new law and helped ensure that it was obeyed.

  And that was only the beginning. Several days later, Saith disappeared.

  She was neither in her quarters nor at her special altar, nor could she be found anywhere within the District. That morning, the sky darkened and the air grew heavy; it seemed to heighten the fearful mood inside. As anxiety began to grow and spread throughout the mall, people began searching for the girl in every conceivable place: in abandoned stores, hallways, and storage spaces. By late afternoon, the heavens broke open in great blasts of lightning that lit up the skylight as thunder shook the District to its foundations. For two days, heavy rain poured down, lashing at the windows and keeping everyone indoors.

  Gideon had no idea where she was. As the days passed, he grew more curious about when she would return, fascinated to learn her reasons for vanishing.

  Then a week later, from inside his tiled office, Gideon heard the excited calls throughout the District.

  “She back!”

  “It Saith!”

  “Saith is here!”

  When he emerged, he saw people heading toward Saith’s altar on the fourth floor. He joined the growing mob that thronged outside the small room, jostling to get in. On all sides, boys and girls pressed their fingers against their temples, gazing downward as they bowed again and again. Gideon had to work his way through the crowd before he managed to catch a glimpse of Saith.

  What he saw took his breath away.

  The young girl was almost unrecognizable. She sat cross-legged on the floor, a guard on either side. She had cut off nearly all of her hair; what remained was a fuzz that lay close to her bony skull. And she had lost significant weight off an already tiny frame. Now she looked skeletal, her gauntness accentuating her enormous dark eyes. Her skin was so pale it seemed translucent, as if lit from within.

  Before, Saith was just another little girl. Now she looked ethereal, otherworldly . . . like something not quite human.

  And that, Gideon realized, was the whole point.

  He took stock of everything else she had done in order to heighten the effect. She had discarded all of her finery; there were no more gold and silver chains draped around her neck or heavy wristwatches on her arms. She no longer emitted the scent of roses and jasmine. And instead of the voluminous white robes and metallic sandals she used to wear, she now had on a simple black T-shirt, so huge it fit her like a dress, loose and baggy. Her exposed legs and arms, paper white and as thin as twigs, stood out in shocking contrast.

  When everyone had gathered, the majority spilling out into the hallways because there was no room inside, Saith crooked a single finger. At the gesture, one of her two guards clapped his hands once, compelling the crowd to order.

  And then she began to speak.

  Her voice was higher and fainter, lighter and more singsong than it had been only a week before; Gideon had to strain to make out what she was saying. One by one, everyone around him grew silent as well, mesmerized by the tale she told. It was pure nonsense, the boy knew, a story he assumed she was making up on the spot. Yet after a few moments, even he had to admit that he felt caught up in its spell.

  A week ago, Saith had been praying to the Beings, who, she explained, had created the world. But late that night, she was surprised that the voices did not respond. When they still did not answer her prayers in the morning, she left the District to seek them out and discover why they were no longer speaking to her. That day, a great storm came that drove her to seek hasty shelter in an abandoned store. She felt her way through the dark building and soon fell asleep in a corner. Yet when she awoke, there was enough light for her to realize that the roof was partially missing. To her horror, she discovered that while she was sleeping, she had become drenched in rainwater.

  At this, many gasped, their eyes still averted. Saith waited until they stopped before she continued.

  Within two days, Saith became seriously ill. She developed a fever so bad she thought she would die from the heat alone. When the sores came and spread over her body, she knew that the end was near. And yet she continued to pray to the Beings, asking them for help.

  On her deathbed, they finally spoke.

  They told her that the sickness was their punishment of all who behaved in a sinful way. It was intended to destroy those who chose not to believe. For only the pure and the righteous could hope to live, to bear healthy children, and to survive past their youth.

  After the Beings spoke, the fever went away. Within hours, Saith found that her sores had healed and for the first time in days, she had an appetite. Yet she had learned her lesson: to renounce all vanity. To turn her back on pleasure, on self-indulgence. And to worship the Beings with every breath she had within her.

  That was the way to survive the disease.

  Saith gladly put aside the trappings of immodesty, for she now understood they were dangerous: her rich clothing, her jewels, even her hair. The Beings had saved her, but for a reason: She was to spread the word of salvation.

  When she finished speaking, there was silence. Most in the crowd had their heads still bowed. But Gideon noticed that more than a few were peering up, a look of doubt upon their faces. Two boys whispered to each other, and another laughed. Without glancing at them, Saith raised her voice.

  “Some don’t believe.” She lifted her arms and displayed them, palms upward, and those closest to her let out a gasp. That prompted the others to peek through their fingers. Even from far away, anyone could see that the inside of her white limbs were dotted with faint yet distinct purple blotches: scars left by the deadly lesions of the killing disease.

  Gideon wondered what the blemishes really were: daubs of mud? Or perhaps Saith had squeezed one of the tubes of dried color that some females used to darken their lips. It was even likely, he thought, that the girl had deliberately cut or burned herself to create the necessary marks. But he was alone in his speculations. Around him, everyone else had broken out in murmurs and exclamations of shock and excitement.

  It was impossible, he could hear people saying; no
one had ever survived the killing disease. Yet Saith stood there in front of them, alive.

  “Follow me,” she said. She was smiling. “And you ain’t gonna die.”

  Overnight, all forms of ornamentation were outlawed. That meant no jewelry, wristwatches, belts, scarves, or even sunglasses. The robes and headdresses that people wore over their jeans had to be either white or black; a ban on any sort of pattern, color, or embellishment was enforced. With Gideon’s permission, Saith expanded her personal guards to a small army of a dozen of the strongest Insurgents. She took pains to pay them well, and they returned her generosity with unquestioning loyalty. They roamed through the mall, using force to collect items, which they would later destroy in immense bonfires in the main hall. The air would be filled with the stink of melting plastic and burning leather as giant flakes of soot wafted high.

  Yet to the people of the mall, losing their personal goods was just one of the painful requirements to come.

  Saith decreed that the sexes were to live separate from one another. This meant that families were broken apart: brother was forcibly separated from sister, partner from partner, and parent from child. The mingling of the sexes led to bad thoughts, she decreed.

  Throughout, Gideon watched with a kind of awe. Saith was making the rules capricious and subject to change without warning. No one knew what to expect, and therefore everyone lived in constant fear of breaking a law they hadn’t even known existed. Many complained, although not out loud; a handful even began meeting in private to discuss how to fight back against Saith and her harsh decrees. Yet the girl prophet heard about their plans before they could even be formed, for she also paid handsomely for information. If anyone was even suspected to be a troublemaker, Saith’s guards would pay a visit in the middle of the night.

  After that, no one would ever hear from that person again.

  One ruling met the greatest opposition: It banned all the activities in the basement.

  Gideon had given Saith free rein when it came to making rules; he and the girl were a team, after all. But, in private, he tried to argue her out of this one. He reminded her that the lower rooms were the greatest source of glass in the entire District. Yet she pointed out that the lost profits could be made up for in another way: Her guards would simply seize the possessions of anyone made to disappear. Reluctantly, Gideon agreed that this might work. And so under Saith’s supervision, both the drinking room and its locked supply closet were emptied. Hundreds of sealed bottles were removed and brought outside, where their contents were poured into the gutter. The stench filled the street for hours.

  A day later, Nur was stunned when guards arrived at the twin closets where her girls plied their trade. She assumed there had been a mistake and attempted to talk reason to them. But pushing her aside, they went through her belongings, gutting the rooms.

  All of the girls she supervised were led away at gunpoint. Then the boys pulled out the stained bedding and set it on fire, not even bothering to block Nur’s attempt to escape. They knew as well as she that the dual stairways were heavily guarded upstairs and that there was no other way out.

  In her desperation, Nur ran into what had been the drinking room. There she found Eli, who sat slumped over a table, asleep. By now, he was little more than a shadow that could not or would not do anything to save her. He didn’t even seem to understand that the drink that had sustained him for so long was now forbidden.

  Two guards seized Nur. As she screamed, they held her down and sliced off her long brown hair, flinging the locks onto the ground. Then they dragged her up from the basement. As they paraded her through the main hall, everyone gathered to watch from all sides of the mall and gazed down from the balconies. Now that Nur was out in the open, newly shorn and in disgrace, many jeered at her, catcalling and spitting.

  She was finally brought upstairs to Saith, who sat in her altar room. At first, the older girl was defiant, her head held high. When she saw that Gideon was there, however, her bravado wavered and she threw him a look that was both terrified and beseeching. Then a guard smacked the back of her head, hard, and Nur touched both hands to her forehead as she gave a deep bow. Tears splattered on the marble floor at her feet.

  The little girl stared at Nur with an unreadable expression. “It true what they say?”

  “What that?”

  “You in charge of girls who sell their bodies. To boys. That true?”

  Nur continued to keep her gaze averted, but her cheeks flushed. “Maybe you ask him,” she said under her breath. “It was his idea.”

  Saith’s face darkened. She was about to speak when Gideon cleared his throat. He leaned forward and whispered in her ear. Saith responded with heated words, but he persisted, holding his ground. Then at last, with what seemed like misgivings, she nodded.

  “I Shun those other girls,” she said. “But you lucky.”

  To her confusion, Nur was led from the room. She was given a black sheet to wear and a place to sleep on one of the halls reserved only for girls.

  In the early morning, Nur was told she had been given a new job. She was to be Saith’s assistant, nurse, and cook.

  Nur knew that Gideon had spared her life. Yet for the girl who once had so much vanity, there could not have been a worse punishment.

  Like everyone else on the top two floors, Esther was aware that something significant was going on downstairs in the mall.

  She could hear her few remaining students whisper about the new and restrictive rules: the change in clothing. The forced separation of the sexes. The actual worship of Saith. Yet if they noticed Esther was listening, they would stop talking and break apart from one another at once.

  It was impossible not to notice that many of them dressed differently now: in black or white robes, unadorned by jewelry, watches, sunglasses. The girls either cut their hair short or tied it back beneath a hood. Yet all of these new rules were just the outward signs of a bigger and more sinister change.

  Even though Esther and her friends were effectively sealed off from the lower floors by windows that looked down over the atrium, she could smell smoke arising from time to time in the stairwell. And on two recent occasions, she had awoken to the sound of faraway screams.

  Esther knew what was happening. She had thought showing everyone her child had defused a deadly situation. Now, not to be outmaneuvered, Saith was taking her aggression to a whole new level.

  Esther would have to confront Gideon and the little girl before it was too late. But first, she would have to find out everything she could.

  This time, she called on Silas herself.

  FIFTEEN

  SILAS ADJUSTED THE BLACK SHEET SO HIS FACE WAS OBSCURED. THEN HE made his way down the staircase to the main floor of the mall.

  The little thief had taken extra precautions. He had been caught by the assassin with the white streak in his hair not once, but twice. Why the older boy hadn’t killed him was something Silas would never understand. Still, he had learned from his close encounters. And now that Esther had enlisted his help, he felt an even greater need to prove himself.

  Like the others, Silas had heard rumors about the changes downstairs. He knew enough to wear a black hooded robe fashioned from several bedsheets, as well as to confine his spying to the lower two floors, where only boys were allowed.

  Yet nothing could have prepared him for what he saw when he emerged.

  The market that had been a bustling center of commerce was now completely different. Gone were the mobs of people and the endless rows of tables heaped with clothing, housewares, luxury items, shoes. Now, a dozen or so male customers stood on a silent and orderly line. Identical and anonymous in robes that were either white or black, they waited to purchase only two things that were on sale from a single vendor: food or water. There were no more glittering luxuries, like the watch he had once stolen. Silas recognized produce, squash and potatoes, that he himself had helped pick that morning.

  Armed boys no longer stood guard at the h
ead of the dual staircases leading to the basement; what few pedestrians there were now were free to move up and down between the bottom two floors. Because there were no crowds in which to get lost, Silas had no choice but to join the line. He had brought along a handful of glass in case he needed to buy something. As he approached the table, he suddenly noticed something else on sale.

  A loose stack of paper was piled to the side. Nearly everyone on line was buying one.

  When he made it to the table, Silas selected a bottle of water and a bunch of radishes. On an impulse, he took one of the sheets of paper and added it to his pile, as well. Only when he handed over his glass fragments and took his items could he examine it. A drawing done with pencil, crude and childlike, showed a girl with large eyes and short hair.

  Around him, others were folding up the pictures and slipping them into their pockets. Silas did the same. Then, as he made his way to the basement, he heard something odd.

  A dull drone filled the air. Although it was faint, it grew louder as whatever it was approached.

  Silas glanced around. To his surprise, nearly all of the other boys, including the vendor, had stopped what they were doing and stood as if rooted to the spot. In unison, everyone closed their eyes and raised their hands, pressing their fingers against their foreheads; then all began bowing again and again in the same direction. They faced the far end of the hall, where the rounded stairwell spiraled down from the floors above. Everyone’s lips moved as they mumbled something Silas could not make out. It matched the tone and rhythm of the noise, which the boy suddenly realized was the faraway sound of many people chanting.

  Without missing a beat, Silas copied their gestures, facing the stairs and moving his lips as if joining them. Yet he kept his eyes open enough that he could observe what was going on.

  Silas noticed that one boy refused to join in, a heavyset child who seemed a few years older than he was. He could tell at a glance that it wasn’t intended as an act of rebellion. Silas remembered Eli’s partner, Asha, who hadn’t been right in her mind. She was more like a toddler than someone in her teens and this boy was no different. His face slack and his gaze turned inward, he seemed to be talking to himself. Laughing at nothing, he repeatedly flicked his fingers against his thumb, one at a time, as he rocked back and forth.