by Kass Morgan
“Like hell I will,” Bellamy snapped, before he had time to stop himself.
“I assure you that there are many skilled hunters among my people,” Max said, shooting Bellamy a reproachful look. “We aren’t going to let anyone starve.”
“Why should we trust you?” a recently arrived Phoenician woman shouted. “You were hiding weapons at Mount Weather, guns that could’ve been used to fight off the attackers!”
The crackling of the bonfire was soon drowned out by the buzz of heated conversation as people shouted over one another to be heard.
“That’s enough!” Rhodes’s voice boomed. “We’ll put it to a vote. All those in favor of sending out an armed party to retrieve the members of our community who were taken in last night’s attacks, raise your hands.”
His words were drowned out by a chorus of “Yes” as hands flew into the air.
“All those opposed…”
A few hands rose up, but not enough. Bellamy felt his heart start to pound with anticipation. Now he could do what he’d been longing to since the moment he saw his sister dragged into the woods. Chase them. Find her and Wells. Get his revenge. No matter the risk.
“We have a few volunteers already,” Max was saying, “and we’ll be keeping the party purposely small, to avoid detection. But if anyone would like to join us, please step for—”
“I’ll go,” Clarke’s voice called out. Bellamy’s skin went cold, watching her pick her way out of the crowd, her lips set in that stubborn line that Bellamy knew meant there was no talking her out of anything. “You’ll need someone with medical training with you.”
No, Bellamy thought. It was one thing for him to put himself in danger, but the thought of anything happening to Clarke was more than he could bear. He opened his mouth to argue, but before he could, another voice said it for him.
“Absolutely not,” Clarke’s father shouted, breathing heavily as he jogged over from the direction of the infirmary.
Clarke shot her father an impatient look. Finding her parents alive had been a miracle, banishing the specter of grief that’d always clung to her. Yet while her broken heart had healed, Bellamy knew that having her parents around was a bit of an adjustment.
She took a deep breath and motioned for her father to join her a little bit away from the rest of the group. Bellamy went to stand next to them, wracking his brain for a way to support Clarke while ensuring that she stayed behind.
“Your mother and I did everything in our power to get back to you,” her dad said.
“I know,” Clarke replied softly.
“And now against all odds, we’re finally together again. Your mother’s condition is serious. She needs you here. This is the worst possible time for you to go jaunting off, straight into god knows what kind of danger.”
“But we don’t get to pick the timing, do we?” As Clarke took her father’s hands and squeezed, Bellamy could see the anger fading from the older man’s eyes. “If we could, we’d never have been attacked. You’d never have been sent down before me. We would have been together this whole time.”
Clarke glanced back at Bellamy, clearly looking for backup. And though he wished she could stay here, she was right. They had no idea what condition their friends and family would be in—they’d need a medic with them. Bellamy stepped closer, in solidarity with her.
“I won’t be alone,” she said. “We’ll be careful and smart. But we have to do what we can for them. I can’t just sit here and do nothing. They have Wells, Dad. I can’t just abandon him. That’s not who I am.”
Her father’s shoulders slumped; then he took a deep breath and nodded once. “Just promise me you’ll be careful.”
Though he didn’t want to put Clarke in danger, Bellamy felt strangely relieved. He was grateful to have her by his side. There was no better person to join the party: She was brilliant and brave, and an incredible problem solver. And, selfishly, he hated being apart from her, the person who made this wild, strange planet feel like home.
“I will,” Clarke said. “I promise.”
“And swear that you won’t do anything foolish. There’s a big difference between bravery and recklessness.”
Clarke shot Bellamy a look, as if to say that he needed that advice more than she did. Despite himself, Bellamy smiled.
“Yes, I understand that,” Clarke said.
“You’re leaving tonight?” Clarke’s father asked.
Bellamy nodded. “We can’t risk waiting until tomorrow and losing the trail. We need to leave soon. Now.” He glanced around the clearing, anxiously tapping his foot. “Why is Luke just standing there? We have to get moving.” He cleared his throat. “Luke… Luke! What the—” He cut himself off as Clarke squeezed his arm, her expression slightly pained.
Too distressed to notice the exchange, David Griffin let out a long sigh. “Okay. Be sure to say good-bye to your mother before you head out. And you”—he locked eyes with Bellamy—“take care of her.”
“I promise,” Bellamy said. “Though I think we both know she can take care of herself.” He glanced over at Clarke. In the late-afternoon sun, her hair shined like gold. Combined with the intensity of her glowing green eyes, she looked fierce and otherworldly, like some ancient goddess of war.
Clarke’s father gave a grim smile. “I know.” He turned and walked away, suddenly looking older and more tired than he had minutes earlier.
Bellamy laced his fingers between Clarke’s, holding tight. He was glad she was coming with him. They were stronger together. Always had been.
She squeezed his hand and then let go. “I’d better say good-bye to my mom.”
The group around the bonfire was starting to break up. A few people were distributing some meager rations for dinner, while Paul organized a crew to sort through piles of charred blankets, looking for anything salvageable. Like last night, people would have to sleep outside.
“Okay,” Bellamy said. “I’m going to find Luke and get the supplies ready.”
Clarke looked around the crowd. “Who else is going with us?”
“Luke, of course. And Felix. I don’t think he’s even sat down since Eric was taken. We’ll see if he’s able to calm down and focus. A couple of Earthborns. And Paul volunteered.”
Bellamy grimaced slightly, and waited for Clarke to do the same, but to her surprise, she nodded. “Great.” She glanced over to where Paul was sorting blankets. “He seems like he’ll be useful. Steady.”
Something about the word rankled Bellamy. “Steady?” he repeated.
Clarke shrugged and tried to play it off like it was nothing, but as she walked away, he caught a glimpse of something in her eye. Worry. Fear. But not just about the people who’d been taken.
She was still worried about him. Still didn’t know if he’d recovered enough to be trusted. And the worst part was that he wasn’t sure she was wrong.
CHAPTER 8
Glass
At first, when Glass and the seven other girls had woken up, they’d shouted until they’d lost their voices. Their screams got them nothing; their captors stayed silent, their masklike faces betraying no emotion. Their wagon just kept onward, all night and into the early morning, stopping only occasionally for breaks. All Glass knew was that they were following a bumpy trail through the middle of a dense forest.
She didn’t know the other prisoners very well. Octavia was with her, and a pretty Earthborn girl named Lina. The other five were almost strangers. But they were a unit, bound together by their despair.
And thankfully, she knew that Luke was alive. The last thing she remembered was the look of helpless anguish on his face. Wherever these people were taking her, he’d come after her.
Glass fought through her exhaustion and refused to succumb to sleep. She wasn’t going to miss an opportunity to gather crucial information about her captors. There was no knowing what detail would end up meaning the difference between life and death.
But her observations just made her more confused. Th
e ground was “good.” The raiders kissed their fingertips and touched the dirt every time they set foot on it after leaving the wagon. Hard work was good, judging by their constant droning conversation about it. They called themselves “Protectors.” She wasn’t sure where killing people fit in the grand order of good or bad, except that Earth was the best thing of all, the deity they seemed to worship, and that Earth… it… She… was the decider of who lived and who did not.
Hours passed aimlessly, the wagon rocking and the guards staring in silence. Lina sobbed uncontrollably until she eventually seemed to run out of tears. Finally, the young guard opposite Glass leaned forward, his eyes cast up, peering out of the high window.
“We’re in sight,” he said, then turned to the girls with a solemn frown. “Not long now, if Earth wills it.”
“If Earth wills it,” the others repeated.
Glass and Octavia exchanged worried looks.
The wagon made a sharp left and all the girls toppled a little, the stale smell of sweat and warm breath wafting even stronger with the movement. The guards all turned to peer out the narrow front window, past the driver’s high seat. Spurred by a combination of curiosity and apprehension, Glass craned her head to see what they were all looking at.
They were approaching an ivy-covered wall that extended as high and wide as she could see. It just stretched and stretched and stretched.
The young guard saw her watching and smiled tightly at her. “We’ve arrived at our great home.”
“Oh,” Glass said, unsure how to respond.
He seemed encouraged by that. “It was here before the Shattering, when man was wicked and untamed… the greatest fortress in the land. The most powerful men sat there, hoarding their power, but then Earth took their power and She gave it to us.” The chest of his white uniform swelled with pride. “Earth’s magic resides within us. Soren said so.”
“Soren?” Glass asked.
The guard nodded. “Soren is Earth’s mouthpiece.”
Soren’s their leader, then, Glass thought. Another piece of information to add to the pile.
“Our great home is in the shape of a perfect pentagon,” another guard said.
“We call it the Stone,” the younger one cut back in. “The Stone is our new home, and if Earth wills it, it will be the foundation for our great work.”
The wagon grew dark as they approached the shadow of the great gray wall. Then, with a clomping lurch, they stopped. Glass crawled forward as the back doors opened, curious for a better look, but the second her foot hit the ground, the closest guard shoved a blindfold over her face.
Glass didn’t struggle. She was fully in enemy territory and the only way out was to survive long enough for the rescue party to arrive. She kept silent, and in reward, the hand on her elbow kept a gentle grip as it led her forward. To that building, she supposed. To whatever was waiting for them. To whatever she’d force herself to endure as long as necessary.
As they stepped through what felt like a doorway onto hard, flat flooring, Glass’s pulse sped up, goose bumps prickling on her arms. She was inside their fortress.
The air grew warmer, staler, as they led her around one corner, then another. She couldn’t keep track even now that she was trying. Then they stopped walking and pulled her blindfold from her face with a strangely dramatic flourish, as if she was meant to be impressed.
Glass blinked into the shadowy space. It was a cavernous, windowless room with skeletal metal posts holding up the tall ceiling every few yards, each hung with a flickering lantern. Her eyes adjusted, but hardly anything came into focus, because there was hardly anything in here. Just stacked mats spaced at even intervals, some of them with girls sitting on them, unmoving, their feet flat against the cold floor, staring blankly at the new arrivals.
The young guard attempted a painful-looking smile. “The women’s den. Make yourself at home.”
Den? Glass thought, recoiling slightly at the odd choice of words.
They gave strange little bows, leaving their eight bewildered prisoners behind as they backed out of the room, shutting the door behind them.
Glass braced for the sound of a lock, and sure enough, there came the same telltale clank that’d haunted her all those terrible months in Confinement. The cruel irony produced a silent, grim laugh. She’d fled the dropship, scrambled through air ducts as a fugitive, spacewalked, and lost her mother in her struggle to make it down to Earth—and for what? Here she was, locked up again, separated from Luke by a distance much farther than the skybridge.
After the door clanked shut, the girls sitting stiffly on the mats seemed to relax slightly, rolling their ankles and rubbing their shoulders. There were more than two dozen of them in this “den,” all dressed in white dresses, their hair tied back severely in tight braids. The girl nearest her was sitting in an awkward position with her bare feet flat on the ground. And for some reason, she was scowling at Glass.
Glass tried a nervous smile. The girl didn’t return it.
“You should take off your shoes,” the girl snapped. “Our feet must touch Earth while we are in Her service.”
Two cots over, a pretty girl with curly dark hair sighed wearily. “Look down, Bethany. Does this look like Earth to you? We’re inside.”
Glass stared at her, startled. The girl’s accent wasn’t like any of the Earthborns’ or the Protectors’. It almost sounded like… but no, that was impossible…
But Octavia had caught it too. Her head whipped around, and she was staring at the girl, wide-eyed.
The curly-haired girl rested her feet on the mattress, in apparent violation of their “feet on the Earth” rules, and as she leaned back, the lantern light hit her face and Glass was sure she recognized her.
Glass grabbed Octavia’s arm, and they walked toward her quietly. “Are you from the Colony?” Glass whispered.
The girl stood up so fast she nearly knocked Glass over. “Your accent… are you a Phoenician?”
They stared at one another, dumbfounded. Finally, Glass spoke. “How is this possible? What’s your name? Where did you come from?”
“My name’s Anna. I was in a dropship that went off course. I’m not sure what happened, but we crashed far away.” She winced, and Glass briefly closed her eyes as memories of her own terrible crash came flashing back. “It was awful,” Anna continued hoarsely. “Eleven people died on impact, and a bunch more over the next few days. It’s funny. You spend your whole life being told that Earth is this paradise, and then it turns out to be one horrific nightmare after another. I wished I’d just stayed behind.”
“The ship was dying,” Glass said, flinching as she remembered the faces of people who realized they had nowhere to go as the air leaked out of the ships.
“I know. But at least I would’ve been with my family. There’s nothing for me here. I hate this planet,” she said bitterly.
“It’s not all so bad,” Glass said. A wistful note crept into her voice as she thought about walking through the woods with Luke, about waking up in his arms to the joyful trill of birdsong.
Octavia shifted closer to Anna. “So what happened after you crashed?” she asked curiously, the terror of her capture momentarily overshadowed by the strangeness of meeting a new Colonist.
“It was awful. No one could agree about what to do. We all wanted to find the rest of you, of course, but we didn’t know how to get there. In the end, we split up into smaller groups, which I realize now was dumb. Together, we might’ve had safety in numbers. But apart, it was easy for them”—she jerked her head toward the door—“to attack. I fought as hard as I could. I even knocked out a few of one guy’s teeth.”
Next to her, Octavia snickered and said, “Well done.”
“But it wasn’t enough to get away,” Anna continued. “They took me and a few of the boys I was with, and we’ve been here for the past few weeks.” She glanced around the room warily, as if afraid of being overheard. “So what happened to you?”
Glass’s
stomach clenched. Had some of the boys from their camp been captured too? She prayed that Wells wasn’t among them.
She listened as Octavia gave Anna the short version of their story. Glass was slightly surprised by the animation in her voice. In her experience, Octavia had always been a little reserved around strangers, which made sense once Glass learned about the childhood spent in hiding, the adolescence in the ship’s care center, and the traumas she’d endured after landing on Earth.
In the dim light, Anna’s eyes grew wide as Octavia spoke. “You had cabins? And enough food for a feast? That’s amazing.”
“We used to have cabins,” Octavia said grimly. “These Protectors blew most of them up. Bellamy is probably losing his mind.”
“Bellamy?” Anna repeated. “Is that your boyfriend?” Was Glass imagining things, or was there a hint of disappointment in her voice?
Octavia shook her head. “No. My brother.”
“Your brother? You’re from the Colony and you have a brother? You’ll have to tell me all about that.” Anna sat back down, patting her mat to invite the girls to sit. Octavia immediately claimed the space right beside her.
“Why are they doing this?” Glass whispered, settling onto the other end of Anna’s mat. “What do they want with us?”
Anna looked around again and lowered her voice. “Well, all the girls in this room are just what they call recruits. They’re people they’ve captured along their way here from wherever they were before this. According to the Protectors, we’re here to serve Earth. Which really means to serve them. Cooking, cleaning, laundry. Whatever makes us useful…” Anna trailed off and bit her lip.
“So we’re just servants?” Octavia asked.
“No,” Anna said, her voice barely audible. “That’s all I’ve been doing for the past few weeks, but I think there’s more.”
Despite the warmth of the room, Glass shivered. “What?”
“I’m not sure. When we first got here, they forced us through some sort of cleansing ritual in the river, but they said we weren’t ready to become Protectors. That we wouldn’t officially join their ranks until the Earth gives them permission to lay down roots. Apparently they need to have a sign from Earth that this is their new home, and then we’ll pass some sort of final test to prove we’re true believers. But I’m not sure what that test is, and I’m worried there’s some other way we’re useful to them.”