The Wanted (The Woodlands Series Book 4)

by Lauren Nicolle Taylor

  Oh God.

  Just breathe. Breathe…

  I sank into the black, leather swivel chair and watched Mr. Hun sort through his various instruments lovingly. He picked up a small piece of metal the size of a toothpick and eyed it closely. A light attached to an arm was brought closer to my face. Mr. Hun dragged a stool in front of me and sat down, the air leaving the seat with a sad whistle. I allowed him to tie my arms to the chair and then he pulled my bandages from my fingers one by one, his face creased with concern when I winced at the cloth sliding over my newly scabbed skin.

  He placed his warm hands over mine and patted me gently.

  “Make sure you put some antiseptic cream on these afterwards.” I nodded, a few tears pooling in the corners of my eyes. I squirmed in my chair.

  “Ok, where were we…?”

  A deep voice sounded behind me. “Her friend, the other escapee, sir.”

  Mr. Hun smiled kindly at me, his crinkled skin puckering around his mouth. “Oh yes, right. Now, Rosa darling, tell me about Careen.”

  I stared down at his fingers holding the metal toothpick. “Careen has red hair, she is about five foot eight, and she is my friend,” I whispered, my voice rising in panic. Retreat. Go somewhere they can’t find you, my mind whispered.

  Mr. Hun held down one of my straining fingers and placed the toothpick under my nail. “What else?”

  “I don’t know where she is.” Which was the truth. Mr. Hun pushed the toothpick under my nail.

  “Ahh.” It hurt so much the meager contents of my stomach were hurtling towards my mouth. I swallowed and dipped my head to my chin, struggling to focus. My hair fell around my face. He pushed it in harder. Think of trees spotted with lichen, pale green and white.

  “More,” he said, his voice losing its softness.

  I tried to pull my fingers in, but he held them down hard. “She… she… is a hunter. Her baby died. She is in a romantic relationship with a Survivor.”

  “Who?” Mr. Hun urged. I gasped in pain as he took my next finger and drove a metal pin halfway under my nail. I screamed. “Tell me his name, dear.”

  The forest is warm, that springtime buzz of bees and pollen surround you. The trees are bending to tell you secrets. Arms wrap around your waist and you laugh.

  I looked up at the ceiling. The black, padded walls that kept my screaming in seemed to expand like a pillow ready to smother me. Don’t let them see how much they’re hurting you. Feel your bare feet pressing into the mud, the squelch of it seeping between your toes.

  “Pietre,” I panted. Their list was growing. So far, I hadn’t given them anything of consequence. But I didn’t know how long I could hang on.

  I closed my eyes and thought of Orry in their arms. I thought of stars, of green. Of fresh meat and fires.

  Mr. Hun took my pinky finger, pulled it up at an angle, and held it that way, straining on the edge of breaking. My head flopped forward.

  “Bring me the screen,” he asked patiently. A guard walked forward and handed him a large reader the size of a book.

  It was already paused on a video. He pressed the triangular play button.

  Give me the pins. Give me pain, shredding hot pain. If the plan was to hurt me, then you’ve found your method.

  The film was clearly taken from one of the many surveillance cameras placed around a Woodland town. I could see the images in the sky blocked slightly by people’s shoulders, but they were looking. Gasps emitted from the crowd. Sighs of shock and rumbles of anger. A name was cried out, and then the camera focused on people’s damning feet as they surged towards a group of guards.

  Shots fired, and people screamed. The feet ran harder. The shadows of boots stomping furiously into the solid ground dispersed, and a circle of space opened up over a small child. His eyes were closed and his clothes dirtied—his body motionless. Trampled.

  More shots.

  Then an explosion.

  It cut to another camera, one over a Ring gate. It followed a trail of smoke to a birch tree, alight. Its leaves curling and crackling. Chunks of concrete lay in the street. People screamed, pushed, but not to get out. They were running away from the wall. I didn’t understand it. My eyes blinked several times, trying to take it in. They were afraid of us.

  Mr. Hun handed the screen back to the guard, who put it on the desk and pulled it back to the image of the child in the street. Lying there, curled protectively over himself like he was hiding something, a secret he couldn’t tell. The image shone bright in the dark of this tiny room.

  Mr. Hun let go of my pinky finger, which was just about breaking, and I remembered pain. One by one, he pulled the pins from my fingers, cleaning them with alcohol wipes and placing back on his tray of instruments. He patted my cheek with his warm, dry hand and left me.

  They all left me. To stare at the lifeless child whose death was partly my fault. They wanted me to take it. The responsibility. And I did. This hurt me more than all the small pains they had inflicted on me so far. I tried not to let it show. But as soon as the door closed, my mouth broke into a torn-up sob, my heart seized, and my head fell.

  “No,” I whispered. To myself. To them. To the child.

  They were chipping away at me, wearing me down to a splinter they could flick to the floor. I couldn’t let them win.

  JOSEPH

  I’m clinging to the end point of a snowflake, spinning round and round.

  “Just let go,” she tells me. “Just let go…”

  “Hang on, Joe. Damn it. There’s a lot of blood. Should there be this much blood?”

  My legs were warm; my chest was cold, wet. Every bump felt like my skin was peeling away from my body. I opened my eyes to slits. Warm spots of light hovered over my head.

  I wasn’t dead.

  I was flat on my back, my body sailing unevenly though the air. Up. Rocks slid and people stumbled. My leg fell off the stretcher, and I pulled it back up with a lot effort. I could use my legs. A good sign. They hurt like hell, but I could feel them. Someone’s hand wrapped around my own. It was soft, delicate. I squeezed. I didn’t open my eyes. It could be her. I’d keep them closed, and it would be her.

  A smooth, feminine voice spoiled my delusion. “Hang on, Joseph. You’re going to be ok.” The voice was worried, but sure. So I believed it. I hung on. Until my mind slipped from consciousness again. But this time I knew I’d wake up.

  Smooth fingers glided across my forehead. I flinched and opened my eyes. Staring back at me were two perfectly symmetrical, almond-shaped eyes, light green ringed with a darker green around the outside. She blinked and so did I, trying to change the picture. She smiled and ran a cloth over my chest. I shivered.

  “Sorry,” she murmured, shyly, as she ran the wet cloth over my wounds, her gaze on my chest rather than my face. “I need to clean your wounds.” She pursed her pink lips and concentrated on her work.

  I grabbed her wrist and stopped her hand before it touched me again.

  “Who are you?” I asked, looking from left to right and searching for a familiar face. We were still in the woods. It was dusk or dawn; either way, the sun was leaving or returning and not giving much light. People moved around me, talking.

  “Whoa there, Joe. She’s trying to help you,” Desh said, his face coming into focus behind this girl’s halo of short, blonde hair. She smiled at me again, her small freckles dancing over the bridge of her nose. I narrowed my eyes.

  “Who is she?” I said, coughing.

  She held a bottle of water to my lips. “Drink,” she whispered, her brow furrowed.

  I snatched the bottle and regretted moving so suddenly.

  Desh came to sit by my side. “Joe, this is Elise, the Birchton Spider. She saved your life.” He grinned and patted my leg. I winced. I was covered in bruises. I took a small sip of water. It slid coolly down my throat.

  “You make me sound much more important that I am,” she said, shaking her head and muttering, “The Birchton Spider… sounds like the title of a b
ad book.”

  I pulled myself up to sitting, the sudden movement making me dizzy.

  “Book?”

  Gravity caused blood to seep from the deep claw marks on my chest. The girl put both her hands on my torso and pushed me back down gently.

  “You need to rest.” She rolled up a jacket and placed it behind my head.

  Desh’s head bobbed up and down. “It was amazing Joe. After the blast, that thing, that huge, white bear came at you. Everyone was trying to get your attention, but you were totally zoned out. It jumped down on your chest and went for your neck. Elise ran out from behind a rock, slapped its big, white butt with a tree branch, and it just ran away.” He was breathless from excitement but managed to calm down and look at me seriously for a second. Poor Desh, I’d put him through hell. “What were you doing out there, Joe? It was like you wanted it to kill you.”

  Did I? I wasn’t sure, maybe for a millisecond.

  Elise started spreading gauze over my chest and taping it down. I caught her eyes. “Thank you,” I mumbled.

  She shrugged. “Don’t mention it. It’s what I do,” she said casually.

  I groaned as she pressed down on my skin. Her touch wasn’t reassuring; it just felt alien.

  “You routinely slap bears on the ass?” I asked quizzically, raising my eyebrows.

  “Ha!” Desh spluttered. “At least now we know he’s not brain damaged!”

  Rash shouted from across the campsite, “Based on current evidence, I’m gonna need further proof.”

  Desh shot him a warning look and I snorted. That was kind of funny.

  Elise laughed lightly, ignoring Rash’s comment as she tossed her head back to get her hair away from her face. “No. I’m Medical. Saving lives is what I do.”

  “Oh, right. Me too. Or at least I was. Medical.”

  “Shhh!” she said, putting her finger to her lips. “Get some rest.”

  Her face faded to a pale blur for a moment, and I shook my head. “Where are we? What happened after the blast?” I asked.

  She didn’t answer.

  Matt’s warm voice sailed in and his face followed. “How’s the patient?”

  “Superficial wounds to the chest and legs. Bruising to most of the lower body and also to the left eye,” Elise replied, running her little finger down the side of my face. I jerked away from her touch.

  “It doesn’t feel very superficial, Matt,” I said, managing a smile. “Now tell me what happened after the blast?” I insisted.

  He nodded and faked a smile. “Nothing.”

  I clenched my fists and pulled my head up so I could see him better. Smoke from a campfire whirled around our faces and stung my eyes. “What do you mean—nothing?”

  Desh patted my arm.

  “Nothing yet, anyway. We always knew Birchton and Radiata were going to be a harder sell. We’ve left two of our own back there to wait and see. We do know people reacted to the film.”

  I glanced around the camp. Gus squatted down near the fire, poking the coals under a tin of beans. Rash leaned against a tree, quietly seething.

  “Where are we now?” My voice was dry.

  “Between Birchton and Radiata; we have two more nights before the next show,” Desh replied, spreading his hands out and wiggling his fingers.

  I chuckled despite myself. “Man I’ve missed you.”

  He grinned, his dark eyes flashing concern. “It’s good to see you smile.”

  Elise stood up straight, and she was almost as tall as Desh. “I’ll leave you boys to it.”

  Desh raised an eyebrow as she walked away. Matt’s gaze followed her. I’d never seen him staring at a woman before and it made me laugh, which hurt my chest.

  Desh elbowed him. “Like what you see, eh?”

  I rolled my eyes.

  Matt blushed and smacked his arm. “She’s a little young for me.”

  I grimaced from pain and being uncomfortable. All this smiling, laughing, and joking was too much. I didn’t like how easy they could pretend, or maybe they weren’t pretending. All I knew was I didn’t like it. I didn’t want them to be sad all the time, but when they were joking like this, I saw her, or almost the absence of her. Like someone had cut a hole in the air in her exact shape, and I was just waiting for her to fill it.

  I sighed loudly.

  “You ok?” Matt asked, reaching for my wrist to check my pulse.

  “I’m fine,” I snapped, the pressure on my chest feeling heavier and heavier. “Seems like you are too.”

  Matt and Desh avoided my eyes. I knew I was being a jerk, but I couldn’t stop myself. “How long do I have to lie like this?”

  “Another day. At least until the bleeding slows.”

  I closed my eyes. I couldn’t look at them. It was a reminder. The last thing I heard was Gus discussing the next move.

  “If it goes the way I think it will, we won’t be able to stay.”

  ROSA

  There was no clock. But there was ticking in my brain anyway. I counted the little bursts of movement from the camera in the corner. It told me it was after midnight. It told me I wouldn’t sleep tonight. My hands ached, and my heart ached. My eyes were like two purple, velvet pincushions.

  At home, there was never a quiet place, no stillness where my body used to lay. Now silence smothered me like heavy-fogged poison. It pushed at me from every angle. That peace I thought I needed, that I craved, was all around me and I couldn’t stand it. What I truly needed was gone. The slip of sheets moving across bodies, the clang and thud of metal, wood, stone. Gone. I wanted it now, more than anything else.

  I pulled at the sheets in my clawing hands, wondering what I could throw at the cameras. A metal bowl grinned at me from the bedside table. I reached out to grab it, sliding my fingers along the cold surface, but once they made contact, they retreated. I had to be good. Obedient. To stay alive I had to not… be… me.

  I drew my hand in under the covers and shivered with the need to break something.

  The latch clicked and a slice of light cut the floor. A tall, long shadow wavered in the entrance like heat, and then moved towards me.

  Immediately, I clicked the lamp on, lighting up a calm, young face.

  Denis.

  I slithered up to sitting and watched him as he carefully approached me. Never not moving, but going so slowly that it was agony. I wanted to jump up and get behind him to shove him forward. But he continued in his sloping, loping way of walking. Like he was picking out each spot he was going to put his foot on before he stepped on it, the angle he would place his foot at, and how much noise his shoe would make. I ground my teeth together in annoyance.

  He lifted his head slowly and connected with my eyes. “Look scared,” he whispered, his deep blue eyes ringed with darker circles like someone had taken a pen to his irises. I was kind of scared but mostly impatient. If he was coming in to hurt me, I wished he would get on with it. I nodded, which he seemed to be irritated by. So I clutched the sheets in my fists and tried to look wide-eyed and scared.

  He was wearing just pajama bottoms and no shirt, which could have been intimidating if not for the old man slippers. His body was toned but childish, as if he’d never seen a hard day’s work in his life. Nothing about his demeanor suggested harm.

  He stood two steps away from me. I found myself staring at his feet, trying to guess where he would step next. Left, left, right.

  Finally, he reached me and I huffed. He kneeled down, neatly folding his legs over each other like a collapsible pram. Carefully, he put one hand on my shoulder and the other over my throat. I would have screamed but he wasn’t really touching me. His eyes bounced to the camera and he shifted his head so he was blocking my face from its view. His held me down with one hand and the other was like a collar, taut and straining but hovering just millimeters from my skin.

  “Wha… what?” I whispered. His eyes screwed shut, and he shook his head to the left.

  “Look frightened,” he whispered more urgently.
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  I was starting to be.

  “Better,” he said with a slight, lips-pressed together kind of smile. He stared down at my own lips, and I started to feel uncomfortable.

  “I’ll scream,” I threatened half-heartedly.

  “No, you won’t,” he assured me. And he was right. I wanted to know what this was all about.

  His hand still fluttered above my throat, and then he pressed down a little. My breath caught as it tried to move past the blockage.

  “Stop playing along,” he whispered so quietly it was just air and small noise passing his lips. “If you keep doing as you’re told, he will kill you.” I raised my eyebrows. “The minute he thinks he’s got you figured out, that he’s broken you, you’ll be executed,” he said, his voice a whistle through his teeth.

  I was about to nod, but he stopped me. “Don’t nod, throw your head against the head board in three… two… one.” I did as he said, and the hand on my throat moved with me but never pressed too hard.

  Unfolding his knees, he stood with controlled movements. He turned his back to me and walked slowly out of the room, my eyes drilling into his back.

  As soon as the door closed, I turned my head into my pillow and smiled. Grant’s son had just told me to stop obeying, to stop being the opposite of me.

  I picked up the metal bowl and flung it at the camera. It cracked deliciously and fell off its perch, hanging by a single wire like a hung prisoner. The bowl slammed into the dresser, teetering and scraping until it came to rest, hard and unforgiving against the polished wood.

  ROSA

  Apella rattled the bars of her cage, the tidy place I’d made for her and the others inside. She warned me not to go too far. Patting my chest, I shook my head. I never listened to her when she was alive, and I wasn’t going to start now. It will be okay, I told my ghosts and myself.