Someone comes out of the building, and when they see us or, more importantly, when they see what we’re carrying, they run back inside, calling people out excitedly. Within seconds we’re swarmed, and the noise of voices shouting questions and calling out in delight at the sight of real food is deafening after the silence of our trudge through the forest.
We eat well that night, and I was right: the glares from the rest of the group turn into smiles, maybe not purposefully aimed at me, but there all the same. But still, Clarke sits in the back of my mind, and I can’t stop thinking about what she did out there, and why. I run through all of her reactions so far, and I don’t understand it. I don’t understand how she could hate me so much when I haven’t done anything to her.
I make eye contact with her from across the room, and she sneers at me, and my stomach drops. If I don’t do something about her quickly, she’s going to turn them against me.
19
I do not sleep.
I roll onto my side and stare at the door of my room. Everyone else is already asleep, but I feel ridiculous just lying here, waiting for dawn. Eventually the restlessness becomes too painful and I stand up, pushing away from the floor and letting the blankets fall from around me. I thought having a room to myself would be bliss, after all those years sleeping in a web of too-close bodies. But it doesn’t really work like that. Sometimes the smallness of the room just makes me feel claustrophobic.
I need up and I need out. I need to not be in this tiny room. I need space.
I lay my hand on the door knob, my heart loud in my ears as I twist it slowly. I step out soundlessly and creep into the kitchen. Running my fingers across the rough concrete wall, I examine the kitchen, cold and empty as the moonlight breaks in through the gaps in the board that cover the window. The sink on the floor was removed that first day, and I stand where it used to be, feeling the house sleep around me.
During the day it feels electric, so much desperation packed into four walls makes the place stifling, but at least it feels alive. At night, it feels dead. It feels like it must have felt before we arrived here, abandoned and gutted and lifeless.
I hear something moving and I freeze, my entire body going deathly still as I listen. If Clarke finds me in the kitchen this late, she’s going to wake the entire house and they’re going to throw me back out into the forest, with no hope of survival.
Before I have a chance to run back into my room, the door creaks open, and Kole steps into the room. He stares at me blankly for several seconds, and I watch him slowly come back from inside his own head.
‘Why are you up so late? You should be in bed,’ he says, slightly bewildered.
‘Why are you awake?’ I ask. ‘Shouldn’t you be asleep too?’
He blinks at me. ‘I can’t,’ he says slowly, slipping further into the room. ‘I can’t get to sleep.’
‘Why?’
‘Has anyone ever told you you’re like a child?’ he asks, sounding frustrated. ‘You won’t stop asking questions.’
‘You’re avoiding my question,’ I observe. I cross my arms in front of my chest, the oversized T-shirt and sweatpants doing little to keep me warm against the freezing air.
‘Yes, I am,’ he says, shrugging, not offering any kind of explanation. He’s wearing a dark grey woollen sweater, and abruptly he pulls it over his head, revealing a black T-shirt underneath, and throws it across the table at me.
I catch it in the air, and give him a questioning look.
‘Take it,’ he says.
‘But—’
‘You’re cold, I’m not. Take the damn sweater.’
I pull back a little, caught off-guard by the hard edge in his voice. He rubs his temples, closing his eyes as he pulls in a deep breath.
‘Do you want something to drink?’ he asks, not looking at me as he pulls things from a wooden box in the corner.
‘Sure,’ I say quietly, more to appease him than because I’m actually thirsty.
Mark has been working around the clock since we got here. He’s been teaching some of the others how to make things from wood, like he can. The lopsided table has been given a fourth leg, and now it can actually stand reliably. Even the box that Kole was pulling things out of a moment ago is one of Mark’s creations. The stove that we found in the building actually works, and the fire from dinner is still burning as Kole places a steel kettle atop it, before going back to the box.
I watch Kole move around, preparing some kind of drink at the stove, and it’s the first time since I met him that I have looked at him, really looked at him. His hair isn’t actually black, just such a dark brown that it looks black, and as he leans forward it falls into his equally dark eyes. He is tall, but comfortable in his height, his movement fluid in a way I’ve only ever seen from Aaron. And though there is power in his shoulders, and pride in the way he walks, there’s something … off about him. There is no balance in him. Even the few smiles I have seen on his face are crooked, tipped to one side and uneven.
‘What?’ he says, watching me inquisitively as he moves around the kitchen, head cocked to the side.
‘Nothing.’ I shake my head.
He watches me for a second more, and a muscle in his face twitches, making me think of Aaron again, the way he could tell what I was thinking even when I didn’t know myself.
‘Okay,’ he says, and he seems to be relaxing in a way I haven’t seen from him before. ‘Give me a second.’
He pours water from a container on the ground into the kettle, pulling out a small box with an old Oasis label on it. I wonder at how fast these people have set up their lives in this new place.
‘Where’d you come from?’ I ask, but he frowns at me. ‘In Oasis, I mean.’
‘Again with the questions,’ he groans.
‘You can’t expect me to just sit here, completely clueless.’
‘I can’t?’ he asks, and I’m distracted by the almost-smile on his face. I don’t know where all of this is coming from.
‘No,’ I tell him.
The kettle whistles.
‘Did you have any family?’ he asks, ignoring the high-pitched sound.
‘Dead,’ I say, and it’s out before I can even think about it. But it’s easier this way.
I don’t actually know what happened to my parents after they put me in the Outer Sector, and I’m not in the mood for being asked questions I don’t have any answers for.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says, sliding a cup of hot liquid towards me.
‘An actual cup?’ I ask, putting my hand to my heart in mock surprise.
‘An actual cup!’ he mock-enthuses, sitting down with his own across from me. We’re sitting on chairs with wobbly legs and drinking out of actual cups with actual chips gone out of them, but it feels different suddenly. Like the world outside doesn’t exist.
‘So what now?’ he asks.
‘What do you mean?’
‘What’s next for you? Are you staying here?’ He takes a sip of his drink.
‘I’m staying, for a while at least.’ I try to make myself sound sure, to make myself sound like I don’t wake up every morning wondering when they’re going to kick me out.
‘Okay.’ He nods. ‘What then?’
‘I don’t know …’ I pause, wondering how much I should tell him. ‘I think I need to find my own way.’ I wonder if I should be talking to him now, this late, when I’m this tired. I don’t know what I’m saying.
‘And this isn’t?’
‘Falling in a river and being saved isn’t something that you do, it’s something that happens to you.’ I stare into my cup, swirling the greenish liquid around, half afraid to drink it. ‘I just want to stop reacting. Eventually you have to figure out how to make your own decisions, instead of letting everyone make them for you.’ The minute it’s out of my mouth I regret it. I’m saying too much. I need to shut up before I get myself in trouble.
I glance up at him, and he’s watching me with an emotion I can’t name. It
’s like he’s fascinated.
‘I know what you mean,’ he says after a while. ‘I got to that place in my life a few years ago.’
‘And?’
‘And? And it gets better. And you’ll figure it out. And if you didn’t have to figure it out, if it were easy, if it were natural, if you were just you, well then it wouldn’t be worth it. It’s only worth it if you have to fight for it.’
‘Huh. What I would give for that to not be true,’ I mutter, looking into my cup again.
‘That’s what everyone thinks at first.’
There’s a brief silence, and I’m thinking over what I’ve said, trying to figure out why I couldn’t stop talking.
‘Drink it,’ he says after a moment, nudging my cup with his empty one.
I lift it to my lips slowly, taking a tentative sip. It’s warm and it tastes strange and I keep swirling it around in my mouth. I take another sip.
‘You like it?’ he asks, and the smile on the corners of his mouth is warmer than before.
‘I think so.’ I drink down the rest of it, and that warm sunny feeling comes back. I decide that I do like it. I like the feeling of it running down my throat.
‘Well then, that’s another thing.’
‘What?’
‘You like nettle tea. That’s another thing you know about yourself. Collect them up and figure yourself out.’
I laugh quietly, trying not to wake anyone upstairs, but I like the idea. Compiling a mental notebook of facts about myself. Maybe if I do that for long enough, I won’t feel so unsure. Maybe freedom is in knowing who you are, so no one can try to make you think you’re someone else.
Maybe that’s it. As simple as that.
‘What did you do?’ he asks quietly, like the question just slipped out without him realising.
‘What do you mean?’
‘You’re Branded.’
I feel my heart stop. I feel my insides turn to sand and pour into my feet. I feel my throat shut tight and my heart refuse to restart.
‘What?’ I hiss, and there are so many things in my voice I can’t count them. Anger and fear and hate and pain and something raw, like an open wound.
‘I saw it when you tied up your hair while we were out hunting. The neck of your shirt fell down and I saw it.’
All of the sunshine is gone from my insides. I can’t breathe, and I can’t speak, and I stand up and I try to do something, anything, but I can’t.
He keeps talking, like he can’t stop, like he’s too exhausted, too stupid to stop.
‘You’re from the Outer Sector. They don’t Brand people in the Celian City, so you must be from the Outer Sector. So what did you do?’
‘Go to hell,’ I say.
‘What?’ Now it’s his turn to look shocked. He’s leaning across the table, so close that I can feel his breath on my face, and I feel my heart, every pump of it pushing the rage faster through my system.
‘Go. To. Hell,’ I spit, and I turn on my heel and I tear open the door to my room and I slam it behind me, ignoring the voice in my head warning me that I’m going to wake everyone.
I feel dizzy with fear and anger and fear and fear and fear and oh my God.
I do not sleep.
20
I hear people begin to wake upstairs, but I don’t move. My back is to the wall and I’m facing the door with my knees pulled up against my chest as I try to figure out a solution. I can’t let Kole tell the others what he saw, or how I reacted. It’s not like they wanted me here in the first place, and if they find out I’m Branded, they’ll never let me stay. The Branded are known only as cruel, insane, violent monsters, and if the group found out, it would only confirm what they had suspected from the beginning: that I’m dangerous. My heart pounds in my ears as my mind scrambles to come up with an excuse, an explanation.
But it doesn’t matter what I say. The Branded are reviled the same way the Pure are glorified, and that’s never going to change.
No one comes near the door. I hear people talking outside, Kole’s voice rising above the others as he starts delegating work for the day, most of it centred around the house now that the threat of starvation has temporarily disappeared.
I push myself up off the ground, squaring my shoulders as I walk out into the kitchen, pretending nothing happened.
And nothing seems to have happened.
Nobody stares at me, nobody points or starts shouting. They continue moving around the building as usual, and a few of them even make brief, unaggressive eye contact with me.
I feel a sense of relief so strong I begin to feel lightheaded, and lean my hand against the table for support.
Kole is talking to a group of men in the corner, and when I pass he doesn’t look up. He acts like he doesn’t see me, and maybe he doesn’t.
Maybe I can pretend last night didn’t even happen.
Lacey finds me a few minutes later, two containers in her hands.
‘I’m going foraging with a few of the others,’ she says. ‘Do you want to come?’
I nod mechanically, and she nods back, moving away and gathering a few others. The lack of warmth in her voice startles me, and I wonder if Kole told her, even if he didn’t tell the others.
I take a deep breath, and try to convince myself it’ll be okay even if he did, but I know that’s a lie.
There are four people in our foraging group: me, Lacey, Meredith and Walter. We don’t push as deep into the forest as we did the day we went hunting, and we don’t have to stay quiet either.
Walter makes a joke about the berries not running away, and nobody laughs.
I lag behind, because I am the only one here with no idea what they are doing. They search slowly, not passing a single bush without investigating.
‘If you see this,’ Lacey says, pointing to a green shoot growing at the base of a tree, ‘dig it up. We can eat the root.’
I nod solemnly and begin looking for it under the dense greenery.
‘Hey,’ I say after a few moments of quiet searching. ‘If I found white berries, up in a tree, what should I, uh, what should I do with that?’
Lacey and Meredith both turn to me with wide eyes.
‘You mean mistletoe? Don’t go near it. If you eat that stuff, you’ll be sick.’
I nod slowly, trying to pretend I don’t already know that from first-hand experience.
‘You didn’t … you didn’t eat some, did you?’ Lacey asks nervously, looking around to see if she can locate the plant.
‘No, no, no. Of course not,’ I say, heat crawling up my neck. ‘I just saw it a while back, and I was wondering, that’s all.’ Eventually the group starts to spread out, trying to cover more ground as the sun rises higher in the sky. I’m just walking around aimlessly, not trusting myself to pick the right stuff, when Lacey calls me over to where she’s hunkered by the base of a tree.
‘Help me pick these,’ she says, pulling tiny white flowers up by their roots.
‘What are they?’
‘Wood sorrel.’
‘They don’t really …’
‘Look like much?’ She laughs. ‘I know, but they’re edible, okay?’
I smile a weak smile back at her. The old warmth is there in her voice again and he didn’t tell her and it’s going to be okay.
‘Hey, Lacey?’ I ask after a while. ‘What’s Clarke’s deal?’
Her pale hands pause on the root of a flower she’s placing inside the container.
‘What do you mean?’ she asks, but her voice sounds like she already knows.
‘She seems angry at me. I don’t know what I’ve done wrong.’ I keep my focus firmly on what my hands are doing.
Lacey finishes putting the flower gently into the container and turns to look at me.
‘Everyone’s under a lot of stress right now, and Clarke’s always been a bit wound up.’
‘But it’s more than wound up, Lacey. She hates me.’
‘She doesn’t hate you, I promise. She’s just a little in
tense. It’ll ease up. You just need to give her time to get used to you.’
Time for her to get used to me, or time for me to get used to her attacking me?
‘Would you please tell me what’s going on today?’ I ask, changing the subject.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Everyone’s been acting weird. They seem, I don’t know, upset or something.’
‘Oh,’ she says.
I brace myself for the answer, but when it comes, it’s not what I’m expecting.
‘Do you remember I told you there was another group? You were sick at the time, so maybe you don’t. Anyway, they were supposed to join us here a while ago, but there’s no sign of them.’
‘But … how is that possible? I thought you had to run before the Officers found you.’
‘Yeah, well Jay thought he could raid the Officers while we knew where they were, after the attack. He just wanted blood after what happened and no one could talk him out of it.’ She sounds exhausted.
‘Who’s Jay?’ I ask quietly.
‘He’s just another one of us. But he’s reckless and angry, and I think he might have got himself killed.’ Lacey’s voice whispers to a halt, and I find myself reaching out to her. My hand touches her shoulder gently, and she looks up at me with tear-filled eyes.
‘I know you’ve been having a rough time, Quincy, but I’m glad you’re here.’ She places her hand over mine.
I pull my hand back.
‘Uh, thanks,’ I say, my throat feeling tight. ‘I think we’ve got them all.’ I gesture to the flowers as I stand up, trying to pull myself together.
I’m letting these people get to me too much. I need a break.
‘I’m gonna just head back now and see what’s going on at the house,’ I tell Lacey. She starts to say something, but I just walk away.
I need to pull myself together.
21
‘I want to help you find the other group,’ I tell him, walking up to Kole, who’s talking to Mark in the kitchen.
‘What?’ He looks at me. He looks edgy, and I can’t tell if it’s because of me or something else.
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