Captives (24 page)

Lonn had three Xs on his cheek. Anyone with three strikes was all right by Levi. “So you’re going away for good then?”

“Soon, yeah. But hopefully not without giving them one last expression of my distaste.”

“So … I only have one X. Does that mean they’ll let me out?”

Lonn swept the hair out of his eyes. “Maybe. Depends if you give them what they want.”

Then he’d likely be in the cell forever. “They killed my people.”

“That doesn’t surprise me.”

“Hey there, raven,” a woman on Levi’s left said, her voice a husky rumble. She was standing against the bars that separated the side of his cell from hers; she was bone thin and was wearing a pale-blue jumper three sizes too big, which she’d unbuttoned to reveal impossible cleavage for someone so malnourished. Her face might have been pretty once, but her cheeks were gaunt and gouges circled her eyes.

Levi turned back to Lonn. “How often do the enforcers come down—”

“Don’t look away, Valentine,” the woman said. “Come on over here and let me trigger your stims.”

Levi yelled as loudly as he could, “Anyone from Glenrock here?”

“Me!” a small voice cried from the cell on the other side of the crazy woman. Levi stepped closer and peered through his neighbor’s cell. A dark-haired girl in a pale-blue jumpsuit. It couldn’t be. “Penelope?”

“Levi? Oh, Levi! What are you doing here? You were supposed to free us!” his cousin said.

Her words made him feel like he swallowed his heart. “I will, Pen, don’t worry. Give me some time to figure this place out, will you? Is, uh, Jemma —?”

“She’s okay, I think. She was with us in the transport. Your mom too. But Omar did this, Levi. Omar is a traitor.”

A chill flashed over Levi, Omar’s lies fresh in his mind. “You sure?”

“The enforcers gave him a gold envelope. Auntie Tamera said it was for a job.”

No, no,
no!
Levi ran his hands through his tangled hair. Omar responsible for the death of their father? Of little Sophie? Sure, his brother had lied, but … “Anyone else from Glenrock in the jail, Pen?”

“Jordan. But he’s unconscious. They put him down toward the front cells.”

Yes!
Hope surged in Levi’s chest, and he craned in hopes he’d see his friend.

The gaunt woman stepped in front of Levi, blocking his view of Penelope. She reached past the bars and grabbed the sleeve of his jumpsuit. “Come on, Valentine. Let’s you and me share a little love, huh?”

Levi stepped back, pulling his arm out of her grip. “I’m trying to talk to someone here.”

“Natachah just wants a kiss,” Lonn said. “And she won’t shut up ‘til you give in.”

“I let her kiss my hand,” Penelope said, her tone somewhat ashamed.

The people here were worse than Papa Eli had said. “Well, I guess I’ll have to raise my voice, then,” Levi yelled into the woman’s face, “because I’m not touching you!”

Natachah screamed, threw herself on the floor, and began to shake
as if having a seizure. She must have been faking it, but it sure looked real. Levi backed away from the bars and sat on his bed. Two guards ran down the corridor to the woman’s cell.

“Give us a break, Natachah, will you?” one of them said as he opened the door. “You’ll never get out of here if you keep this up.”

The second guard secured Natachah’s hands behind her back while the first held a white tube to her lips. Natachah pursed her lips around it and sucked in the longest breath Levi had ever seen. When the enforcer removed the tube, Natachah exhaled a plume of white smoke, blowing it out in a long stream, her face frozen like a skeleton’s.

“Sleep it off, Natachah, huh?” the guard said, grabbing her by the arms.

The guards helped Natachah onto her bed, removed the handcuffs, and left her cell.

“You just think about giving her a little peck when she wakes up,” one guard said to Levi. “Or she’ll just start in with you again and none of you will get any sleep.”

The guards left the cell and walked back the way they’d come.

Levi jumped up. “Hey!” he yelled after them. “I have some questions!”

The guards ignored him.

“Levi!” Penelope still stood at the bars on the side of her cell.

Levi knelt at the bars that divided his cell from Natachah’s. “Why you in here, Pen?” he asked, noticing they’d put the same number— 9X —on Penelope’s cheek.

“I got in trouble in science class. We went outside to collect leaves from one of the grassy areas, and while I was looking for a pretty one a boy asked to kiss me, since I was new. I told him no thank you, and he called me a proo dish.”

Levi frowned and double-checked the word. “Do you mean prudish?”

“A prude dish,” Lonn said. “That’s an attractive person who won’t play love games.”

Levi didn’t want to know what kind of love games were played in
a school for thirteen-year-olds. It had better not be more than kissing in trees. “What happened, Pen?”

“He wouldn’t leave me alone. And he tried to kiss me anyway. So I kicked him where you taught me and tied him to a tree with his belt.”

“Ha!” Levi slapped his thigh and grinned. “That’s my girl!”

“The teacher saw, though. Said I was unloving and sent me to the assistant educator, who lectured me on hateful behavior, added an X to my number, and put me in here for the day.”

If Levi ever saw that kid or the educator … “That’s you and me, Pen. I guess 9X is the number to be, huh?”

“But, Levi, I don’t want to go back to the school. I want to go home.”

“Me too. And we will soon. Tell me about this boarding school.”

“It’s for all kids under fourteen. We have to live there. They said we can’t see our moms again. Nell is in my dormitory. I hope she’s okay without me. The boys were teasing her too, and I don’t think she’ll fight them off.”

“Tell me everything that happened yesterday, Pen. In the village.”

So Penelope did, starting with the attack on Glenrock: gathering in the meeting hall, the gunfire, the enforcers getting the women’s names, Omar arriving with Jemma. “The enforcer gave Omar a gold envelope. Then they took us to this city and marked us with numbers. Levi, they took my mom somewhere—they have all our mothers. One of the men told me I won’t see Mom until I’m fourteen or pregnant.”

The word
pregnant
pulled Levi away from dwelling on his idiot brother.
“Excuse me?
Explain what you mean by
pregnant.”

“Exactly what I said, Levi. I’m not dumb. They took the older girls and moms to something they called the Highland Harem, to take turns having babies. Nell said she was going to volunteer to get pregnant so she could see her mom again sooner.”

“No, Pen. No, no, no. You tell Nell to be smart. I’m going to get us out of here, okay? Don’t let these people get to you. You fought today, Pen, and that was great. I’m proud of you. That was Papa Eli’s blood in your veins. You keep on fighting, okay? But be careful too.”

“But I’m scared.”

Penelope’s words—
take turns having babies—
caused his stomach to lurch. “I know, Pen. I’m scared too.”

“Dog-faced, manure-eating cockroach!”

Levi perked up at the familiar sound of Jordan’s insults. He ran to the bars that separated his cell from Natachah’s. Thankfully, the woman had been let out yesterday, the same day they’d released Penelope. He peered out and watched as enforcers dragged a somewhat limp Jordan through the door of a cell about six away from Levi’s. The enforcers heaved his friend onto the bed and left.

When their footsteps faded, Levi called out. “Jordan!”

Jordan groaned and lifted his head off the mattress. “Levi?”

“Are you okay? What happened to you?”

Jordan blinked twice, squinted at Levi, and screamed “No!” so loudly that Levi crouched and covered his ears.

“What’s the matter with you?” Levi asked. “You want them to come back and sting you again? Shut up!”

“You’re
supposed to rescue us, you droppings of a donkey … How’d you end up here?”

“They caught me sneaking into the city through the storm drains.”

Jordan cursed another long, drawn-out, completely illogical phrase.

When he stopped, Levi asked, “What about you? What happened?”

Jordan pushed himself up so he was sitting with his legs dangling off the side of the bed. He rubbed his hands over his face. “They want me to join their people, so I tried to kick some enforcer’s face in. But those electric guns! Hog’s teeth, those things mess me over. By the way, they’ve got Mason up there somewhere. He decided to play along to see what he could learn.”

“Why didn’t
you?
”

“Are you mad? I’m not letting those maggots push me around.
They already put their mark on me.” He looked at the back of his right hand. “What does 4X mean?”

“Don’t know about the number, but X means you’re trouble,” Levi said.

“Good. They’ll cover me in Xs for what I’m going to do when I get my hands on that hairy, spike-nosed, vole-loving—”

“There’s no way out of here,” Levi said.

“Can we dig a hole like that Shawshank guy?”

“It’s all cement.”

“The drains then. Rip out that sink and follow the pipes.”

“They’re too small, Jordan.”

“But we could get to the dirt that way and dig a hole.”

“The cameras, Jordan. They’re watching us.”

“Shame what they do these days,” Lonn said from his cell across the way. “They bring outsiders in here, make all kinds of promises, but most people end up dead before the Guild even gets what they want.”

“What do they want out of us?” Levi asked.

“Babies. Uninfected ones if they can get ’em.”

Levi stared at the older man, bewildered. Why did the Safe Landers want their children? And if that was their goal, why were they keeping everyone separated? But before Levi could ask, Jordan jumped off his bed and walked to the bars of his cell. “The enforcer said the same. That our women would bear children for this place. Why?”

“Because our people can’t,” Lonn said.

“I don’t give a pile of rotten robin’s eggs about what your people can and can’t do,” Jordan said. “They took my wife. They will
not
keep her. Or my son.”

“I like your fire, boy, but you’ve gotta be careful. Their so-called liberation ain’t gonna get you what you want.”

“So what will?” Levi asked. “They have my fiancée too.”

“Patience and wit.” Lonn grabbed a scrap of paper and scribbled something on it, then casually tossed the now-crumpled wad toward Levi. Being just as discreet, Levi leaned down and grabbed the missive, quickly reading the words:

Levi looked at Lonn and nodded, then turned to Jordan and said in a low voice, “Looks like we have an ally.”

“That’s right,” Lonn said.

“Why should we listen to you?” Jordan asked.

Lonn swept his hair over his head. “Trust me?”

Jordan laughed harshly. “I ain’t trusting none of you maggots.”

“The problem is, we won’t get out of the city unless we find a way out of this cell,” Levi said.

“Getting out might not be as hard as you think. They’ll do something to convince you to comply and play nice,” Lonn said. “It’s how they operate.”

Levi couldn’t imagine anything convincing him to comply with these maniacs, unless it involved Jemma. He might be able to play the game for a little while, to keep Jemma safe. But if they hurt her in any way, they’d forever regret it.

T
he redheaded guard, Ewan, escorted Shaylinn and Mia to their cosmetic consultations in a blue luxury car. The Plaza Medical Center was a huge white building several blocks away from the harem. It was six levels high—bigger than the entire village of Glenrock.

Tyra Grant’s office was on the third floor in the Beauty Care Department. As they entered the waiting room, Shaylinn couldn’t stop staring at the silver walls that were covered with pictures of beautiful women. Did they plan to make her look like them?

While Mia went in for her appointment, Shaylinn settled onto a cushy black sofa and tried to settle her nerves by playing with a GlassTop table that recommended a variety of hairstyles and clothing choices “that will make the new you sparkle even more.” She was just starting to relax when she heard Tyra’s voice.

“I really think you’ll do great, Mia,” Tyra said.

“I can’t wait to get everything done,” Mia said.

“Come on in, Shaylinn,” Tyra said, waving Shaylinn to follow.

Tyra’s office took a moment to get used to, due to the light pink walls and Kelly green shelves and accents. Even the glass desk Tyra now sat behind was incredibly shiny and bright. The chair Tyra motioned her to
sit in was the most interesting of all: pink and green polka-dots covered every inch.

“Adorable chair, right?” Tyra said. “Shaylinn, you’re going to love living here. The Safe Lands has everything a girl could ever want.”

Shaylinn wanted to believe her, but things were moving so quickly. “I’m not sure I want to have a surgery.” She’d been caught up in the makeovers yesterday, but actually changing what she looked like …