Stung. Part 12

"They aren't. They hit their target," he says.

My mouth drops open, and hot panic surges inside me, mixed with confusion. "You? Why?"

"Because if I'm dead, you aren't protected. And if you aren't protected a" Bowen looks at Arrin. "What's your name, kid?"

She takes another step away and peers at Bowen through her bangs, a sly, devious smile on her face. A smile that makes my skin crawl.

"Arris," she whispers, the s a slow, drawn-out hiss. She perches on the b.a.l.l.s of her feet at the exact moment Bowen points his gun at her. Arrin drops the piece of denim, leaps behind him, and grabs me, clinging to my back, her nails digging into my flesh. "If you don't let me leave, I'll kill Fo," she says, peeking her head around my shoulder. A blade jabs my spine, and I flinch. "And if you shoot me, you wake the hive."

Bowen lowers his gun but doesn't take his finger from the trigger.

"Bowen, this is the Fec who brought me to your camp," I whisper, trying to placate them both while easing away from Arrin's rusty knife.

"Arris brought you to the camp?" he says, eyes locked on Arrin, hands rigid on the rifle. "I thought you said you were brought by a girl."

"Arris, Arrin a she is a girl."

Bowen laughs a whispered laugha"a grating, miserable sound. "No. Arris is the most deadly, conniving, evil thing that lives in the tunnels. Arris is not a girl."

The knife leaves my back, and in a heartbeat, Arrin is gone. Only the smells of crusty feces and rotting teeth linger in the air. Bowen's gun is on his shoulder again, aiming into the shadows, but there's no trace of the Fec.

We ease toward the open door and step out into starlight and fresh air.

"Hold this," he whispers, thrusting the gun at me. "And don't hesitate to shoot anything that moves," he adds. I put the flashlight in my pocket, lift the gun to my shoulder, and let its weight settle, looping my finger through the trigger.

"You hold that like you know how to use it," Bowen whispers, crouched beside his open backpack.

"My dad taught me to shoot."

"Your dad?" The skepticism in his voice makes me stand a little taller.

"Just because he was partially paralyzed doesn't mean he couldn't shoot a gun," I snap.

He chuckles. "I'd say the wafers are losing their effect." He sets the first-aid kit on the ground and opens the lid. "Sorry. I didn't mean to disrespect your dad. He was a good man."

He takes out a packet and tears it open with his teeth, then peels back the sleeve of his s.h.i.+rt. In the starlight, a dark gash slices through the white bite-mark scar on his shoulder. Blood oozes from the gash and trickles down his arm in a dozen branches, like an upside-down tree. He pours a few pale beads into the open wound and sucks air through clenched teeth. His body stiffens and shudders, and then the air leaves his mouth in a swoosh. Sweat gleams on his shadowed forehead.

"You'd think that would get easier to bear with time," he whispers through clenched teeth. He takes a water bottle out of his pack and rinses the blood from his arm. "We need to get out of here. But we need to talk first." He takes my hand and leads us away from the building with tinted windows.

Pressing me against a white brick building, he puts his hands on my shoulders and looks right into my eyes. "Arris, the Fec, was wearing your old clothes?" he asks.

"You want to talk about clothes right now?" I ask.

"Was he or not?"

I frown. "If he was, they're a lot dirtier."

"He was wearing a pair of knee-length drawstring shorts and a V-neck s.h.i.+rt. Does that sound familiar?"

"Yeah." I nod. "Those were mine."

Bowen's lips thin and pull tight against his teeth. "We have to travel. To night. In the dark. We have to get away from the militia. And that means we run the risk of intercepting raiders."

The intensity of his voice scares me. "What are raiders?" I ask, my eyes wide.

"They're ruthless slavers, rapists, and murderers. They keep beasts as pets, tied up, and beat them and then drink their blood. They take pleasure in other people's pain and hunta"for humansa"at night." He hangs his head. "They're the reason my mom's dead."

I put my hand over his. "I'm so sorry," I whisper.

"The militia has orders to shoot them on sight. Because the militia patrols the wall twenty-four-seven, the raiders typically avoid the wall," he continues. "So if we stay near it, we probably won't run into them. But if we do a" He stares at me, the whites of his eyes visible above the shadowed planes of his cheeks.

"If we do?" I ask.

"If you get caught a" He takes a deep breath and shakes his head. "You can't get caught. If they find out you're a girl a a woman a" His hand leaves my shoulder and cups my cheek. "You can't get caught," he whispers, leaning his forehead on mine.

"Okay."

Chapter 21.

We cling to the wall's dark shadow, leaving its protection only when we are forced toa"the militia are stationed every quarter milea"not standard protocol according to Bowen. They've upped security, probably because of me.

Every few minutes, Bowen pauses and listens to the quiet of nothing, as if he's expecting a something.

We walk for what feels like hours, and I keep expecting the sky to brighten, the sun to rise. A slow, persistent ache grows in my lower back, and blisters form on both my heels. When I think time must have paused, trapping us in this forever night, the darkness takes on a different hue, like the fuzzy gray of predawn.

Light flickers and glimmers between buildings, turning slowly from gray to red, and I realize my mistake. Not sunrise. Firelight.

Bowen pulls me to a stop and drags me into the closest buildinga"an old apartment building with a walkway between numbered doors and a few tattered doormats littering the ground. He eases a door open, number 1C, and we step inside.

A hint of firelight s.h.i.+nes in through a shattered window, between a broken pair of blinds, illuminating an overturned table and the frame of a sofa. He presses me against a wall, his damp hands tight on my shoulders. Firelight glows against the side of his face, leaving the other side black and featureless.

"There's someone out there," he whispers. "We've got to get away unseen." A wail, eerily humana"yet nota"echoes into the apartment building, and Bowen grapples with his gun, aiming it toward the window. "If they catch you," he whispers, eyes glued to the window, "you're a boy! But don't get caught! If I give you this signal," he pumps his fist three times, "that means run. Go to the north gate and turn yourself in. Don't get caught!" He lowers the gun and looks at me again. "You stay behind me. Do not make any noise! And stay in the shadows!"

His hand goes to his belt, and he removes something, a Taser, and presses it into my hand. He shows me how to use it and sets it to kill. And then, our feet silent, my heart thundering like a ba.s.s drum in a symphony, we step back into the night.

We haven't gone ten steps when the ba.s.s straining against my ribs is joined by more drums. Pounding. Throbbing. An entire ba.s.s-drum section being played at once. A sound that makes my throat constrict, makes me want to whimper.

Many footsteps, marching in synch.

Bowen whips around and grips my s.h.i.+rt, yanking me down behind the nearest hiding placea"a blue postbox cemented to the sidewalk in front of the apartment building. The two of us barely fit behind it, sandwiched shoulder to shoulder in a crouch, backpacks against the cold metal, waiting, hiding. Icy sweat drips down my back.

Shadows dance on the buildings around us, framed by the flickering, growing light of a moving fire. I peer to my left and see the light's source. Men, dressed in a mishmash of jeans, shorts, T-s.h.i.+rts, tank tops, or no s.h.i.+rts, all filthy and holding burning torches, are coming down the street. They look like the kind of grisly men I remember from road-warrior movies, who wore metal spikes around their necks, had tattoos and piercings, and rode motorcycles. Only, these guys don't have the spikes and tattoos and piercings. They don't need them to give off an air of ferocity. Instead, each man has four thick scars on his left forearma"a marking as deliberate as the tattoo on my hand. But there's a problem. The drumming feet? They don't match the uncoordinated steps these men take.

I look to the right, past Bowen, and understand. They look like militia, these men walking down the opposite side of the street in perfect unison, toward the scarred gang of warriors. Well, they almost look like militia. Only, instead of the stripes shaved onto the sides of their heads, the sides of their heads are bald, below slightly longer hair, like peach fuzz, on the tops of their heads. But the dark uniforms, guns, Tasers, rigid backs, set mouths, and lockstep walk make them look like militia.

"Bowen," a man's quiet voice calls from the street, from the clean-cut marching men. My mouth falls open and I look at Bowen, wondering how a man who has just arrived knows we are here. Bowen gasps and presses harder against the postbox, eyes scrunched shut, like a kid playing hide-and-seek who thinks you can't see him if his eyes are covered.

"Company, halt!" a smooth, deep voice calls, and somehow it is familiar, like a song you never forget once you hear the tune, even after a long time has pa.s.sed. "At attention. Tasers before guns," the voice orders in monotone.

Bowen opens his eyes, and his eyebrows pull together. Sweat gleams on his creased forehead. Slowly, millimeter by millimeter, he peers to the right, around the side of the postbox, and then eases back around, facing me.

"My brother's out there," he breathes. "That's the Inner Guard."

Feet shuffle to a messy halt on the lefta"the gang of men with torchesa"but even though they've stopped, something still shuffles in their midst. And growls. I try not to breathe, try not to blink, as I slowly peer around the side of the postbox. And then I try not to bolt. Or scream. Or pee my pants.

I gulp down the scream threatening to be my undoing, and an icy hand finds mine, squeezing an ounce of courage into me.

"What did you see?" Bowen whispers, eyes white-rimmed with fear.

"They have a beast!" I mouth, too terrified to whisper. "Bound with chains," I add, and close my eyes, seeing it all over again. A sleek, glossy, masculine body, the kind that used to grace the cover of fitness magazinesa"ripped with fine muscle and zero body fat. Only the smooth, taut skin is speckled and slashed with dark flaws. I see the rusted chains, barely glinting in the torchlight, wrapped around the beast's tethered arms, each ankle, and necka"the kind of chains you put on a dog. I see the four ma.s.sive, muscle-heavy men giving the beast a wide berth while holding the chains. And burned into my memory are the eyes, looking straight into mine.

Chains rattle and a growl echoes off the building in front of me, and I force myself to take another look. The beast is yanking on its chains. Its muscles, marked with deep gashes that ooze blood, bulge in an effort to get at the postbox where Bowen and I huddle. I whip back around, too scared to take another look.

"It knows we're here," I whisper between gritted teeth. Bowen's hand leaves mine and rests on something on his belt.

"We will not commence this business until you get your pet under control," a calm, educated voice calls, a voice totally wrong for this dark, ruffian- and beast-filled alley. "Bowen, instruct your men to take aim at the beast. Guns, not Tasers."

"Company, aim to kill the beast," the familiar voice from earlier says. And all the pieces fall together, like suddenly hitting a perfect chord on the piano. Duncan Bowen, Dreyden Bowen's brother, is the man out there commanding the Inner Guard. It is his voice that I recognize, so like his younger brother's.

I stare straight ahead at the blank apartment-building front. It is like watching a movie, only, the actors are shadows. And none of it is make-believe. A shadow raises a torch and swings it downward into another shadow. Chains rattle. The second shadow falls to its knees and starts panting. The beast is down. Business can begin.

"That's better," the man saysa"the man who commands Duncan Bowen and the Inner Guard. A pair of clopping shoes, like dress shoes, echoes in the street, and a shadow moves forward, walks to the edge of the torch-bearing men, and stops.

Bowena"my Bowena"eases to the right, head barely around the post box, for a better look.

"Did you bring us the trade?" a man on my left, with a voice like cracked concrete, asks. I stare at the building in front of me, at the interplay of shadows. The shadow with the smooth voice is short and lean. The shadow with the gravel voice is beefy and towers over the other man.

The smaller shadow holds something up, but when the big shadow reaches for it, the first shadow yanks it away. Guns rattle and feet scuff.

"At ease, men," Duncan Bowen orders.

"I will not," the smooth voice purrsa"the voice belonging to the smaller man, "part with this until you show me my payment."

The big shadow holds out his arm. Someone steps behind him and places an unidentifiable shadow-object into the man's hand.

The smaller shadow exhales a deep, satisfied breath of air and lunges toward the burly shadow, grabbing at whatever is in his hand. The objects are traded, and the smooth-voiced shadow cradles his object to his chest.

"Careful! It's gla.s.s," the big shadow warns. "You break it, I can't bleed my beast for you again. He's new. And he's a Ten. We all took a lot of blood from him, and it has made him weak. And I still wanna know why you can't get yours from the lab anymore."

"That is none of your business," the smooth voice snaps.

The bigger shadow shrugs. "Suit yourself. Why don't you tell your boys to lower their guns before we turn our backs on you."

A throat is cleared. "There is one other thing," the smooth voice says. A paper rustles. Beside me, Bowen's body grows more taut and his breath hisses between his teeth. "This girl," the man says, and Bowen looks at me.

A rectangle of shadow is pa.s.sed from the small man to the big man, and the paper rustles again. A grating, stone-crus.h.i.+ng laugh vibrates from the bigger shadow. "I haven't seen one like this in years. Look at this girl, boys!" He holds the rectangle overhead.

It starts with whistling, then growling and howling. Soon, the street is filled with the sounds of wild animals snarling, teeth snapping, and panting. And I wonder, who are the real beasts in this land of desolation? Is there a difference between these scarmarked, grown men and the tattoo-marked beasts? The men can choose how they acta"they still have a semblance of humanity to them. But the beasts have nothing human left in them. Do they have a choice in how they act?

"Her name," the smooth voice calls out over the din, and the noise dies down. "Her name is Fiona Tarsis! And I want you to catch her!"

My heart jolts in my chest, and fear condenses in a damp sheen over every inch of my body.

"Fiona is young, fresh, and not hardened by the streets like the other women you catch! She bears the mark, but that won't make her a hard target for men like you. And a" He stops talking, but no one makes a sound. "She's on your side of the wall!"

The raging starts again, shadows dancing, fighting with each other, men screaming, howling, tearing their clothes, pounding their chests.

And then the big shadow raises both his hands, dampening the noise from forte to mezzo forte. "What do we do with her when we find her?" he grates out over the sound of his men. "If you think we'll turn her over to you, you'd better have an outrageous reward waiting for us, and I can't guarantee she'll be impeccable on delivery." The roaring dies at the word delivery, as if cut off by the sharp blade of a knife.

"You misunderstand me. She is the reward. But if you find hera"when you find her, because I know you willa"do not let her get inside the wall!" the smooth voice replies, though the smooth tone is accompanied by a fevered need. "When you find her, kill her. I don't care how. But make all evidence that she existed disappear. Burn her remains."

The roaring starts again, throbbing painfully loud. Torchlights flicker. Men howl, their shadow faces aimed at the dark sky. I try to force myself to blend into blue metal. Become the box.

"Bowen!"

Bowen jumps beside me, his shoe sc.r.a.ping on the cement, a sound way too loud even with the men screaming around us. Someone has to have heard.

I stop breathing, stop movinga"even my eyeb.a.l.l.sa"as I stare straight ahead at the shadows on the building. One of them noticed the sound of Bowen's sc.r.a.ping shoe. I see the figure uncurl from the ground, see the shadow chains restraining it. Biting my tongue, I peer to my left, around the postbox, and look right into the beast's eyesa"eyes that are twin to my own.

"Jonah," I whisper, as sorrow and fear thunder through me. His head tilts to the side and he lunges. Taken off guard, the men holding the chains fall forward with Jonah's momentum and he clangs free, dragging his chains behind him and running straight at me. My eyes grow round, and I shake my head a fervent noa"I cannot imagine what will happen if I am caught, if he gives my presence away. And, as if he's the old, gentle Jonah, he pauses, the briefest release of his sculpted muscle. He blinks, looks away, and changes course, veering toward the opposite side of the street, sprinting away on one good ankle, and one ankle that is twisted painfully to the side.

The men erupt, feet pounding the ground. Gunfire echoes over the shocked, furious screams of men, and as if a vortex has sucked everyone away, the street becomes dark and empty in a matter of seconds. Only the smells of smoke and sweat remain, and trash gently flutters to a stop in the street.

Bowen sags against me, his breath ragged. Where our shoulders press together, my T-s.h.i.+rt is sopping with frigid sweat.

"What is going on?" he whispers, his breath like frost against my ice-sweaty skin.

"I don't know." My voice is almost a sob. "Who was that man with the Inner Guard?"

"The governor. From inside the wall. The ruler. My brother's employer," he whispers, still sagging into me as if his bones have been removed.

"Who was the other one? The big guy?" I can still hear his gravelly voice in my head.

Bowen lifts his head and looks at me, wiping damp bangs from his forehead. "Remember the gangs I told you about? The raiders? There are two of thema"two main gangs. He's the leader of one of them. He's the man who stole my mom."

Chapter 22.