Lena nodded, though she didn’t understand why he was being so hard on the Neo-Barb. She was a strong power, just like the rest of them. Most Council citizens had prejudices against Neo-Barbs based on fear and misunderstanding, and Lena had to imagine that the agents who’d have to be on guard against them would be no different. She’d somehow expected better of Alex, though. The suspicion left her disappointed.
“It’s okay, Rose.” The least she could do would be soothe the woman’s understandable offense and anger. It would take time they didn’t have for Lena to try to convince Alex he was being a fool. “As soon as we get to safety, an hour at the most, it’ll come off. I promise.”
Rose straightened her shoulders, her distrustful gaze moving between them.
“Rose,” Lena told her, “As soon as I saw you all, I promised you your freedom. You didn’t know it. But I did. I promise you this now. I’m not going to let anything happen to you. And in spite of how he seems, neither is Alex.”
He raised the strip. “Now or never. I’m not putting everyone else at risk for you.”
Rose leaned in and allowed him to fasten it snugly around her head. It fit over the entire top of her head, from the tip of her nose to the back of her head. He double-checked it for gaps.
Relief flowed through Lena. She took a deep breath and reached to take Rose’s hand.
Satisfied, Alex stood. He swung the blindfolded Marissa back up into his arms and took another little hand in his. The other girls held tight to each other as Alex led them along by the hand of his first small companion. “All right, soldiers. Now we march.”
Chapter 22
It bothered Lena that Rose sat back in her seat on the train, shoulders back, lips squeezed tightly. Her white-tipped fingers compressed the armrest of her chair, despite Lena’s attempts to make her comfortable. Lena understood, though. Rose was more cooperative than Lena would have been had Alex tied a blanket around her head. Even if she was almost angry enough to rip the seat arms off.
Rose would have none of Lena’s concern, so Lena decided to minister to the younger girls, instead. She couldn’t do much for their psychological wounds. She couldn’t even fix her own, after all. But the cuts and welts? The infected blistering? Those she could heal.
The girls huddled together. Alex had removed the blindfolds from all but Rose as they stepped on the train, and they tracked Lena’s movements as she returned from checking on Rose. Two of them, little brunettes who looked to be the same age, sat together on one chair, their arms wrapped tight around each other and heads touching as they warily watched Alex, Jackson, Herrons, and the other agent instead. The others also huddled close together in adjacent seats. One, a dark-skinned girl with hollow eyes, sat apart, unmoving.
And Marissa, the smallest of them, had scooted all the way back in a chair that seemed to swallow her small body. The backs of her ankles barely tipped over the edge of the seat.
She’d start with Marissa.
She knelt in front of Marissa’s seat. “How are you doing, Marissa?” she asked, and winced internally. What a stupid question.
The little girl shrank back against the chair.
“Remember when I said I could help your neck feel better?”
Marissa seemed to consider the question. She nodded.
“Can I do it now?”
Lena received another hesitant nod.
“Can you scoot forward a little?”
The little girl moved slightly forward. Lena smiled and gently pulled her a little closer. Marissa stiffened. Lena turned as the dusty hand of one of the teenagers reached past her to rub Marissa’s shoulder with reassuring fingertips.
A pair of dark, steady doe-eyes met Lena’s. Like Jackson, the teen girl’s caramel-colored skin and full lips spoke of a multicultural heritage. Under the matted hair, dust, scratches, and sharp angles of hunger, Lena could see she’d be beautiful. Now she was wary.
“It’s okay, Marissa,” the girl said, her voice trying for confident but veering into false bravado. “She wants to help us.”
Lena nodded. “Right. That’s right…” Her voice faded. She’d forgotten the girl’s name.
“Phoebe.” Her tone said she wasn’t surprised her name had been forgotten.
“I’m sorry,” Lena murmured. She turned back to Marissa, acutely aware now that they were all attuned to her actions. “Phoebe is right, Marissa. I want to help. Will you let me?”
The little girl didn’t answer, but she scooted forward a little more.
Lena might have started to believe she couldn’t speak if she hadn’t told Lena her name back at the Snake River. She raised her hands and settled them on the little girl’s neck.
Marissa’s body trembled as she fought not to pull away.
Anger spiked again at the jailers who had put the collars around these girls and at the Council who had ordered it. She added it to her list of acts requiring vengeance.
“It’s going to get warm,” she told Marissa, “but it shouldn’t hurt. I’m going to tell the Dust where to go and how to fix your cuts. It will burn the infection away and knit your skin back together.”
“Using your mind?” The little girl finally spoke. Her voice remained as faint and hoarse as it had been at the riverside.