Frida nodded.
“The Pirates only returned to the Land once more. We’d started security shifts, and Micah told us to let that little shit leave the red warning, pretend we hadn’t seen him come and drop the bandanna in front of the Hotel in the middle of the night. Micah didn’t want them to know anything had changed, and that was smart.” She sighed. “Two days later, when the Pirates finally arrived, your brother stepped out of the house he’d claimed as his own, and without even a word he shot the young leader in the chest. The kid gasped, and he fell off the horse. I remember the way his long body hit the ground: sort of dripping off the animal. Randy was with them, on his own horse, his hair matted into knots, shirtless and in a pair of red gym shorts. He was sunburned, and he had what looked like cigarette burns all over his arms.
“Micah told the others to hand over Randy right away. I think the men were shocked. When Randy didn’t move, August and Sailor came out from behind another building and shot his horse. Randy fell off. For a moment, he wasn’t sure what to do. Micah said to stand up. As he spoke, some of our men emerged from other houses, all of them with guns. The Pirates who were left whistled once and turned around. I guess the new kid wasn’t worth a fight. I bet one of them was ready to take the throne after the assassination.
Frida wasn’t sure if this was surprising or predictable. Her brother was capable of shooting a man point-blank in the chest. She should have known. That’s what Cal might say. The Group had inured him to violence, made it into a game. And these Pirates had done unspeakable acts to the Land, and taken one of their children. She remembered her brother as a kid: long eyelashes, arms thin and lanky, pen marks all over his hands from drawing on the butcher paper Dada had bought them. Micah had never been interested in guns and shoot-’em-up games. He’d been sweet.
“You should know, Frida. Micah beheaded that man.”
“He what?”
“He called us all over and told us to watch. He pulled the body from the ground, and with his knife sliced his head off at the neck.” She paused. “If that sounds like it was quick, it wasn’t. The head didn’t come off easily, and your brother had to saw across bone and tendons until it was removed. One of the babies didn’t understand what was happening and was squealing with laughter. I remember Sandy covered Jane’s eyes—but Sandy didn’t keep herself from looking. None of us did. What Micah was doing was horrible, but that man had taken Randy. We wanted to see it.
“Deborah had grabbed for Randy as soon as she could, but when Micah started, Randy began to cry and pull away from her, as if the Pirate were his father. Micah ordered Randy to follow him out to a Form and made him hang up the head. Micah left it to rot into a skull. There were a few more skirmishes with Pirates after that, but never on the Land proper. By the time they stopped altogether, there were five heads hanging from the Forms.”
Neither woman spoke. Frida searched for something harmless to ask.
“You said you built more Forms?”
“We did. We hadn’t thought of them as security, as a gate to keep people out, until Micah suggested it. We also built the lookout Towers. We worked for months. Aside from using all the inessential stuff here on the Land to add to the Forms, August had begun leaving and coming back with discarded items for us to use. He was going to Pines—that’s when we found out about that. I remember my hands then; they were shredded from all the manual labor. I was glad the kids missed that.”
“You haven’t told me what happened to them. Where is your son?”
Anika looked like she might throw up, and Frida glanced at the window to check the dawn’s progress. The sun was about to rise. When Anika spoke, her voice was low and quiet. “It’s almost dawn. Morning Labor is about to start.”
“Just hurry and tell me now.”
Anika shook her head and grabbed the bowl of dough. “You can’t make me rush a story like that. Let’s knead this before it’s too late.”
16
At the morning meeting, they convened in a circle on the Church’s stage. It was so cold, they covered the icy metal chairs with blankets before sitting down. August had returned the night before; now he held a clipboard stuffed with yellowed loose-leaf paper and a pencil that he’d sharpened first with a knife and then, when that wasn’t quite sufficient, his teeth. Cal had to admit, the guy did look pretty tough gnawing at the lead. As usual, they spent half an hour reviewing Labor assignments, all of them outlined in August’s notes, and then Sailor told them about his meetings with the team leaders. Cal had been deemed a strong critical thinker by the construction team leader, though he was “unnervingly quiet.” Sailor raised an eyebrow at Cal as he said this. “And everyone in the kitchen loves your wife,” he added.