“You should have just told me,” James says. “You make it so hard.”
“Please, James. Please. I saw her. And she was happy. Or she could be, at least. She was out, away from all this. You say you care about her. Let her stay out.”
“What about you? You know what it means if she doesn’t come back.”
“It doesn’t matter. She deserves a chance. Please don’t take it away from her.”
There’s a pause. It’s long, too long. Then he says softly, thoughtfully, “How do you know she was happy?”
“She laughed. Really laughed. And she let him hold her hand.”
“Him?” His voice is hard. I sink back into the bed. I have done it again. I have said the wrong thing and lost whatever chance I had. “She was with a guy? Who was he?”
“Please. Let her go. We can both let her go.”
He snarls. “None of us gets out, Annie. We are all too steeped in blood for that.” And then, when I am flinching for his next battery of words, he surprises me by sounding sad. “You said Adam Denting was bigger than you and Fia. So is what I’m doing. And I can’t let her go.”
I remember what Fia told me, about who the real Keane behind the school was. “What would your mother say?”
“That’s just it. Nothing. Because she got out and left the rest of us here to deal with this mess. Now get up. I’m taking you back.”
I will never get away, and Fia will always be dragged in because of me.
ANNIE
Six Months Ago
I AM TRYING TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO SEE.
So far, the information I’ve found out by being friendly and listening when I’m not supposed to is limited. Mostly things I already know. The school isn’t a school so much as a testing ground for psychic talent. Only girls, too. I thought they might have an equivalent place for boys, but for whatever reason, boys can’t do any of these things.
Which means thoughts and feelings are safe around security guards. It’s something.
Girls are quickly weeded out for not being skilled, thus the reason the classes get so small so fast. Those who have strong enough abilities are slowly but surely sucked in, and those who can be trusted are moved up and out to do who knows what for Keane.
They never come back.
Those of us who are on shaky ground are kept here, in the massive school building, but away from the new students. They find what they need to threaten us with so we have no option but to work for Keane. Readers and Feelers are more common and seem to do better. Seers he doesn’t trust. None have as much power or as high a place as Clarice did.
No one is like Fia, who can’t do what we can but somehow is even more interesting to him than the rest of us. I know Fia’s special, but I still can’t understand why they care so much about her. Why they forced her to stay. Why they didn’t do anything to her after she killed Clarice.
All the girls are found through rumor or odd news articles, occasionally through visions, then approached the same way I was—a scholarship, a prestigious school, specially tailored instruction for specially gifted girls. Then gradually the girls figure it out, learn they aren’t alone, that they’re surrounded by others who have the same gifts (or curses, depending on how you view it), given instruction and help and a home.
It’s brilliant, really. The applications for espionage, both in business and in politics, are endless. Nearly all the girls start here so young and are treated so well that of course they want the power and money that is offered.
But knowing this all is not enough. It’s not enough for me to keep Fia safe, for me to get her out of here. So I work on the only advantage I have, and that’s seeing.
Clarice didn’t teach me much. She told me to focus, but she always had me focus on Fia. I don’t need to see Fia right now, though I want to, so much. If only to see whether or not she’s happy. Her letters make her feel even farther away. They have no soul.
I’ve occasionally been able to get tiny flashes, glimpses of things I’ve thought very hard about, like the mountains where we used to live but that I don’t remember from before I lost my sight. They had fewer trees than I imagined, more rocks. Beautiful. And then there are the strange ones, jumbles of images I can’t sort through or make sense of.
So now I am fasting and staying awake as long as I can. Maybe if I push my body to the brink, push it as far as I can, my brain will take over and I’ll be able to see more.
It works—sort of. I sit, so tired I can’t think straight and so hungry my whole body is trembling. And then I see things.
Fia, on a balcony, with haunted eyes as she stares out at a city filled with stone buildings and winding streets. She looks healthy, if not happy. Healthy is something, at least. James is taking care of her like he said he would.