Harper spat the stone into the snow. It was pink with blood.
She got so light-headed when she stood up, she had to put a hand against a pine to steady herself. She made her way from trunk to trunk, like a wobbly toddler taking her first steps and using the furniture to steady herself. She found the turning to the waterfront and started down the hill. She got perhaps twelve steps when someone called out to her.
“Nurse Willowes?” Nelson Heinrich shouted. “Where are you going? The path to the infirmary is up here.”
He stood on the boards with Jamie Close. Jamie was dressed in the same clothes she had been wearing the last time Harper saw her, the blaze orange snow pants and the puffy slate-colored parka. The only thing different was that she had taken off her Tyrion Lannister mask.
“That snow is up to your neck. Why don’t you come back here before you’re buried alive?” Nelson’s face was scrubbed red from the cold and he grinned to show his two front teeth.
Harper’s breath steamed. When she licked her upper lip she tasted blood.
It took her almost five minutes to trudge the twenty steps back to the boards, wading waist-deep in the snow, powder getting inside her boots.
“Jamie and I were just off to relieve the Lookouts at Mother Carol’s! Good thing we showed up when we did. You were all turned around.” He reached out with both hands to help her up onto the planks. He frowned, but his eyes were gay with amusement. “But look at all these tracks! We have rules, you know! No wandering off the paths! We can move the boards, but we can’t make tracks disappear. What if a hunter wanders by? By God, if we were discovered, they’d ship us all off to Concord! If they didn’t just shoot us here! Wandering puts the whole camp in peril! Mr. Patchett and Mother Carol have been very clear about that. One hour with a stone should remind you of your responsibilities.”
Jamie Close stepped around him, holding out a white stone in her palm. She grinned to show a chipped tooth.
Harper took the rock and obediently put it in her mouth.
12
She was walked, like a prisoner, through the trees, Nelson leading her back to camp, Jamie behind her with her rifle and her sawed-off broomstick. Harper was surprised to find she didn’t mind the stone as much as she thought she would. She believed with time she might even start to find it a comfort. The stone invited calm, meditation. It insisted on silence—inner silence as well as actual silence.
It demanded her entire attention, which was a relief because so much of what she normally thought about twisted her up inside: if she could keep Father Storey alive, if she could keep herself alive, what she would do if the baby had Dragonscale like her, what would happen if stress brought on premature labor.
The stone forced it all away and at first she thought if she had known how easy it was to live with a rock in her mouth, she wouldn’t have resisted so furiously. Then she thought she had always known, deep down. She had always understood that obedience would be a great comfort to her, and that was in fact exactly why she resisted. She had sensed if she gave in once, just once, the next time would be easy.
They emerged from the woods close to the chapel. The double doors to church were open and people were looking out at her. She felt sure most of them knew what she was walking away from.
Harper turned her stare on them, cold, remote, unashamed, and was pleased to see some of them shrink back into the shadows. Most of the kids, however, held their ground. The punishment of others was a matter of great interest to children, a source of tremendous gratification.
Allie paced at the bottom of the chapel steps, but when she saw Harper she went still.
“Keep that ass of yours moving, Nurse,” Jamie said.
Allie waited until Harper had gone past, then couldn’t keep herself in check. She broke and sprinted across the snow to intercept them.
“Allie,” Nelson Heinrich said, “you’re supposed to be Lookout in the steeple tonight. Go back to your post.”
Allie ignored him. “Harper. I want you to know, I never meant for—”
But Harper had quietly dropped the stone from her mouth into her hand. She hawked up a mouthful of phlegm and spat it on Allie’s cheek. Allie flinched as if slapped.
Jamie thumped her in the back of the head, with a fist or the stick, Harper wasn’t sure.
“That stone belongs in your mouth!” Nelson squawked. “And you can keep it in there until sunup now!”
Harper never broke eye contact with Allie, whose face was wrinkling with shock and misery, her startled eyes beginning to spill over. Harper watched until Allie’s first sob. Then she put the rock back into her mouth and continued on into the infirmary.
BOOK SIX
PHOENIX
FEBRUARY
1
From the diary of Harold Cross:
AUGUST 10th:
THEY LOVE SINGING THOSE OLD-TIME HYMNS IN THIS CAMP. WE GET “AMAZING GRACE” ALMOST EVERY SINGLE NIGHT, CAROL STROKING THE KEYS OF THE ORGAN LIKE SHE THINKS SHE’S RAY CHARLES. LET ME TELL YOU SOMETHING, THERE’S NO GRACE AND THERE’S NO GOD AND I’M THE PROOF. IF THERE WAS A KIND, BENEVOLENT MASTER SPIRIT WATCHING OVER US, I WOULD NOT BE A VIRGIN AT TWENTY-FIVE. I AM PERHAPS THE ONLY WHITE AMERICAN MALE OVER THE AGE OF EIGHTEEN WHO HAS NOT MANAGED TO USE THE APOCALYPSE TO GET HIMSELF SOME PUSSY.
ALLIE STOREY SPENT TWO WEEKS COMING ON TO ME—PRACTICALLY HUMPING MY LEG. SITTING WITH ME IN CHAPEL. ASKING ME TO “HELP OUT” IN THE KITCHEN WHEN THE PLACE IS DEAD EMPTY, SO WE COULD BE ALONE TOGETHER. FLICKING WATER ON ME SO I’D FLICK WATER ON HER, SO SHE COULD LET ME HAVE A LOOK AT THE TWINS UNDER HER WET T-SHIRT. I THOUGHT MAYBE SHE WAS FEELING NEEDY BECAUSE HER MOTHER DIED. AS I NOTED EARLIER, ALLIE’S LOSS SUGGESTED MY POSSIBLE GAIN: THE DEATH OF A LOVED ONE IS A NATURAL APHRODISIAC. IT WAS LOGICAL TO HOPE SHE’D SEE MY COCK AS A POTENTIAL COPING MECHANISM.
BUT I THINK NOW SHE WAS PLAYING SOME FUCKING GAME WITH ME. MAYBE SHE PRETENDED TO LIKE ME TO ENTERTAIN THE OTHER GIRLS—MAYBE THEY DARED HER TO SEE HOW MANY DAYS SHE COULD STRING ME ALONG, HOW MANY TIMES SHE COULD GIVE ME BLUE BALLS AND THEN LEAVE ME HANGING. FINALLY AFTER WEEKS OF WAVING IT IN MY FACE, I MAKE A MOVE ON HER, AND SHE ACTS LIKE IT WAS ATTEMPTED RAPE.
“JESUS, YOU SHITHEAD, CAN’T YOU LET ANYONE JUST BE YOUR FRIEND?” SHE SAYS.
“YEAH,” I SAY. “LET’S BE FRIENDS. LET MY DICK BE FRIENDS WITH YOUR FUN HOLE.”
SHE SHOVES ME SO HARD MY GODDAMN GLASSES HIT THE FLOOR AND SHE GRINDS HER HEEL ON ’EM ON THE WAY OUT AND NOW I’M JUST ABOUT BLIND.
I WISH SHE WAS IN THE COTTAGE WHEN HER MOTHER BURNED. I WISH THEY BURNED TOGETHER. I WISH THIS WHOLE PLACE BURNED.
THIS PLACE IS A HOT, DUSTY PRISON CAMP, AND EVERYONE IS WATCHING ME ALL THE TIME, BUT A LATE-BLOOMING FRIENDSHIP WITH JR HAS MADE IT POSSIBLE FOR ME TO SLIP OUT OF CAMP ON AN ALMOST DAILY BASIS. THE MAN IS A MAGICIAN. EVERY TIME I VISIT THE CABIN, I ASK MYSELF WHY THE HELL I STAY AT CAMP WYNDHAM. NOT ONLY DO I HAVE A GENERATOR AND INTERNET THERE, I HAVE HOT POCKETS. EVERY BITE IS EXTRA DELICIOUS KNOWING NO ONE ELSE IN CAMP GETS ANY.