Octavia shook her head. “No. My brother.”
“Your brother? You’re from the Colony and you have a brother? You’ll have to tell me all about that.” Anna sat back down, patting her mat to invite the girls to sit. Octavia immediately claimed the space right beside her.
“Why are they doing this?” Glass whispered, settling onto the other end of Anna’s mat. “What do they want with us?”
Anna looked around again and lowered her voice. “Well, all the girls in this room are just what they call recruits. They’re people they’ve captured along their way here from wherever they were before this. According to the Protectors, we’re here to serve Earth. Which really means to serve them. Cooking, cleaning, laundry. Whatever makes us useful…” Anna trailed off and bit her lip.
“So we’re just servants?” Octavia asked.
“No,” Anna said, her voice barely audible. “That’s all I’ve been doing for the past few weeks, but I think there’s more.”
Despite the warmth of the room, Glass shivered. “What?”
“I’m not sure. When we first got here, they forced us through some sort of cleansing ritual in the river, but they said we weren’t ready to become Protectors. That we wouldn’t officially join their ranks until the Earth gives them permission to lay down roots. Apparently they need to have a sign from Earth that this is their new home, and then we’ll pass some sort of final test to prove we’re true believers. But I’m not sure what that test is, and I’m worried there’s some other way we’re useful to them.”
Glass’s stomach roiled as she looked around the room, at the girls sitting on their mats, all of them at the mercy of these unhinged people.
“I’m happy to show them just how useful I can be,” Octavia said, a dangerous edge to her voice. “As I stick a knife in their backs.”
“A girl after my own heart,” Anna said. “Nothing I like more than a killer with a red ribbon in her hair.”
Octavia brought her hand to her hair. “I told them I would strangle them with it if they so much as touched it, so they let me keep it.”
Anna grinned at her. “For some reason, that doesn’t surprise me.”
Footsteps echoed in the distance, and Anna’s face went suddenly grave and pale as she scrambled to place her feet back on the ground.
Glass and Octavia exchanged glances, the same unspoken question running through their minds. What on earth was going on here?
CHAPTER 9
Wells
“You run like a wounded rabbit, boy! Do you have a thorn in your foot? Pick up the pace!” The Protector’s rancid breath in Wells’s face nearly made him gag. He’d been running for what felt like an hour, and every cell in his body burned.
After a seemingly endless ride in the putrid wagon, they’d arrived this afternoon at the Stone: a five-sided fortress with crumbling walls. They weren’t even given a moment to recover from the journey. After tumbling out of the wagon, they’d been marched toward a row of what looked like chemical vats. One by one, the Protectors had shoved the prisoners up and into the tanks without explanation. Eric was the first to stop yelling and realize they were submerged in nothing more than ice-cold water.
“Wash,” the Protectors had shouted, and Wells had, almost gratefully. He’d felt awake, finally, alert. Then the Protectors had dragged the prisoners out, letting them air-dry in the frigid autumn wind as they walked to collect new uniforms from a pile of white clothing. Wells’s new uniform still had the name “Laurent” written on the collar. He wondered who Laurent had been: A prisoner? A true believer? Or did that amount to the same thing if you were here long enough?
While the Stone looked as if it had once been a massive, enclosed complex, nature had reclaimed much of it. Hallways ended in patches of dense trees, and staircases stood on their own, leading to nowhere. There was a well-worn path around the perimeter, and that’s where Wells, Eric, Graham, and the Earthborn prisoners were running now. Whether it was a game, or a punishment, or a test, Wells wasn’t sure. All he knew was that he had to keep moving.
“You are running on Earth,” the bearded Protector jogging beside him shouted, spraying spittle at Wells’s shoes. “You are striking Her with your feet. Apologize!”
“I’m sorry,” Wells huffed between strides. The Protectors were carrying short, blunt sticks, and he’d seen what they did with them to prisoners who didn’t answer.
“You space scum abandoned Her to die. Beg Her forgiveness!”
“Please… forgive me…”
“Pledge yourself to Her service!”
Wells’s legs were burning. His lungs were burning. He could barely move, let alone speak.
“I pledge—”
The Protector’s fist shot out, connecting with Wells’s jaw and sending him careening off to the side. His ankles threatened to give out, his whole face throbbing with hot pain, but he kept running. He had to keep running.