Born (The Born Trilogy Book 1)

by Tara Brown

  "Jakey." Will’s voice cracks exactly the same.

  “No way.” Jake drops to his knees in front of me. His hands slip to his mouth, moving back and forth with his head. “Will? Will? Is that you? Oh my God. How?"

  Will rushes at him and lifts him up. He pulls him into his embrace. The brothers’ hug is fierce, but all I hear is the sentence they took her repeating in my mind.

  Jake looks back at me. “You found him? How?"

  I shake my head. I have no words. Anna isn’t here. I’ve walked for days. I’ve run from the infected and the others and hidden and cried and seen things that can’t be unseen and she isn’t here.

  They hug and cry and laugh, but I am stunned. Finally able to speak, I mutter, “Where is the closest farm?” Their reunion no longer means anything to me. Silent plans are forming in my mind, and I don't even know where she is, but I know how to get her out.

  People pass by me, becoming a sea of faces. All I can think is how I will get her back too. I will do anything to get her back. “Where’s the closest farm?” I ask again, staring into the sea of people. But the huge boys hug and rub each other's hair. I want to shout, but Will saves me the trouble. He looks around. “Where's Anna?"

  "Hunters got her a few days ago. She went looking for Emma, and I heard her screaming at the edge of the field. I couldn’t run. They took her in a truck. I saw them. It was a moving truck—it was the others. They’ll sell her to the nearest breeder farm. We need to figure out which one is nearest to us."

  "I’ll get her back.” The words slip from my lips. “It’s my fault. She went looking for me.”

  When I look up at Jake, he shakes his head. “Emma, you went for food after you went for medicine to save me. None of this is your fault. We'll get her back. We got him, we can get her back.” He looks at Will and shakes his head. “I can’t believe you’re alive, man.” It amazes me how much they look alike.

  Will ruffles his hair again. “You too, little bro. You should have died a long time ago with your survival skills."

  Jake blushes and laughs. “Anna.” He looks down like he is ashamed. I hope it’s ‘cause he couldn't help her.

  "We need to get her back, Jakey."

  He nods.

  I can't stand around here doing nothing and laugh with them. I can't pretend that everything is warm and fuzzy. A slow scowl starts across my face.

  Jake sees it and sighs. “What?”

  I spit my words. “So how did you end up here? Why didn’t you stay at the farmhouse in the barn bunker?"

  "I tried to go after them. I went over the hill and broke the branches like you told me. I knew you'd find me.” He shakes his head at Will. “She's like a terminator."

  Will laughs. “I got that impression."

  Jake runs a hand through his hair, which always looks like he’s fixing it. “Anyway, I came here yesterday. They all know you, Will. They knew I was your brother the minute I got here. How’d you get so popular?"

  Will shrugs. “I made friends at camp, just like I always did, Jakey."

  I hate this moment. I hate the way Will calls him Jakey. For some reason I sort of hate Will in a horrid way. I wish he was at the breeder camp and Anna was with us. Him and his girlfriend in the shorts.

  Leaving them to have their mini reunion, I turn away and walk to the nearest small tent and look in the flap. A younger-looking guy is asleep inside. Half his face is burned.

  I walk from one small tent to the next, until I find one with a barrel-chested man with red hair. He’s holding a pen and looking at a map that’s spread across a table. “Are you Marshall?"

  He nods, but looks suspiciously at me.

  "I need to know where the closest breeder camp is."

  He chuckles. “Little girl, you aren’t thinking about volunteering, are you? The food's not that bad here."

  I don’t laugh, I look at the map. I don’t really know how to read maps. I add it to the list of things my dad should have taught me, before. My dad was amazing at being ready but there just wasn't enough time to teach it all. And I know he just ran out of time, but map reading seems pretty important now.

  He stops laughing and raises his eyebrows. “Why?"

  "My friend was taken. I need her back."

  He starts laughing again. “What do you plan on doing?"

  I glance up at his older gray eyes and his bright-red beard and stare him down. “I'm going to get her back."

  He scratches the back of his fuzzy red head. “Look kid, I get you're upset but there is no getting them back. They go in and nine years later they get a nice house in the city. It's not a bad gig. They get healthy food and a place to sleep. Your life here is harder.”

  My face changes, storm clouds fill it.

  He puts his hands up defensively. “Look, we have bigger fish to fry than to worry about one girl at a breeder farm." One girl? Is he really saying one girl? He could storm it and save them all.

  But he doesn't care, that is made obvious when he turns his back on me and looks at the wall of the tent where other maps are hung. My fingers twitch, fighting the want to pull an arrow. Instead, I leave the tent annoyed and wander, confused about my next move.

  "Emma, where did you go?" I look up at Will and Jake walking toward me.

  I scrunch up my face and walk away from them both. I don’t know how to be dramatic, regardless of the need burning inside of me. I don’t physically know how to get angry without using my hands. My dad always said it was my worst flaw. I walk to a group of ladies who are standing around a fire and smile sweetly and look at the one who looks the most like my mother did. “Hi."

  She raises her eyebrows and the corners of her mouth at the same time. “Hey, sugar."

  The rebellion people are nice. It’s like nothing in the last ten years has changed them. I don't know how it’s possible, but they don't seem beaten down or corrupt or evil. They aren’t like the people I’ve met, or me. I’m basking in their warmth, looking like an idiot, when I notice they’re all staring at me blankly. Nervously, I blurt out the thing I want to know. “Do you know where the nearest breeder camp is?" They remind me of my granny so I use the face I always used on her.

  The lady who reminds me of my mom frowns. “Yeah.” She looks over at a dark strawberry-blonde who has a scar along her mouth and asks, “Beth, where was that camp that you all saw not far from here?"

  "Southeast, over two small mountains and a ghost town. Used to be a place called Lincoln there. Stay on the outskirts of that place. Lots of infected and not much good scavenging."

  I nod. “Thanks."

  "You aren’t trying to go there?"

  I shake my head. “No way. Just wanted to know where my friend went. Her nine years is almost up."

  The lady with the scar laughs bitterly. “Honey, she ain't coming back out here to crap in a ditch or over a log. She'll get herself a nice place in the city. I hear they even got air conditioning again."

  “Oh hell. Where do I sign up?” A lady in a t-shirt with a big red tongue on it laughs. “Oh girl, what I wouldn’t do for air conditioning and a toilet."

  They all laugh, and it makes me grin even though I don't know why. Walking away from them I realize I’m lost so I go back to the small tent. The man there looks less than pleased that I am back.

  "Really, you're back again? Look, kid, I'm not sending a bunch of men to their death over one girl."

  Again with the one-girl comments? Really? I have to scowl and force out the one thing I want to say. “I'm not asking you for a thing, I just want to see the map."

  He holds his arm out at the one on the table. “Have at it."

  I look at the compass on the map, knowing how to use it. "Where are we?"

  He drops a fat finger onto the map next to a blue line.

  I drag my finger southeast to the place that says Lincoln. I look up at him. “Which direction out of this tent is southeast?"

  He points to the back of the tent where the other maps are that he's blocking my vi
ew of purposely.

  "Thanks.” I walk in the direction he's told me. My quiver isn't full. Normally I make arrows once a month, but I haven’t had a chance in the last month—what with being hurt and goofing off at my place with Anna and Jake. I don't like starting a journey without them, but I don't imagine I’ll be using my bow for much. The thing I’m thinking of doing doesn't require much firepower, just a lot of courage or stupidity.

  But the arrows aren’t the only things I’m short on. Nothing has been the way it would have been back at the cabin, since I stood at the door as Anna knocked outside of it. I remember the regret I thought I would feel after opening that door. It hasn't been all regret and the other stuff has outweighed it for sure. Not being alone and finding the camps has been something I never imagined I would have. The camps are a hard one for me, regardless of how amazing they feel. I still fear the infected stumbling upon a group of people so large, or the others. But the sick and twisted part of my brain tells me I only have to outrun the other people here. I know I can do that. I know Meg and Anna can too. Besides Leo, they’re my main focus.

  I catch a glimpse of Will and Jake and walk faster. I don’t know what to say, but running away from them seems like a pretty good idea. Being around them makes me angry, and I don't even know why.

  "Em, wait up.” Jake's voice picks at me. He moves faster than I give him credit for.

  I don't wait. I want to be alone but fingers bite into my arm and spin me around.

  Will towers over me. “What are you doing?” Is he annoyed with me?

  I pull my arm from him and finger my bow. “I'm going to find her.” I glance at Jake. “Stay here and get better. That leg wound isn’t going to heal with you traipsing all over hell's half acre. You won’t be able to help at all if you’re just slowing me down."

  He looks offended, like what I said has hurt him.

  Will grabs my arm again. “Em, we aren’t going to let you run off half-cocked. We need a plan."

  I’m angry, maybe because they're not running after her, like I expected they would. I glare at Jake. “When you fell in that hole, she did the bravest thing I have ever seen anyone do. She told me that she didn’t care if I shot her, but I had to come find you."

  Will shakes his head. “We need a plan."

  I point south. “There's probably a three-day hike. We can plan on the way. Three days in a cage is a long time." I don't want to tell them what nearly happened to me in the hands of the others. I don't want them to think about what might be happening at this very moment. I need them to focus.

  Will's grip on my arm tightens. “We will be down a mountain and in the woods alone with no resources when we find her. What plan can you come up with there?"

  I shake my head again, pushing away the image of the man undoing his pants. “I've made it this far without anyone.” I pull my arm free and take a step back. “I don’t need either of you." But she needs me, now.

  My stomach grumbles and I know I should grab food and that they’re right. But I can’t stay here and watch them catch up and act like she isn’t missing, not while she is in a cage. Without Leo to remind me to eat I could potentially starve to death.

  I head down the hill, minus a solid plan while being near starving. All I can do is hope that between my backpack and Will’s, we have something to keep us afloat. I know he’s going to follow me, even if I beg him not to.

  No matter how hard I try to focus on the walk or how quietly they speak, their words find their way down to me. "She's really stubborn.” Jake whispers. I make a face but don’t look back at them.

  "I did notice that. How's the leg?"

  "Good. She did surgery on it. I don’t think I'll ever win the Boston Marathon if it comes back in style."

  Will snorts. "Anna been a handful all these years?"

  “Oh man, the year she started the road to womanhood was the beginning of the end. Oh my God, it was bad." Jake laughs and sighs.

  My face is flushed with embarrassment at them discussing Anna and something so private. I remember getting my first menstruation. I had thought I was dying for a few days until I read Granny's encyclopedia of health and found the answer I'd been seeking. I made rags, stayed indoors, and I rubbed the clary sage oil on my stomach for the cramping like the book said. The best thing was the warm compresses on my belly. It was the first thing I added to the list of things he should have told me about. Being twelve and alone in the forest was daunting but bleeding every month for no reason was much worse.

  I realize how far ahead of them I am, when I come out of my daydream and can't hear them. But when I peek back, they are laughing and walking like it's a stroll in the park. I glance up in the trees to see the guards still placed strategically. I know we are still safe from the others, but I can't imagine laughing and joking and catching up the way they are. Not while their sister is in a cage.

  That makes me walk faster. I miss the silence and uncomplicated days of traveling with Leo. He would hunt and we would touch each other every now and again, but neither of us needed to make a sound.

  I don't even have to look back at Jake to know the way he’s lumbering through the woods. I sigh.

  The bottom of the mountain leads to a valley so I climb a tree and sit up in it to get a better view.

  "What do you see?" Will asks, looking up at me.

  "A highway. There are cars on it. They're burned." The road frightens me. Scavengers are always nearest to the old remains. I stay away from the remains—it’s a rule. It dawns on me that this is the very highway where my world ended and began again completely changed, seconds later.

  "Do you see movement?"

  I shake my head but narrow my eyes to improve my vision. The sick have a way of not moving when you need them to. The sun is going down so I want to cross the highway and be halfway up the next mountain before it's completely dark.

  I climb down the tree and try not to look at either of the hulking men standing next to me as I pull an arrow and crouch low to the ground. Instead, I shut my mind off and try not to think about how I'm scared senseless.

  I can hear Jake behind me walking, no doubt completely upright and picking his teeth with a piece of grass. I decide that if he starts humming, I’ll shoot him myself.

  The weeds on the side of the highway are long. As I slip through them, the wind plays with them, making a whispering sound. The birds are not the kind that warn you of danger—they're scavengers. They want you to die.

  The long grass sways and plays with my hair as I slip past it. My heart is beating faster when my foot touches the gravel on the side of the highway.

  I bring my stare back to Will as he nods. Jake's lips curl into a smile; it’s clueless and magical, all at the same time. I can't help but want to smile with him. I see myself back at the cabin for the briefest of seconds. Images of him and I lying opposite each other on the couch and loveseat fill my mind. I sigh, remembering the way we tried not to get caught staring at each other. He was so nerve-wracking and intense to be around in the beginning. It was my first time near a guy my age that wasn't scum. And then I met his brother.

  My mind snaps back so hard I nearly get whiplash.

  I close my eyes and listen to the wind but there is no sound as I climb out of the huge ditch and walk quickly and silently up onto the broken asphalt. Like everything else it's started to crack from the weather and lack of care. Where my foot steps first, it crumbles. I scan every inch of the deserted highway.

  Burned-out cars sit staggered along the long straight road. They are the remains of the people caught in the traffic jams when the tidal waves were coming or when the bombs were dropping to contain the sick. The people fled from their vehicles. They left everything and ran. I remember running. My father thought we had waited long enough in his friend's bunker. It was the only mistake he ever made.

  I shake my head back to focusing and slip between an old burnt SUV and the skeleton of a small car. The hood of the car is lifted and the battery is gone. Not u
ncommon.

  "Which way?” Jake asks louder than I would like.

  "Shhhhh,” Will whispers soothingly.

  The gravel on the other side is a welcome sight. When my feet touch the grass, I break into a run. The bushes hit me in the face when I enter the forest, and I run until I see the tree I want. I climb it and sit with my arrow pulled and at the ready, scanning the highway and the ditch vigorously.

  Jake is huffing and puffing like the big bad wolf below my tree. “Oh man, you can run. Holy crap. I thought your leg was hurt. Whoa."

  "Jake.” Thankfully Will is back to being Business Will. There is no fun with him, only survival. I think it’s the thing I like the most about him.

  My eyes don't leave the road, making certain nothing moves.

  I am about to climb down, but my brain whispers for me to wait one more second. Just then the bushes across the highway move as I pull the arrow back tighter. It looks like an animal but I can't see it clearly. "I see something.” My voice is low.

  "What?"

  I shake my head. “Animal. Dog, maybe."

  "Great."

  “Dogs scare you?” I glance down through the thick branches at Will's face and raise an eyebrow.

  “The others scare me, Em. I’m not too proud to say that.” He shakes his head. "Hunters have dogs, maybe—"

  “Right.” I cut him off, again scanning across the highway. “I think it’s gone.” The animal is gone and nothing else is moving so I climb down fast and turn to face the dense woods. “This way."

  Jake looks pained. “Seriously. We're going to run some more?"

  I scowl at him and nod. “Think about what it's like for Anna right now. She's terrified. She is waiting for her turn, no doubt."

  He flinches. “Jesus, Em. Easy with the visuals. She's my little sister, for Christ's sake. I'm not griping. My leg is just killing me."

  If he has torn it open again, I’m going to kill him myself. I glare. “Is it bleeding?"

  “No, but it hurts." He shakes his head and looks down at his pants.

  "Climb the tree and wait for us.” I hand him the water bottle from my belt.

  He shakes his head and looks at Will who is stoic. "Will, I'm not staying."