Hostage

by Rachel Manija Brown

  Jennie couldn’t avoid the defense chief forever. But she was afraid that if he asked her for a report—if he questioned her at all about her decision—she wouldn’t be able to stop herself from shouting, You told that bounty hunter to kill Ross!

  Let the bounty hunter deliver the report. He probably had already.

  Jennie wondered who else she could ask about the town meeting. It was noon. The students would be outside for lunch. She ran to the school, where she spotted Brisa, Becky, Meredith, and Sujata, eating under an ironwood tree.

  That was new. Sujata was friends with Becky, but not with Brisa. Meredith was friends with Brisa, but not with Becky. And Jennie had always been under the impression that Sujata and Meredith disliked each other. But they all seemed friendly now. Maybe Sujata and Meredith being in Ranger training together had changed things.

  “Have some dead bread!” Brisa offered Jennie a bun frosted with an unnervingly realistic skull. “I made it early.”

  Jennie’s empty stomach lurched. “I’m stuffed, thanks.”

  Jennie had forgotten that Day of the Dead was coming soon. All over town, people would be building altars, decorating graves, leaving offerings of food and flowers, parading around in skull masks, and praying for and remembering loved ones who died.

  Not a day goes by that I don’t remember Sera, Jennie thought. I wish there was a special day to forget.

  Meredith cheerfully bit into a skeleton-frosted bun. “What was it like, hauling that princess over the mountains?”

  Before Jennie could answer, Brisa said happily, “It was fun! Well, not at first. But we won her over. She’s dying to meet you all, especially you, Becky. I told her all about you.”

  It certainly looked as if Kerry had won over Brisa. But Jennie had caught Kerry shooting a contemptuous glance at Brisa’s back. “She was play-acting, Brisa. She hates us.”

  Brisa looked hurt. “Imagine if you were her. She was riding along peacefully when she got kidnapped, dragged away from her home, and then thrown in jail. She had every reason to be mean to me, but she wasn’t.”

  “Will you take me to meet her?” Becky asked.

  Sujata added, “I used to love stories about princesses.”

  “I never cared about princesses,” remarked Meredith. “But her power sounds cool. The challenge you’d get, fighting with someone who can create invisible weapons!”

  Jennie couldn’t believe that Kerry had managed to not only win over Brisa, but to get Brisa to sway others to her side. All it convinced Jennie of was that Kerry was dangerous. “Brisa, don’t get so friendly with her that she talks you into some ridiculous scheme to let her go.”

  Brisa’s eyes rounded in shock. “I would never! It’s treason!”

  Jennie wished she’d been more tactful. “Sorry. I know that. Hey, when’s the town meeting?”

  “Half an hour,” said Meredith. “School’s been closed. Everybody’s going.”

  Teenagers who still attended school seldom went to town meetings, since they didn’t have a vote. Despite Brisa’s assurances, Jennie couldn’t help being suspicious.

  “You all want to know what will happen to Voske’s daughter?” Jennie asked.

  Brisa nodded guiltily.

  “And Ross,” Becky said softly.

  *

  Jennie had never been at such a long, unendurable meeting. She was appalled to see people stand up and argue that Ross was too dangerous to have in town, and therefore no hostage exchange should be attempted. Nor did she like the arguments for letting Kerry Voske wander around town under armed guard. Jennie respected Kerry’s power, but her most lethal weapon was her tongue.

  Mr. Horst was still going on about Changed monsters. Jennie’s rage rose up in a blinding red fog.

  Sheriff Crow interrupted him. “I think the ‘Changed monster’ side has had its say.”

  The mayor nodded. “I agree that all sides have spoken. I will sum them up, and then we will hold a vote.”

  Felicité wrote fast as Mayor Wolfe counted on her fingers. “One: we send a messenger to Gold Point, to request an exchange of hostages.” When people started muttering, she held up her hand, silencing them. “Two: we execute the prisoner. Three: we keep her indefinitely as a hostage against the safety of Las Anclas. Four: we let her go.”

  Jennie blinked. That was the first time she’d heard that suggestion. It would make her entire mission pointless.

  Mr. Preston spoke loudly. “My vote is to attempt the exchange. The girl has clearly been trained to resist interrogation, so we’re unlikely to get any useful information from her. Ross, however, has proved his value to the town. But if Voske doesn’t agree to the exchange, we should cut our losses and kill the girl. If nothing else, it will prove that we don’t make empty threats.”

  The way Mr. Preston raised his voice, Jennie wondered if he was addressing Voske’s mysterious spy device.

  Judge Vardam spoke up, her voice thin but steady. “We do not kill people who have not committed a crime.” Next to her, Dr. Lee nodded.

  Someone shouted from the back, “No matter what, we have to treat her better.”

  Someone else chimed in, “Yeah! What if Voske does conquer Las Anclas? If we’ve kept his daughter in a cell for years, he’ll kill us all.”

  “That kind of thinking is a surrender before the first arrow flies,” Mr. Preston retorted.

  The mayor held up her hand. “We are repeating ourselves. Let us vote now on the question of a hostage exchange. Hold up your fan, green side toward me for yes, red side for no.”

  Jennie immediately put up her fan green side out, as did the rest of her family. To her enormous relief, most fans were green.

  Mayor Wolfe announced, “The majority favors the hostage exchange. Now, it will be at least two weeks before we get Voske’s response. The next question is, what do we do with Kerry Voske in the meantime? Our options are keeping her in jail, or allowing her limited freedom of the town, escorted by an armed guard.”

  “Prison!” Mr. Horst bellowed. “What if some soft-hearted traitor feels sorry for her and lets her go?”

  The mayor’s annoyance showed in her voice. “We have discussed this, Mr. Horst. Las Anclas is not easy to leave unnoticed. If the vote is to let the girl out, she will be guarded during the day and returned to her cell at night. Should those precautions prove insufficient, she would still need to get over the walls unseen, obtain a horse and provisions—also unseen—and make her way through the desert, alone and while evading pursuit.”

  Mr. Horst opened his mouth, but Mayor Wolfe spoke first. “Citizens! Raise your green fans if you want the girl allowed outside under guard. Red if you want her to stay in jail.”

  Ma and Pa put up green fans. Jennie bit her lip. Kerry probably couldn’t escape, but what if she somehow did? Then they’d never get Ross back. And it bothered Jennie deep down to think of the girl walking around town, pulling the wool over people’s eyes, like she’d done to Brisa. Voske had killed Sera. His daughter could rot in jail, as far as Jennie was concerned.

  Gritting her teeth in anticipation of her parents’ disapproval, Jennie jerked up her fan—red side out.

  Not only did her entire family stare in surprise and disappointment, so, from across the room, did Mia. Jennie dropped her gaze.

  But the vote, by 23 fans, was to let Kerry be released under an armed guard.

  Sheriff Crow addressed the voters. “If any of you ever see Kerry Voske alone, raise the alarm.”

  “Final vote,” said the mayor. “If any further decisions need to be made regarding Kerry Voske, will they be by the vote of the town, or by the decision of the council? I will give you a few minutes to think about it.”

  “What’s this vote about?” Jennie whispered. “Why does it matter?”

  Pa looked grim, and Ma looked sad.

  “It’s in case Voske refuses the exchange,” Ma explained softly.

  “He won’t refuse,” Jennie said, too loudly. Someone shushed her.

  “
But if he does,” Pa replied. “The next vote will be whether or not to execute the girl. If the town votes to let the council decide, they’re saying that they don’t want her blood on their hands.”

  Ma articulated her words carefully. “They’ll want the council to vote for her execution, and afterwards they can blame them for killing a teenage girl in cold blood.”

  It was the most cynical thing Jennie had ever heard from Ma. Jennie was sickened. Of course it wouldn’t come to that . . . but if there was one thing Jennie believed in, it was not shirking responsibility. If she had blood on her hands, she’d own it.

  “Final vote,” called the mayor. “Green for town. Red for council.”

  Jennie raised her fan green side out. But across the hall, fan after fan went up, until all she saw was a sea of red.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven. Las Anclas.

  Mia

  Mia ran to Jennie’s house. Six months ago she would have plunged headlong into her idea, but this time she’d do the smart, careful thing and talk to Jennie first.

  Actually, six months ago, she wouldn’t have had the nerve to do it at all.

  She nearly ran Jennie down at the kitchen door. To Mia’s surprise, Jennie was loading buckets of smelly garbage onto a cart.

  “Isn’t that a twelve-and-under job?” Mia asked.

  “I took it over,” Jennie replied. “I had a fight with my parents, and I wanted to make up for it.”

  “You had a fight with your parents? Over what?”

  Jennie looked embarrassed. “It was stupid. I was in a bad mood.”

  “I’ll help you feed the earthworms,” Mia offered as they pulled the cart toward the compost heaps. “I wanted to talk to you about an idea I had. You know Mr. Preston—you can tell me what I should say to convince him.”

  “Convince him of what?”

  “I want to guard Princess Kerry.”

  Jennie stopped in the middle of the path. “What?”

  She spoke so loudly that people weeding their kitchen garden nearby looked up. Then she began walking so fast that the garbage slopped all over the cart. Mia trotted alongside, glad that she’d been doing extra exercise. At the rate Jennie was going, two weeks ago Mia wouldn’t have had enough breath to talk.

  Mia held up her diagram. “I designed manacles to prevent her from escaping or using her powers to attack anyone.”

  Jennie said over her shoulder, “Great. Make the manacles. Someone else can be her guard.”

  “No, the reason for the manacles is to give me an excuse to be the guard,” Mia explained. “See, obviously the princess knows what they’re doing to Ross, but Dad said she lied all the way through the interrogation. But they didn’t give her any reason not to. Mr. Preston punched her in the face! No wonder she wouldn’t tell the truth.”

  Mia stopped to catch her breath as Jennie stopped at the pungent black compost heap. The pink, ringed backs of the giant earthworms writhed in and out of the rich soil, like the dolphins Mia sometimes saw playing in the sea.

  “Look! That one’s a six-footer.” Mia pointed, hoping to get Jennie to smile. When they were kids, they’d loved watching the worms turn the town sewage into mulch.

  Jennie didn’t answer. She picked up a bucket and flung the contents far out in the heap. Mia gave her a nervous glance. Jennie was obviously angry about something. The “stupid” fight she’d had with her parents?

  “Jennie, are you okay? Is something wrong?” Mia tried to match Jennie’s garbage throw, but hers splattered a disappointing twenty feet away.

  Jennie’s bucket clanged as she dropped it into the cart. “Mia, this is a terrible idea. I don’t think you should have anything to do with that girl.”

  She picked up the last bucket. This time, the contents cleared the entire compost heap to splatter against the city wall, right above where the pipes emptied sewage into the compost. Potato peelings and something orange and slimy oozed down.

  A teenage sentry, hurrying past to avoid the worst of the smell, hooted, “Nice throw!”

  Mia wondered what he’d done to get stuck with the punishment duty of guarding the stinky stretch of the wall. Jennie ignored him.

  “The princess knows about Ross,” Mia protested. “Don’t you want to find out what’s going on with him?”

  “I captured that girl for Ross.” Jennie directed her angry gaze straight at Mia, who shrank back. Jennie had never looked at her like that before. “Once we do the hostage exchange, Ross can tell us himself what happened to him at Gold Point. But you have to stay away from that girl. She’s dangerous. She has Brisa twisted around her little finger.”

  Mia snatched off her glasses and polished them, as if a clearer view would restore the world to normal. But when she jammed them back on, Jennie’s angry glare was still directed at her. “You think I don’t know that? What do you think I’m going to do? Let her go? Don’t you trust me?”

  “It’s not a matter of trust,” Jennie started.

  “Okay, then. Back to my plan. I thought it all out, beginning with asking you how to approach Mr. Preston. How do I convince him?”

  “You can’t.” Jennie shook a bucket hard over the compost, dislodging a long curl of carrot peel. A gaping pink mouth surfaced and sucked it in. Jennie watched the worm like her life depended on it.

  “You don’t trust me.” Mia couldn’t believe she was saying that to Jennie— she couldn’t believe that she believed it. “Nobody in town takes me seriously. None of you think I can handle anything important that isn’t mechanical. I thought you were different. You saw me save Ross’s life in the battle!”

  The memory rekindled the fierce joy that had overwhelmed Mia when she saw Ross begin to breathe again. But the joy vanished when Jennie’s profile stayed frozen, as if that didn’t matter at all.

  Anger made Mia hot and prickly. “And also, who used her flamethrower to startle Voske so he missed when he tried to shoot Mr. Preston dead?”

  Jennie stood still as a statue.

  “Ah-ha!” Mia exclaimed, clapping her hands and rubbing them. “I bet Mr. Preston remembers who saved his life. I’ll go make my manacles now, and then I’ll remind him of that. That’ll make him listen.”

  She left Jennie alone with the empty buckets.

  *

  Mia rattled the manacles nervously as she stepped onto the mayor’s sun porch. She forced herself not to wipe her sweaty palms down Dad’s second-best shirt. She’d tried to dress up for this interview, but she’d grown out of her blue linen dress—not a surprise, as Dad had bought it for her when she was twelve. Her only other fancy outfit was her mother’s ruffled pink dancing dress, and she didn’t think that would make the right impression.

  Dad’s silk shirt and linen trousers were big on her, but at least they weren’t stained with oil or rust. She shoved her glasses up and patted her pockets and tool belt for the fiftieth time. She had everything she needed.

  Mr. Preston himself answered the door. He looked larger and loomier than ever, scowling down at her. “Mia? Did the mill house water pipe burst again?”

  “Pipe? No.” Her voice sounded squeaky. “I wanted to talk to you. About an idea I had.”

  “If it’s about weaponry, you can have any supplies you need,” Mr. Preston said.

  “Yes. I mean, no. Well, it involves weaponry.”

  “Come on in.”

  Mia froze in the doorway. She hadn’t been in that house since Felicité’s tenth birthday, when the mayor had invited the entire schoolhouse to Felicité’s party. Mia had spent the whole time worried that she would accidentally break something.

  She wished she hadn’t remembered that. The place was full of delicate relics of china and glass. She looked up, trying to avoid the sight of things she might collide with. A huge crystal chandelier hung threateningly overhead.

  A cold gust of wind blew past her, making the crystal drops chime. Mia jumped. At least they weren’t red.

  She slid off her shoes, followed him into the parlor, and sat on the sati
n chair that Mr. Preston indicated. She was glad she’d put on Dad’s clean clothes.

  “Would you like something to drink?” Mr. Preston offered.

  A skittering sound distracted Mia. Wu Zetian appeared, her little pink nose twitching. Then the rat scampered off.

  Mia nodded, then decided not to risk having anything slop over Dad’s shirt and the pale pink satin. “No, thank you.”

  The mayor walked in, bringing a scent of verbena. Now there were two of them staring at Mia. She had no idea where to put her hands. Mia stuck them in her armpits, yanked them out, then clutched them together.

  “Hello, Mia,” the mayor said. At least she wasn’t wearing the Button Dress, which made her look as tall as Mr. Preston, who looked as tall as the bell tower.

  Mia gulped in a huge breath. Now for her neatly organized, memorized explanation. “I had a—”

  Felicité walked in, with Wu Zetian trotting at her heels. “Town business, Mia?”

  “Yes. I think.” To the mayor and defense chief, Mia said, “I’d like to be Kerry’s guard.”

  “What brought this about, Mia?” Mr. Preston asked.

  Mia sucked in another breath, forgetting her memorized phrasing. “Well, she hasn’t talked to anyone, but she must have lots and lots of useful information, but no one can get at it, because she’s guarded by an adult, and why would she trust another adult? They’re the ones that locked her in that miserable little cell, and punched— So I made something!”

  Mia pulled out her manacles, and demonstrated as she spoke. “See, as long as you move slowly, you can walk and use your hands, but if you move fast, like to run or to attack someone, they snap tight and lock your wrists or ankles together. And then you need a key to unlock them. See?”

  Mr. Preston and the Wolfes looked sincerely impressed.

  “Very clever,” remarked the mayor.

  “And even if she did attack me very slowly, I do know how to fight, even though it’s not the main thing I do, but I’ve been training very hard recently. And also I have this.”

  Mia brandished her cudgel.

  Mayor Wolfe sat back, looking surprised. Mr. Preston said, “What use is that little thing, Mia?”