Liberation (I Am Margaret Book 3)

by Corinna Turner

  Kind of afraid to look, actually. Everyone thought of me as the golden goose – I knew that was why the bulletproof jacket was forced on me – and they were all just waiting for me to lay another golden egg. Everyone thought the blog would be it – but would people really want to read the maunderings of a New Adult, especially when possession of them would probably result in a charge of Sedition: Category 2 at the very least?

  “Go on, look,” urged Jon, when we returned after supper.

  Reluctantly, I lifted the laptop’s lid and waited for it to wake up. Refreshed the webpage.

  “Oh.”

  “What does it say?”

  “Five hundred. Do you think that’s good? I really don’t know anything about blogs. I’ve only ever seen PrintArounds.”

  Jon frowned.

  “Well... for a brand new blog no one knows about yet... sounds pretty good to me. See what it says in the morning.”

  “Yeah. Ooh, I think Bane’s waking up.” I hurried to the bed. “Good evening, sleeping beauty.”

  “Sleeping Beauty’s a girl,” he murmured. “Everyone gone, then?”

  “Yeah...” I broke off. A frown had just settled on his brow. Mostly when he was awake he seemed relieved to be alive, albeit weak as a kitten, but now... he almost looked... afraid.

  “Maybe I dreamt it... Margo, where’s Father Mark?”

  Swallowing, I looked down at the bedcovers.

  “Margo?”

  I met Bane’s eyes, seeing the desperate denial in them.

  “You know, Bane. You saw.”

  He closed his eyes and turned his head away, jaw clenched. He’d seen. He remembered. I could see him fighting back tears. Some of Uncle Peter’s assistant priests hadn’t had much time for a hot-tempered boy who made it clear in no uncertain terms that he’d no intention of changing his status of nonBeliever. Some even expressed concern Bane was in on so many Underground secrets. But like Uncle Peter, Father Mark had always had time for him.

  “I should’ve called it off,” he said at last, his voice choked. “I should’ve just aborted the mission...”

  “Bane, Father Mark knew what he was doing.” My voice shook. “He knew trying to spring a trap was dangerous, but he preferred to risk it than just leave those reAssignees there.”

  Bane frowned.

  “But they’re still there, aren’t they? We have to get them out.”

  “Go back to that Facility? Is that a good idea?”

  “You just said it, Margo,” said Bane fiercely, “Father Mark died for them. We get them out! They’ll never expect us to go back, anyway...”

  “Okay, okay. Calm down. You need to rest.”

  He snorted slightly at that – then lay there looking drained.

  “Are you okay, Margo?” he whispered at last. “I never even asked...”

  “Because I obviously am! Why would you?”

  “You didn’t get shot?”

  “Only a little. I’m a picture of health, see?” I raised my hands in a suitably healthy fashion, ignoring my twinging arm and rather more than twinging ribs.

  “No one else hurt?”

  “No, not a scratch. Sister Krayj took charge – got everyone out of there.”

  “Good. Good...” He drifted miserably back to sleep.

  In the morning I checked the blog counter again.

  TOTAL HITS

  10,036

  ***+***

  15

  GUILTY AND DESPERATE

  “See,” said Jon triumphantly, as we headed down to the cathedral. “People do want to read it.”

  “It’s only the first post,” I pointed out. But even my lack of experience knew ten thousand was good.

  When we reached the canteen after Mass I headed straight for the serving hatch, still hungry after several days of sandwiches. Oh... Eduardo was beckoning from the newspaper table... reluctantly I turned Jon and myself in that direction. No doubt he’d read the blog before actually letting it go live. Just to check I wasn’t accidentally giving away our location. I didn’t bother being insulted, it was his job.

  Post might be infrequent for us here, but that enterprising Gozitan was now bringing us newspapers each day. This morning Eduardo had laid out three of the EuroGov’s most strictly controlled papers on the left, the others on the right... oh... the ones on the right all had my name on the front.

  “That was quick.” No wonder the hit counter was so high.

  “You made the headlines?” asked Jon.

  “Yes. Sorry.” Still wasn’t as good as Bane at remembering to describe things. “Um...” I was embarrassed to read them out.

  Eduardo wasn’t.

  “‘Religion and Politics: M. V. Speaks.’ That’s the Maltese Herald. ‘Margaret V.: I admire Everington’ – that’s the EuroTimes, ‘Margaret Verrall’s Category 1 blog’ – that’s the ItalyDaily...”

  “Category One? I was hoping it would only be Two.”

  Jon snorted.

  “You wish, Margo. But they didn’t waste any time categorising it.”

  “Trying to scare people off reading it.” Eduardo sounded unperturbed, even by his standards. “Won’t work.”

  He was probably right. Scarcely a popular blog wasn’t at least Category 2.

  “How did they find it so fast?” I said.

  Eduardo very nearly laughed.

  “Margaret, I imagine every newspaper worth its salt has got autoSearches running for the word ‘Liberations’ let alone for your name. People have been waiting for this.”

  After breakfast we spent a few happy minutes with a conscious Bane, then when he fell asleep again, I opened up the laptop.

  “Y’know, what I’m going to do...” I said to Jon, “After I write each entry, I’ll leave it until the next day before posting. Edit it better.”

  “Whatever works.” Jon started browsing on Bane’s more perishable gifts – Doctor Frederick had forbidden us to try and feed him anything yet.

  Retreating back to his armchair with a bunch of grapes that must’ve come from Malta, he sat, lost in thought. After a moment he took a notepad from down the side of the chair and carefully wrote something down. He held it sideways so he could count down the spirals and avoid writing in the same place twice, pressing very hard to indent the paper.

  “What are you up to?”

  “Liberation plans. The ones to chuck through the windows.”

  “Oh. Of course.”

  So taken up with Bane and then the Blog, I’d practically forgotten about the need for new plans. I turned my attention to the screen. From those headlines, I’d do more good at this keyboard. Okay, so people had been trying to tell me that for a couple of months...

  I opened up the Blog’s home page.

  You have 1,600 new comments.

  One thousand, six hundred? Did I need to read them all?

  I clicked through to my first blog post and scrolled down quickly.

  Deer Margo,

  My big sister was sentt to Cardiff Fasility same time as u. Plese, plese, plese kan u save her plese? U kan have my hole Prancy Pony set or anything else u like, I miss her so much.

  Thanx, Cathie (age 8)

  P.S. That’s not my reel name, I wos friytened to right that, please don’t be mad.

  I let out a long breath and winced.

  “You okay? Are your ribs hurting?”

  “I’m... fine. Cardiff. Damn.”

  “Okay, that’s cryptic.”

  “Some little girl in Cardiff wants us to rescue her sister.”

  “That’s not going to happen, Margo,” said Jon softly. “You know we can’t strike far beyond the Mediterranean.”

  “I know. I just didn’t... think of this. Oh Lord help me, they’re not all...?”

  I scrolled on quickly.

  Dear Miss Verrall,

  I just wanted to say how much I admire what you’re doing. My brother failed Sorting many years ago and I just wish you’d been around then – or that I’d had half your spine. How differ
ent things might have been. Keep it up,

  An admirer.

  Dear Margaret,

  My little girl’s lost her hearing after a virus, the doctors think it may be permanent. You know what that means better than anyone. I’ll try anything – please will you pray for her?

  A desperate mother.

  Dear Margaret,

  My girlfriend failed Sorting five years ago and I’ve spent every day since then hating myself for being such a filthy cowardly wretch and letting her die. I wish there was something I could do to help you, I really do, if there is, please tell us, because I know I’m not the only one.

  A filthy Parisian coward.

  Dear M.V.

  You rock.

  Rock on.

  Phil K.

  Dear Margaret,

  My husband has cancer, but we’re both conchies, or we were. He’s wavering, and so am I. You see, he’ll die without a transplant. Please pray for us.

  H.G.

  Dear Margaret, Bane and Jon,

  I want to adopt all three of you, I really do. But you wouldn’t want me, would you? I let my own children die. Some days I just sit and stare at that bottle of bleach but I suppose I’m just a coward through and through. What would you want with me? Keep it up. Please, please keep it up.

  A bad mother.

  Dear Margo,

  My Great-Grandfather’s very sick. My mum says there’s nothing in it, but please will you pray for him?

  Thank you very much,

  James

  Dear Margaret,

  Please will you save our son? He’s in Hamburg Facility. His name’s Franz, he likes football and music. Before he failed he was going to be a professional footballer, he was on the regional squad. He’s a good boy, he doesn’t deserve this, he only failed one test.

  Please help him.

  Franz’s mum and dad.

  Dear Margo,

  My Great-Granddaughter failed sorting three years ago and my Granddaughter’s not been right since. I’m afraid she’ll harm herself and it’s only me to look after her and I can’t cope any more. I need a transplant or she’ll have to go into a home, but how can I have one? I don’t know what to do. Pray for us, please.

  A guilty Great-Grandmother.

  “Oh my...” My eyes raced over the entries. “How can I possibly...?”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I’ve got one thousand, six hundred comments and about two in three are requests for prayer...”

  A message popped up:

  You have 147 new comments.

  “What do I do! They’re coming in faster than I can even read them!”

  A knock at the door.

  “Come in?”

  Sister Mari entered, three other sisters following in a swish of white, brown and blue habits.

  “Hi, Margo. Eduardo sent us up to have a little confab about how best to organise this.”

  “This...?”

  “He seems to think you might need some Pregatores.” Her eyes twinkled as she used the Resistance epithet.

  “He... oh. I’m to delegate ?”

  “That’s the idea. He’s pulled us out of the work rota. We’re to handle the comments.” She shot a look at the bed. “We’re not disturbing Bane, are we?”

  “No, he could sleep through an exploding shed of fireworks just at the moment. Do find a perch.”

  “So you’ve got an avalanche of comments and half of them are prayer requests?” said Sister Mari, once she was settled on the end of a chest of drawers.

  “That’s about it.” I dragged my eyes from the unending list. “Some aren’t even about Sorting – why’re they asking me?”

  “People who aren’t sure what they believe are often very unsure about praying themselves – but they’ll ask someone else to pray for them. And Margo, like it or not, you are now the public face of the Underground. Certainly of our Stream.”

  I sighed. My blog was the most obvious, most visible, most accessible gateway to the Underground.

  “Well, Eduardo’s right, I’ll have to delegate this. But I don’t want to totally ignore people...”

  “We’ll make lists. List of prayer requests, list of rescue requests, list of messages of encouragement. We’ll deal with the prayer list and we’ll pass anything we think you might like to read on to you. Do you want the rescue list?”

  I winced again.

  “I think you’d better keep it and pray for them too. I don’t know how much we’ll be able to do.”

  “Give us a copy, though,” said Jon. “If any of the places are within striking distance, no harm in choosing them.”

  “Yes, that’s true. Have you guys got access to a computer with internet, Sister Mari?”

  “Yes, Eduardo has Brother Wilhelm and Brother Michael setting up a room for us. They’re on the team too. Do you want us to reply to the comments?”

  “Um, I don’t know. I’d better say in my next post you guys are going to be the prayer team. But... what would you say to the rescue requests?”

  We didn’t want to give false hope. But how did one say, sorry, we can’t save your child?

  Sister Mari considered for a moment.

  “Hmm. Perhaps... Say how very much we would like to rescue every last reAssignee in the EuroBloc but with our current resources it’s simply not possible at the moment. That we are praying for their child and will rescue them if we possibly can, but to please, please remember Europe is very large and therefore not get their hopes up.”

  I blinked.

  “That’s... that’s actually not too bad. Be so nice if everyone could have personal replies... I will try and do some of them myself.”

  “You can do the ones we pass on to you to read, how’s that?”

  “Yes, that should work.”

  “Right,” Sister Mari clapped her hands eagerly, “to work!”

  With a few murmurs of encouragement, they trooped out.

  “Well, thank goodness for that,” I said.

  Jon just grinned and wrote another note.

  Things got very busy after that. Bane moved back to his room after a few more days, and had the planning committee meet in there when they set to work again after a few days R&R – he was staying awake most of the time now.

  I withdrew to my room to write my blog posts, joining in the meetings when I could, but it wasn’t often. I blogged once a day and each entry’s blog counter went higher than the last. Instead of petering off as I’d half expected.

  When I’d a free moment – or made one somehow –I went to the cathedral and prayed through the day’s comments lists as far as I could. Many of the pseudonyms were the same – the words ‘guilty’ and ‘desperate’ occurred with depressing regularity – but the Lord knew who they were. The news there was a dedicated prayer team actually caused a massive increase.

  I should just withdraw from the planning committee, I knew that. Not far off midnight and I knelt before the side altar with the rescue request list in my hands... I tried so hard to get through this one each day, but every day’s list was longer... There’s three more pages, said a rational little voice in my head, and you can’t write well if you’re exhausted. Go to bed. No, I could finish it tonight, I could...

  Janine. Pause. Lord?

  Mary. Pause. Lord? So tired I was just sort of mentally shoving each name at Him...

  Tony. Pause. Lord?

  Helga. Pause. Lord?

  I should stop... but I knew how these people felt, their situation was far, far too familiar, and only a fraction of them were in with any chance at all of being saved, at least by us...

  Frankie...

  Isabella...

  Wilbur...

  Svenja...

  So many... I was so tired, and it was so late, but there were so many... so many doomed... unsaveable... Tears were running down my cheeks, I scarcely noticed.

  Janet...

  Carol...

  Lina...

  Roberto...

  Benno...


  A soft tap-tap-tap drew me from the names. A hand found my shoulder.

  “Margo? Aren’t you going to bed?”

  “I...” I swallowed, trying to clear the tears from my throat. “I haven’t quite finished...”

  “Margo, what’s the point in having an entire prayer team if you’re going to stay up all night yourself? Come on. You know Bane won’t go to sleep until you’ve gone and said goodnight.”

  “I usually have to wake him up to say goodnight.”

  “Look, he made me promise I’d get you to bed if I had to pick you up and carry you. So are you going to come quietly?”

  I knew he was right – they both were.

  “Well, I don’t much fancy having my head bashed on every doorway between here and my room.” I laid the lists back down in front of the altar – people came and went, picking up a page for a while, providing extra prayer support – then stood up and went quietly.

  I’d taken to giving the newspapers a quick glance over before getting my breakfast – get it over with. They couldn’t actually repeat anything I’d written, not without being up on a charge of Sedition, but my name crept onto that front page with embarrassing regularity – ‘Raid on BlogShop – 10,000 M. V. PrintArounds seized’ or ‘Bounty on M.V. raised to Ệ3 million’ – that sort of thing.

  After I’d revealed Bane was behind the Liberations the EuroGov raised the bounty on him until it matched what they were offering for me – but it hadn’t been long before they decided they still hated me more. Eduardo had asked me not to leave the Citadel or even walk around on the battlements with my forehead uncovered. Almost all the Gozitans were either in the Underground – technically not illegal in Malta – or very sympathetic but three million Eurons was an awful lot of money.

  This morning... I stopped dead, then took a couple of quick steps up to the table and snatched a paper. At random.

  Every single one had the same picture on the cover.

  Me.

  ***+***