“We want to join you. Help you,” Silas says.
She puts her hand on his chest. “That sounds lovely,” she says. Maks snickers. Silas blushes. He looks everywhere but at Vanya. “But once you join, I won’t let you leave,” Vanya says. Her hand rests on his chest, but she looks at each of us in turn to make sure we understand that she is addressing all of us. She might be teasing Silas, but beneath the flirting is serious distrust. And I hadn’t expected anything less. Petra would never have welcomed newcomers without first threatening to kill them. When you live in fear of your world being destroyed, you have to be merciless.
“We’re happy to stay,” Dorian says.
Vanya smiles and steps away from Silas. “I’ll have Maks escort you to one of our cabins as a temporary measure. Tomorrow we’ll get to know each other a bit better.”
“Of course,” Dorian says. Silas squints at him. His bootlicking is beyond irritating—it’s dangerously close to disloyalty.
“But tell me: Did anyone else survive at The Grove?”
My stomach hardens. The room is silent. We shake our heads and look to the floor. Holly survived, but no one will mention her.
“We told ’em to leave,” Maude says. “We warned ’em. No one can say as we didn’t.” This is true, though it doesn’t make us feel any better, and I want to tell Maude to keep quiet.
“You’re sure no one else made it out?” Vanya asks.
“The whole place fell in on itself and was foaming the last time we saw it. We waited as long as we could,” Silas says.
“I’m sure you did,” Vanya says. She turns her back on us.
“This way,” Maks says, and we are led out and along the hallway. Maks marches ahead, leaving a gap between him and us.
“At least they’re letting us stay,” I say.
Within seconds, Song is between Silas and me. “Do you know who that was?” he whispers.
“Shh,” Dorian says. He points at Maks.
“Who?” I whisper.
“Vanya is Petra’s sister.”
“Her sister?” I say. I didn’t even know she had one.
“Vanya made wild threats, then disappeared. Walked into The Outlands and never came back. We weren’t even allowed to mention her name.”
“What are you lot whispering about?” Maks asks. He stops and waits for us to catch up.
“I was admiring your tush, sweetheart,” Maude says. She winks at Maks. And we all laugh far too loudly, trying to cover up our doubt and panic. Why didn’t Vanya mention it? And why did she flee The Grove in the first place?
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11
QUINN
I stand beneath a rotten awning to get out of the rain for a minute and pull out the map. From the look of it, Sequoia is more than one hundred miles from St. Pancras, and I’ve walked less than half that. It’s only been a handful of days, and I’m already completely knackered. And I’ve used far too much oxygen. Jazz said I should follow the river as far as Henley, then take the old roads, which is easier said than done. In their search for The Grove, the Ministry has had their way with the whole bloody city, and the route along the river is blocked every few miles by fresh mounds of rubble.
What was I thinking? Bea’s got no one except me, and I just up and leave her. Now I’m alone, and Bea’s practically alone, and I’ve no way of knowing when we’ll see each other again.
The awning creaks under the weight of the water collecting in one corner, and I quickly step into the rain to avoid getting dumped on. The road’s narrow, dark, and most of the buildings have been demolished. In the dust are the marks of tank treads. I kick a sneaker lying in the road, pull up the collar on my coat, and move on.
I round a bend and where the road should continue is a massive stack of rotting cars and trucks. I have no choice but to climb, using the car windows and wing mirrors as footholds. I slip and slide on the wet vehicles and when I reach the top, I’m relieved to see that the way ahead is clear and the river is in sight.
And then something moves.
Not one thing—two.
Two people.
They stop abruptly and look in my direction. I claw my way down the other side, catching my hand on a piece of jagged metal as I duck out of sight. The gash isn’t wide, but it’s deep. I wipe it on my trousers, and with nothing on me to use to clean it, I lift my face mask and spit onto the wound. It stings like hellfire. I curl my hand into a fist to stop myself from shouting. “Shit,” I say aloud.
I turn left toward the river, then scoot along it. As I get to a break in the embankment, flanked on either side by what must have once been stone lions, I stop. Steps lead to a jetty and tied to the jetty is a rowboat. It isn’t big, and isn’t new, but it’s floating.
I don’t wait around. I sprint down the steps.
The boat is tied up with a frayed piece of rope, the oars are in the hull, and other stuff is scattered on the floor: a flask and an air tank; a sleeping bag; a pair of socks; a gun.
Further along the bankside an identical boat has been tied up. So if they see me, they’ll have a way to follow, and there could be a gun in that boat, too. Either way, I need to protect myself. I jump into the boat, and it rocks and bangs against the jetty, water lapping the sides. I sit down to stop myself from getting tipped into the river, grab the handgun, and stuff it into my coat. I open my backpack and shove the sleeping bag into it.
And I freeze because I hear footsteps. And then I see a girl, her head bobbing above the wall along the embankment.
She darts down the steps, and when she sees me, she turns and shouts, “By my boat!” As she reaches the bottom step, she trips and lands in a heap at the foot of them.
I untie the rope tethering the boat to the dock. “No!” the girl pleads. “Wait!” She’s hunched over holding her belly. She pushes her hair out of her eyes and struggles to stand up. I begin to row. It’s harder than it looks; the current on the river is strong. “I need the air tank,” she says. She’s already wearing one, so I keep rowing. Is she mad? Who wouldn’t need the air tank?
She yanks open her coat. Her belly is round. “Please,” she sobs. “I’m pregnant.” She’s no more than sixteen, with large, glassy eyes. Her coat’s soaked through and her hair is stuck to her cheeks. I can’t steal from a pregnant girl. I’m not that low.
“You’re with someone,” I say. She nods and glances over her shoulder. I don’t know whether or not I can trust her, but I stop rowing, and the current drags me back to land. I throw her the rope and, straining, she pulls the boat into dock.
“Thank you,” she says as a tall guy about my age appears at the top of the steps. He’s not wearing an air tank and is panting desperately. I throw the tank in the boat to him as he approaches. He catches it, puts the mask to his face and inhales a few times. His bottom lip is swollen, and he has two black eyes. He looks like the kind of person Silas might team up with.
“Get out of the boat,” he says.
I don’t take any chances: I put my hand inside my coat, resting it on the gun. “Are you Resistance?” I ask.
“Get out of the boat,” he repeats. I reach for a post, keeping one hand on the gun, and pull myself onto the jetty.
“I’m heading west,” I say.
“Where are you going? You don’t look like a drifter. And you don’t look like Resistance either,” the girl says. She probably means I look pampered.
“I’m heading to a place called Sequoia,” I say.
The girl stares, and without waiting to find out more, the boy reaches into his jacket and pulls out a handgun. I don’t know what to do, so I grab the gun from my own coat and point it at the girl, which is a stupid thing to do. I’m obviously not going to shoot her. “No need for any of this,” I say.
“Who are you?” he snarls.
“Quinn,” I say. “I’ve left my girlfriend alone
in the city with a dying child. I need to find a doctor.”
“How do you know about Sequoia?”
“Someone from The Grove told me about it,” I say.
“Are you going to kill each other?” the girl says, and stands between us.
“Get out of the way, Jo,” the boy snaps. I think he might really kill me, if he had to.
“We’re going to Sequoia, too. You can come with us.” She turns to the boy and gestures for him to lower his gun, but he doesn’t. “He should come with us,” she repeats.
“Your purple tattoo,” the boy says. “You’re Premium scum.”
I touch my earlobe. “I was,” I say, and put the gun into my coat pocket. “They think I’m dead.”
“Yeah?” he says. “They think I’m dead, too.” Jo steps aside as he finally puts his gun away and begrudgingly holds out his hand. “I’m Abel,” he says.
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PART II
THE CHOICE
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
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12
ALINA
A hard knock on the cabin door wakes me. I roll off the bunk and open it.
“Sleep well?” Maks says. He looks at my bare feet and allows his eyes to travel the length of my body. If anyone else did this, I’d throw a punch. But Maks is huge. And we’re guests.
“I slept fine.” I cross my arms over my chest, and stare right back at him.
He looks behind me at the others. “Vanya’s ordered breakfast. She wants you to join her. No need to bring the golden oldies. Can you remember the way to her suite?”
“Yes,” I say, even though everything about yesterday is a blur. Maks smirks and leaves, and I shut the door to keep out the cold, not sure whether he was flirting with me or mocking me.
“What a meathead,” Silas says, sitting up in his bunk and stretching.
And soon everyone’s up. Dorian and Song spend a few minutes each on the oxyboxes while Silas and I lower the density of oxygen in our tanks.
“Why ain’t we wanted?” Maude complains. “You’re gonna get back ’ere and find us boiling in a pot. I hope you like the taste of bunions.”
“She probably doesn’t trust drifters,” I say. “She griped about it yesterday. But you’re with us, and we’ll let her know that. Don’t worry.” Maude cuts her eyes at me. Bea’s the one she trusted because Bea’s the one who saved her. But if she knew me, she’d know she can trust me, too, now we’re on the same side—I’d never betray a comrade.
We follow a pebbled path from the cabin to the back of the main house. A guard talks into a radio then waves us through, and once inside, we let Silas lead us along darkened hallways and up a flight of stairs until he stops and points. “I’m pretty sure it’s those doors,” he says, and is about to speak again when a muffled scream roots us to the spot.
The hairs rise on my arms. “What was that?” I say.
“Upstairs,” Song whispers.
“Shh, just listen.” I hope that what comes next is a laugh, or better yet, nothing at all. But another scream rings out—louder and longer.
“We have to see where it’s coming from,” Silas says.
“We can’t go snooping wherever we want,” Dorian says.
“You think we should ignore it?” Silas steps up to him.
I put a hand on each of their arms; we can’t come apart now. “It might be nothing,” I tell Silas. “But we should check just in case,” I say, turning to Dorian.
They both nod, and we all follow the scream up another set of stairs. At the top I gently try a few unyielding doorknobs until I find one that gives. Behind is a narrow staircase. “I’ll keep watch down here,” Dorian says.
At the top, we step into a tapering hallway, dark apart from a sliver of light at the end. We tiptoe toward it, and there’s another scream. When we reach the door, we pause.
“Do we want to know?” Song whispers. Of course I don’t want to know. I want Sequoia to be a haven. A home. But I grasp the handle and turn it slowly.
A guttural scream greets us. And a sweating girl sitting up in bed wearing a white gown. When she sees us, she pushes her hair from her eyes and leans forward, squinting as though she isn’t sure how real we are. She is wearing a face mask and breathes out short, sharp breaths. On the other side of the room, a man has his back to us. He didn’t hear us come in, and the girl doesn’t alert him. The room is clean and bright, empty apart from her bed and a counter top.
The girl rolls onto her side, grasps her stomach, and grunts.
“Count the time between the contractions,” the man says calmly, never turning around.
“Give me something for the pain,” she begs, and that’s when we take off. Without firmly shutting the door, we careen down the hallway and almost land in a heap at the bottom of the stairs.
“Well?” Dorain says.
Silas examines the ground. He looks like he might faint. And the girl in labor screams again.
When we finally reach Vanya’s room, she looks at the clock on the mantelpiece. “We don’t encourage lie-ins,” she says, her voice husky. Maks is sitting in a pink armchair. He is looking only at me. I stand straight.
“We got lost,” Silas says.
“Well, you’re here now.” Vanya gestures toward a table piled with food, and we sit and eat. There isn’t the variety there was at The Grove—no fruit or bread—but there are plenty of synthetic dishes and a variety of cooked potatoes. I spoon a heap of what looks like singed twigs and bark into my mouth. It’s salty with plenty of crunch.
“You like?” Vanya asks, and smiles. “That’s something we’re particularly proud of,” she says.
“Protein,” Maks adds.
“We found a few scurrying around in the kitchen and now we have thousands and thousands,” Vanya says. “We farm them in a cabin near to yours . . . cockroaches.” I cough and almost choke. I have never eaten a living creature before. I should be disgusted, but I can’t help rolling the bug around in my mouth in amazement, and trying conjure up an image of what the creature would look like alive. Does it have eight legs? Wings?
“They survived?” Song says. He picks up a cockroach between his fingers and chews on it.
“We survived,” Vanya says. She is at the head of the table and Maks is at the opposite end, next to me. His foot presses against mine, and my muscles tighten. “Was the cabin comfortable?” Vanya asks. We nod. “And when you got lost, I presume you got to see a few things,” she says.
“Not much,” Silas says. “But I hope we can help here, or at the very least learn to fit in.”
“I think you’ll be a wonderful addition,” Vanya says, and touches Silas’s face. When she sits back, she puts a finger into her mouth like she can taste him.
Silas’s neck flushes, but he doesn’t object to Vanya’s flirting, just like he never objected to Petra’s temper and violence. At The Grove, we all learned how to defer to a leader.
“Why do you need that?” Vanya asks, pointing at my air tank. Now I’m the one whose face burns. Even though it isn’t my fault, I’m ashamed for needing so much air. I look into my plate. “Silas and I lived in the pod and smuggled out plant clippings. They still pump at thirty-five percent, so we need a bit longer to adjust,” I say.
Vanya sips a glass of water and eyes me mistrustfully. But I’m eyeing her, too. Where are the trees? And why has no one mentioned there’s a girl here giving birth as we speak? Isn’t it something to celebrate? I have a horrible feeling there’s more to Sequoia than Vanya wants us to know. “And what percentage are you at now?” she asks.
“Twelve,” Silas says.
I look at my gauge, which is at fourteen percent. “Twelve,” I say.
Vanya tuts. “Reduce it to ten. If you need
more, use the oxyboxes. You’ve seen them?”
“How do they work?” Song asks.
“We didn’t have them at The Grove, you see,” Dorian adds.
“I’m fully aware of what you had and didn’t have at The Grove,” Vanya says, and sits back in her chair. “Don’t pretend you don’t recognize me, Dorian, because I recognize you. You were infatuated with Petra back then—thought she was some kind of deity. And all she was doing was making love to trees. Pathetic.”
Anger burns in me. Growing trees wasn’t some hobby; it was the key to freedom—to survival. I am about to tell Vanya as much, when I sense Silas’s eyes on me. He shakes his head so slightly you’d have to be watching for a sign to even notice. I keep my mouth shut.
Dorian sets down his knife and fork and wipes his hands on his pants. “We thought you died, Vanya,” he says.
“Do I look dead?” she purrs.
“No.”
“So, tell me, was Petra still prohibiting relationships?” Silas nods. “What a drag!” She raises her glass in the air and laughs. “How will the human race endure if we do that?” She is chuckling, her mouth a wide grin, but there’s something quite serious in her tone.
“Why did you leave us?” Song asks.
“It’s complicated. Families always are,” she says. “And I’d tell you everything except I have no guarantee you’re not here as spies. There’s a chance The Grove is still standing and my sister has sent you here to steal my people. Or maybe you’re here to kill me.”
If only, I think.
Silas lowers his head. “I assure you, The Grove is gone,” he says slowly.
“Well, I’d like to check. Can you do that for me, Maks?”
Maks pours himself a drink and waves it at us, almost spilling it. “And what will we do with them in the meantime?”
Vanya rubs her temples as though overcome by tiredness. Then she opens one eye and continues. “Start by giving them iron, immunity pills, and a boost of rockets.”
“Rockets?” Song asks.
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