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We are always fighting against going quiet, going gentle.
“Yes,” I say to Rebecca.
“And?” she asks. “How long before they start letting people go?”
“They will have already begun,” I say.
CHAPTER 29
KY
Someone comes inside. I hear the door open and then footsteps crossing the floor.
Could it be Cassia?
Not this time. Whoever this is doesn’t smell like Cassia’s flowers-and-paper scent. This person smells like sweat and smoke. And they breathe differently than she does. Lower. Louder, like they’ve been running and they’re trying to hold it in.
I hear the person reach for the bag.
But I don’t need new fluid. Someone just changed it. Where are they now? Do they know what’s happening?
I feel a tug on my arm. They’ve unhooked the bag from my line and started to drain it. The liquid drips into some kind of bucket instead of into me.
I’m turned toward the window so the wind rattling the panes is even louder now.
Is this happening to everyone? Or only to me? Is someone trying to make sure I don’t come back?
I can hear my own heart slowing down.
I’m going deeper.
The pain is less.
It’s harder to remember to breathe. I repeat Cassia’s poem to myself, breathing with the beats.
New. Rose. Old. Rose. Queen. Anne’s. Lace.
In. Out. In. Out. In. Out. In.
Out.
CHAPTER 30
XANDER
I must have fallen asleep, because I jump when the prison door opens. “Get him out,” someone says to the guard, and then Oker appears in front of my cell, watching the guard unlock the door. “You,” Oker says. “Time to get back to work. ”
I glance at the cell across from me. Cassia hasn’t come in. Did she spend the whole night watching over Ky? Or have they made her work all this time? All the other prisoners are quiet. I can hear them breathing, but no one else seems to be awake.
When we get outside, I see that it’s dark: not even early morning yet. “You’re working for me,” Oker says, “so you keep the same hours I do. ” He points to the research lab across the way. “That’s mine,” he says. “Do what I say, and you can spend most of your day in there instead of locked up. ”
If Leyna’s the physic of this village, then I think Oker is the pilot.
“Follow my instructions exactly,” he tells me. “All I need are your hands since mine don’t work right. ”
“Oker isn’t much for introductions,” one of the assistants says after Oker’s left. “I’m Noah. I’ve worked with Oker since he came here. ” Noah looks to be somewhere in his mid-thirties. “This is Tess. ”
Tess nods to me. She’s a little younger than Noah and has a kind smile.
“I’m Xander,” I say. “What’s all this?” One of the walls of the lab is covered with pictures of people I don’t know. Some are old photos and pages torn from books, but most look like they might have been drawn by hand. Did Oker do that before his hands stopped working right? I’m impressed, and it makes me think of that nurse back in the medical center. Maybe I am the only one who can’t make things—pictures, poems—without any training.
“Oker calls them the heroes of the past,” Noah says. “He believes we should know the work of those who came before us. ”
“He trained in the Society, didn’t he,” I say.
“Yes,” Tess says. “He came here ten years ago, right before his Final Banquet. ”
“He’s ninety?” I ask. I’ve never known anyone so old.
“Yes,” Noah says. “The oldest person in the world, as far as we know. ”
The office door slams open and we all get back to work.
A few hours later, Oker tells the assistants to take a break. “Not you,” he says to me. “I need to make something and you can stay and help me with it. ”
Noah and Tess send me sympathetic looks.
Oker sets a bunch of neatly labeled boxes and jars in front of me and hands me a list. “Put this compound together,” he says, and I start measuring. He goes back over to the cabinet to rummage through more ingredients. I hear them clinking together.
