I am with the Order of Prometheus, and they are going to kill me.
2
Our lengthy copter ride is silent, save for the chopping of propellers. Taylor sits hunched over at my side, a compact pistol tight in her fingers, and she frequently uses the barrel of the gun to casually scratch her neck. Much of her exposed skin is cut and bruised from the scuffle, including her face, which took a lot of wicked punches. If I thought she was the woman from the ball, I’d feel bad. Instead, I think maybe she deserves it for tricking me.
Embarrassed and angry, I huff and press my back into the leather bench, crossing my arms over my chest and pointing my gaze at her. “Where are you taking me?”
“Quiet, Miss Piccolo.”
As if I’m going to take orders from her. I don’t take orders from anyone. “No. Where are you taking me?”
No one responds.
“I demand you tell me where I’m being taken.” Again, I’m met with purposeful silence. “Someone answer me.”
“You are being transported to a classified location,” Taylor says.
“Nothing is classified to me,” I reply with a sneer. “This region is mine.”
“Right.”
Gritting my teeth, I aim my fury at her. “You will let me out of this helicopter. Now.”
“Sure.” She walks with a slight bend to the door and yanks it open, blowing me back with the force of the wind. “After you.”
I try my best not to look out, or down. “You’d be a real idiot to go through so much trouble just to toss me out into the night.”
Far from the glittering lights of home, the darkness shutters the land below like the inside of a coffin. Inwardly, I breathe a sigh of relief when she closes the door and returns to her seat. Papa always said my smart mouth would get me killed one day, and I’d hate to prove him right.
I shoot her a glare. “Maybe you are an idiot. I don’t know you.”
“No, you do not.”
After an eternity, we land in a clearing of grass encircled by an ominous thicket of woods. The man exits first and Taylor gestures with her gun for me to follow him. He extends his hand to me and I allow him to help, mumbling a thank-you. I may be lost, but I haven’t lost my manners. Besides, he’s not the one who forcibly took me from my home. He’s not the reason I’m about to catch pneumonia, nor the reason I have glass in my hair. The girl who grunts ever so ladylike as she jumps out of the helicopter is to blame.
Escape is impossible—this temperature would kill me before sunrise. Also, I’d be a liar if I said I’m not curious about what lies beyond these trees.
The Order of Prometheus arose from nowhere—a ghost ship on the horizon of calm waters, consuming the entire Southeast family like a poison fog. Whispers of their existence have circulated as long as I’ve been alive, but McGovern’s murdermade them tangible. Papa never gave them much credence, despite the growing tensions in the Underclass throughout our region over the last twenty years. He believes rebellion is cyclical and every generation goes through its growing pains before settling into the status quo. He also maintains a strict adherence to the policy of “money is power.” Judging by the fancy helicopter I traveled in, I think he’s right. Money has reached the fringes and the fringes are reaching back with outstretched fingers, ready to choke.
Panic grips me like a fever as my heels sink into the dirt. Unraveling slowly, goose bumps prickle my skin and tears leak out of the corners of my eyes. How could I have been so foolish? Allowing a total stranger to dance with me? Dropping my guard? I let this happen. I am complicit in my victimhood. I begin hating myself even more than I hate the woman who strides beside me, and shoves her coat in my direction.
“Here.”
My face contorts into horror. “I don’t want anything from you. Spitefully, my body convulses in shudders.
“If I wanted you to die, you would already be dead. Take the coat.”
Petulantly, I put her coat on, internally grateful for the warmth. Overhead foliage cannot impede the brilliance of the stars, twinkling as they do in lullabies. The moon reflects its borrowed light like a silver coin and illuminates the forest almost as bright as a city street. An absence of noise is the most startling. At home, the whir of machinery buzzes on every block, in every home. Here, a symphony of nature swells around us: crickets, wind, and the howl of a predatory animal off in the distance.
We reach the woods’ end, giving way to a clearing larger than several city blocks. Cabins of increasing size buttress the forest in a semicircle. It’s more than a village—it’s a town unto itself.
“Whoa.”
Taylor nudges me along toward an imposing log building with peaked roofs, like something out of medieval Scandinavia. Dirt walkways snake through the grass, lined with enclosed torches giving off a flickering yellow glow. The air reeks of fire, not an unpleasant odor, but far from the gasoline and machine smell of home.
An off-the-grid, sprawling rebel hideout right in our backyard. Papa is going to be furious.
The man who provides jackets and shoes follows a few steps behind us. He appears older than me, judging by the strips of silver in his tight cornrows. While I graze nearly six feet tall in my heels, he stands a full head taller with a stocky build. His face is friendly enough but his big, rounded muscles tell me not to fuck around.
