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“Luke,” I plead. “Please go help Sam. He’s been beaten pretty badly, and—”
Luke’s running off toward the cliff before I finish.
“I think Alex might kill him,” Mary muses, and she looks down at Morgan, running a finger across her cheek. She’s thinking about the Eminent, and I can’t blame her. I’ve gotten my revenge, and she deserves hers.
Mary crouches down in our circle, people walking around us and talking amongst themselves. Some of them run out into the forest, afraid they’ll be dragged back down, but I don’t think there’s much left. The crater not too far from us leads directly to the building. This ground isn’t stable, and neither is the underground.
“What are they going to do with him?” I ask.
“I don’t know,” she answers.
The crowd’s shouts grow louder and we both jerk our heads in their direction.
“Chop off all his limbs first,” a woman screams.
“His cock,” a man yells. “Cut it off and let him bleed out.”
“We need to go,” I say, reluctantly rising from the boys. I reach out for Morgan, and Mary hands her over. Morgan looks perfect, completely unphased from whatever just happened. Her eyes are heavy with sleep, and she’s warm and dry.
For the first time in months, I feel the peace wash over me. We’re bloodied and dirty, standing around thousands of homeless strangers, but we’re free.
The storms are over.
Dean is dead.
We made it.
“Get Alex,” I tell Mary. “We need to get further inland.”
She wraps her hands around her middle and bites her lip, looking out at where the adherents stand. “Don’t leave without us,” she says.
I shake my head. “We won’t.”
“Give me the baby,” Lori says, reaching her arms for her. “Go with Mary.”
I nod and reluctantly hand her over, but I owe Alex so much, and I can’t let his wife go into that mess alone to retrieve her husband.
Mary’s ten steps ahead of me when I’m calling after her, begging her to slow down. The screams of the citizens of the underground are chaotic, the scene full of anger and fear.
Adherents rip off their robes, and some I recognize from the uprising, but others might be doing it for survival, pretending to be a part of this new normal. It’s shoulder to shoulder the further into the crowd we go, and I reach Mary, grabbing her by the shoulder so I don’t lose her.
“Alex!” she screams. “We have to go. Alex!” She can’t find him, and I can barely turn my head as I’m moved side to side with the sway of the angry mob.
“We should go back,” I yell as loud as I can. If she hears me, she doesn’t listen, pushing further until I see him.
Alex is in a circle of men that surround the Eminent, all of their faces contorted in rage. Someone has taken a belt or strap of leather, maybe even the whip Adam used himself, and beats his back over and over.
He’s been stripped of his robes, his skin a mix of tattoos and blood. Alex isn’t inflicting the pain, but he watches while the others take their turns. The Eminent keeps trying to lift to his knees but another crack rips his skin and he falls face down on the earth.
We rush to Alex’s side. “We have to go,” Mary urges him, pulling at his sleeve. He’s in a trance, staring down at the death of the man that caused him so much pain. “It’s not safe here. It could collapse. Alex! Do you hear me?”
I go to his other side and try to pull him backward, but his large body won’t move, his boots firm on the earth. Mary’s head shoots back and forth from him to the Eminent, and we both know that Alex won’t leave until he sees the Eminent take his last breath.
Mary lets Alex go and steps into the open ring surrounding the Eminent. She takes the makeshift whip from the latest accuser, wrapping the edge around each of her wrists.
“M-Mary,” Adam says, rising to his knees. “You’ve come-”
His words are cut off by the strap of leather around his throat. He claws at it, fighting for breath, but she’s stronger. She always has been, and I imagine she had a hundred opportunities where she could have taken his life. That would have put Alex in danger, and like me, she loves her family and would do anything for them.
