The Battle Within Read online

  I can only stare.

  Dusty slides the I.L.D. into a holster at his side and considers me with his gray eyes for several long moments before saying, “I know you have questions. Yet, I can’t answer them—at least, not now, not while we’re still trying to figure out whether or not you’re going to run.”

  “Where do you think we’d go?” I ask, then laugh. “We have no idea how we’d get out of these tunnels, let alone if we’d be able to make it back to the Spire safely.”

  “The Spire’s gone, Mrs. Cross.”

  I pale. “What?”

  “The Spire was taken down in the bombing that occurred last night. It finally fell this morning.”

  A shiver passes along my spine, crossing the surface of my shoulder blades until it enters the nexus of my brain. “But… all the people—” I start.

  “Were either evacuated or dead. Most are dead.”

  “But—the other Beauties,” Wu starts. “How could the SADs have… how could they—”

  “We intercepted a communication from the North before it could reach the city.”

  “But how did we survive?” Ceyonne asks. “How did we…” She turns her eyes on me, and for a moment, she simply stares. Then she says, “You knew.”

  “No,” I say, shaking my head. “I didn’t.”

  “Then how—”

  “Mrs. Cross saved herself—and, by proxy, the two of you—by agreeing to stand with the Southern Saints on regional television. By answering our statement, and in confirming it through our mole who delivered her breakfast two nights ago, she guaranteed her safety.”

  “What about the SADs?” I ask. “How were they able to reach me so quickly?”

  “Amelia Beckinsdale gave her life to ensure that she would be on that top floor that night. Be thankful that she forewent protocol to allow you passage through the stairwell.”

  “So the maid… was a mole,” I offer. “And the SAD who burst through the door… was one of the Saints.”

  “Exactly.”

  “And Eugene knew to let us in because he recognized my face.”

  “Correct.”

  “You let all those people die!” I cry. “All those girls!” I scream. “How could you?”

  “We are fighting a war from the inside out, Mrs. Cross.”

  “So what?” I ask. “You want the North to win? You want all the women to be slaves?”

  “No. We don’t.”

  “Then what do you—”

  “I think we’ve said enough,” Dusty says, and turns away from my trembling form.

  I ball my hand into so tight a fist my knuckles pop.

  He tilts his head to regard me. “Be thankful,” he says. “We could’ve let you die.”

  “But you see me as an asset,” I reply.

  “Yes. We do.”

  Dusty turns and begins to walk away.

  “Wait!” I cry, snaring my fingers through the gate. “What do you mean to do with us? Keep us locked up here?”

  “Your survival was unexpected,” Dusty replies without bothering to turn to acknowledge me. “Your mere existence means that you knew something was going to happen, and that you didn’t tell.”

  “But I… you… we—”

  Dusty McGee walks away without looking back.

  I could roar. I could rage.

  I could scream.

  Not only was I tricked, but I have now been forcefully taken hostage—perhaps not physically, but morally.

  As I stand here, trembling with rage, I try to keep my emotions in check, but find myself fuming.

  I’m alive merely because of my ignorance, and my brave and foolish heart.

  If I were to leave here, and now, with Wu and Ceyonne…

  We’d be branded traitors and executed.

  As I stand before Ashton and Patrice and Wu and Ceyonne, I can only think of one thing:

  Revenge.

  Three

  They bring us food and leave us alone in the hours after we’ve awakened. Filled with malice and hate, and not exactly hungry, I force myself to chew the bread and drink the soup they’ve offered, but find myself wondering if it’s laced with something—anything—that can put me even further under their control.

  You have to remain calm, I think. You have to figure this out.

  Truth be told: there is no way for me to just figure this out. Given my place in the government’s upper echelon, and the fact that I am looking out for not only my own interest, but Ceyonne and Wu’s, I have no hope of blindly asking them to release me. You’ll talk, they’d say. You’ll get us killed, they’d say.

  Or worse, I think: I’d get them killed.

  Killed.

  Like rabid dogs in the street: shot down with little to no mercy.

  The feeling of helplessness is all-consuming. With the knowledge that I have lured us into a trap cruelly implanted within my mind, I try my hardest to focus on the matters at hand, and not on what happened the previous night, but find myself doing just that regardless.

  All those people—

  All those girls—

  Dead.

  Because of me.

  What could I have done to change it all? Could I have gone to the Commandant? The Countess? Reported the suspicious happenings to a SAD? Just what could I have done to prevent all those needless deaths?

  Nothing, I realize. I could have done nothing to change it.

  Even if I had told someone, and even if they’d sensed that something was amiss, what would they have done? They wouldn’t have known that there was a terrorist attack incoming—that someone would do something to bring down the Spire. They probably wouldn’t have even been able to prevent it, such was the way of the world and all its worth.

  Because of me, innocent people, innocent girls, are dead. And I’ll have to live with that for the rest of my life.

  I struggle not to tremble in the aftermath of such horrible thoughts.

  At my side, Ceyonne and Wu remain quiet. They eat slowly and carefully, as if unsure whether or not the food is actually safe to eat. The fact that they haven’t talked to me since the revelation is proof enough that they’d unsure whether or not I’m to be trusted.

  But can I blame them?

  No, I realize. I can’t.

  Would I even trust me if I knew what I’d done?

  With a shake of my head, I drink the soup, finish eating the bread, and push the bowl the food came in to the edge of the metal gate before turning to my friends and saying, “We have to talk.”

  Ceyonne flicks her eyes toward me. Wu merely glances up before lowering her gaze back to her food.

  “Guys,” I say. “Please.”

  “What’s there to talk about?” Ceyonne asks. “It’s not like talking’s going to change anything.”

  “It might not,” I reply, “but at least it’ll assure me that you don’t think I had anything to do with this.”

  “We don’t,” Wu says.

  I stare blankly at the girl. “You… don’t?” I ask.

  Wu shakes her head, tossing her long, straight black hair down her shoulders. “No. I mean… how could you have known? And even if you did, what could you have done?”

  “That’s what I keep telling myself, but the more I think about it—the more I really think about it—the more I believe that I could’ve done something to prevent all this.”

  “What, though?” Ceyonne asks.

  I explain the circumstances surrounding the Southern Saints’ interactions with me: first by reiterating the message that was sent during the press conference, then by telling them about the fortune cookie, then the Maid.

  By the time I finish, both girls are looking at me blankly.

  “What?” I ask.

  “It’s just as we said,” Ceyonne begins. “You couldn’t have changed anything.”

  “But I could have.”

  “How?” my friend responds.

  “I… I don’t… I mean, I—”

  “You couldn’t have done anything,
Kel. Stop trying to give yourself a complex. You didn’t do anything. I mean, hell—” Ceyonne laughs. “They didn’t even do anything.” She jerks her head toward the metal gate separating us from the rest of the tunnel.

  The trembling sigh that escapes my throat is enough to make me feel small.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” Wu says, rather flatly at that. “You couldn’t have done anything different.”

  “At least we’re alive.”

  “For now,” I offer.

  Wu lifts her black eyes once more. “You… really don’t think they’d… well… kill us… right?”

  “I don’t know, but honestly, it’s the easiest way to guarantee our silence.”

  “If the Countess found out—” the girl begins.

  “They probably think we’ve been captured by the North already. If they even know we’re alive, anyway.”

  Neither girl responds.

  Sighing, I lean back against the wall, cross my arms over my chest, and wait for clarity on the matter to strike me.

  Unfortunately, my thoughts are like embers burning in a slowly-dying fire: alive, yet just barely clinging to existence.

  There is no solace within them.

  With that in mind, I close my eyes and begin to do the only thing I can.

  Wait.

  I hear their voices before anyone actually addresses us.

  “How are we supposed to tell them?” one asks.

  “Tell them… what?” another asks.

  “What’s going to happen?”

  The words are callous in nature, haunting in respect, and jar me from the comfort of the sheets surrounding me. Convinced, now, more than ever, that we are in danger, I open my eyes to find that the figures are standing at the very edge of the radius of light, and experience terror unlike any I have ever felt before.

  “Ceyonne,” I whisper. “Wu.”

  Both girls stir beside me.

  “Be quiet,” I caution, “and don’t move until I tell you to.”

  Neither girl responds. Rather, they cease to move—and seem, even, to stop breathing. The urgency in my tone is obvious enough, but knowing that something is potentially being kept secret?

  I continue to listen for fear of our safety.

  “Maybe we should just get this over with,” one of the men say.

  “We shouldn’t say anything until Dusty gets here,” the other man replies. “You know how he gets when he’s kept out of the loop.”

  “But what if he doesn’t let them down carefully? They at least deserve to know.”

  Know what? I wonder.

  The unknown, terrifying as it happens to be, causes shivers to run down my spine, what little fine hairs on my neck to stand proud and rigid. It is as though I have been encased in ice in this moment—and am waiting, it seems, for the frost to thaw over.

  At my side, Ceyonne stirs, and draws forward on her hands and knees. “What are they talking about?” she asks.

  “I don’t know,” I reply. “But you should get up. Both of you. And hide.”

  “What’re you—” Ceyonne starts.

  I don’t know whether it’s the way I don’t respond, or the sound of the footsteps as they begin to approach, that silence her. However, in the short moments thereafter, it takes little for the girls to rise and retreat into the shadows behind the bar: a place that, though not completely shrouded from view, allows them the chance to duck under cover and remain hidden for the time being.

  Knowing that their absence will likely cause suspicion, I rise and make my way to the gate, all the while dreading what is to come.

  The first man that approaches has darker skin, the second flesh as pale as mine. The darker-skinned man frowns as he and his tall, paler companion approach, and says, “I didn’t know you’d be up.”

  “I heard… voices, I offer, “and thought that something might be wrong.”

  The frown that paints the man’s lips is enough to make me uneasy. “We’re not supposed to talk about it,” he says. “At least, not now, not until Dusty comes.”

  His hand falls to his side, directly above where a gun rests in a holster at his hip.

  I swallow the lump that has risen in my throat.

  “What’s going to happen to us?” I manage to ask in the moments that follow.

  “What do you mean?” the pale-skinned man asks.

  “Do you mean to… hurt us? Or…” I swallow once more. “Kill us?”

  “Why would we kill you?” the man asks.

  My eyes fall to his hip once more.

  The man stops drumming his fingers on his pistol and says. “Oh. That. Sorry. Nervous habit.”

  Nervous habit or not, I can’t keep the caution from my eyes, my ears, my heart. There is obviously something going on here—something that even I, with seemingly all my foresight, am unaware of—and for that reason can’t help but remain uneasy.

  I decide, however, that keeping these men in the dark about Ceyonne and Wu’s absence is the most important thing, and for that reason continue by saying, “When it Dusty coming?”

  “He should be here soon,” the darker-skinned man says. “For now, though…” He turns his attention to the gate. “Dennis.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Open the gate.”

  A fire born from the fear of the inevitable courses through my veins, causing my heart to pound and my mind to race. I am at first dumbfounded that these men—casual as they happen to be—would even bother to try and mess with any of us, especially because we are Beautiful Ones. But as the man named Dennis draws a set of keys from his belt, and as he steps forward, a single thought enters my mind.

  Some men do worse things than kill you, my mother once said.

  The lump in my throat intensifies, the sour feeling in my gut grows worse. I feel, in this moment, an unimaginable sense of fear, and turn my head to the taller man before saying, “Leave the gate shut.”

  The man named Dennis pauses before turning to look at me. “What?”

  “I said: leave the gate shut.”

  “We’re not going to kill you, if that’s what you’re concerned about.”

  “That’s not what I’m concerned about,” I reply. “Just leave the gate shut.”

  The darker-skinned man frowns and peers behind me. “Hey,” he says. “Where are the other two?”

  A sound of glass breaking enters my ears.

  A short moment later, footsteps sound behind me, and Ceyonne approaches, brandishing a broken glass bottle. “Do what she says,” she states, “and leave the gate shut.”

  “You honestly think we’re going to hurt you? After everything we’ve gone through to get you here?”

  “We’re not worried about you killing us.”

  “I—” the man starts, then stops before he can continue. Realization dawns in his eyes after a moment. Then he turns his head toward the man named Dennis and says, “Do what they say.”

  “But Dusty said—”

  “Dusty didn’t anticipate them breaking one of the bottles and using it as a weapon,” the dark-skinned man says. “Do what they say.”

  “All right, Aaron. Whatever.”

  The man named Aaron turns his head to look back at me just in time for a pair of footsteps to begin echoing down the long, dark corridor. “That sounds like them,” he says.

  “Who?” I ask.

  “Us,” Patrice says. She, and the tall man named Dusty McGee, step forward. Their eyes instantly fall to Ceyonne. “What’s going on?” she asks.

  “Your men were trying to open this gate,” Ceyonne says as Wu steps forward, brandishing a heavy, unbroken bottle of her own.

  “We’ve had… not so good experiences,” Wu adds.

  Patrice glances at Aaron and Dennis before turning her head back to us. She then says, “I… see.”

  Dusty McGee frowns as he considers the three of us and says, “We locked you in here for your peace of mind.”

  “And you told two strange men we don’t even know to open the ga
te?” I ask. “How does that even make sense?”

  “I suppose it doesn’t.” Dusty turns his eyes on Aaron and Dennis. “The two of you are free to leave.”

  “You’re gonna tell them,” Aaron says, “right?”

  “Tell us what?” I ask, allowing my eyes to drift from Aaron, to Patrice, then finally, to Dusty. “What’s going on? Why are you—”

  The way Dusty McGee sighs immediately cuts me off.

  A short moment later, he lifts his eyes and says, “The Countess is going to fire a weapon of mass destruction against the North.”

  And all I can say is, “What?”

  Four

  Ceyonne and Wu stare in stunned silence.

  I, on the other hand, am dumbfounded.

  A weapon of mass destruction? Against the North? But that would mean—

  Bombs. Mayhem. Destruction.

  The first word that can come out of my mouth is, “Why?”

  “The Countess sees the attack on the Spire, and the resulting deaths of nearly one-hundred Beautiful Ones, as the ultimate act of war. They not only caused irreparable damage to the city, but the future of the South as well.”

  “So she’s gonna retaliate by sending a bomb,” I reply.

  “Not just a bomb, Kelendra. A nuclear bomb—one that is capable of killing thousands, if not millions of people.”

  “She’d do that,” I start, “just because they attacked the Spire—because they killed her Beautiful Ones.”

  “She is mad with rage, fueled by bloodlust, and consumed by the need for revenge. If she gets what she wants, she will start a full-blown nuclear war. Do you know what will happen if that occurs?”

  “I… I don’t—”

  “The bombs will make hundreds of miles of territory completely inhospitable—not just for days, or weeks, or even months, but years to come—and if enough fall, it will kick enough dust into the air to block out the sun, causing what is known as a nuclear winter. It won’t just affect our land, but our world.”

  “But—”

  “Famine will occur. Millions, maybe even billions, of people will starve to death. And worst of all: life as we know it on the planet may end.”

  “This is too much,” Ceyonne says. “How do we know you’re telling the truth? How do we know you’re not lying to us?”