Frequency (The Frenzy Series Book 3) (13 page)

In the woods hunting with Tage. I feel much better. The willow bark really does help. I can stomach small amounts of blood.

She was with Tage. I didn’t like it, but it was better than her being with Roman. Of course, he was still locked upstairs in the experimentation building.

Who’s in the rotation?

She took a long time answering.
No one.

No one?
What do you mean, no one is in the rotation? No human is hunting?

No. The Elders said they’re desperate, but the treaty is as good as dissolved. Tage and I are getting as much meat for the colonists as we can. They’re starving. My brother looks terrible. My father looks worse. Have you seen Mother? Do you know if Roman is in the city? We haven’t seen him in a couple of days, which is weird.

I didn’t know what to tell her about Roman, so I kept silent. What to tell her about her mom?
The treaty shouldn’t be nullified. It puts the humans in danger. And I’ve seen your mom. She’s as well as she was when she left Blackwater.

When she was banished, you mean,
Porschia corrected.

Yeah.

And Roman? Have you seen or heard from him?

I hated to do it, but I lied.
No
.

Could you look around for him? Just in case he’s there with Pierce? You probably already know by now, but they’re brothers.

I do know. I’ll keep my eyes peeled.
I knew I would see Roman in the morning. Pierce wanted me to help him draw blood from him.

She was silent.
Are you there?
I asked.

I am. I’m afraid to move. My feet feel like they’re cemented to the ground.

Why, Porschia?

If I move, I might lose you. I’m afraid I won’t be able to find the frequency again. I think I found you because the forest is so quiet at night.

I smiled. I didn’t want to let her go either, but my head was pounding just trying to keep up the blocks while letting my words filter only toward her.
Find me there. Go back to the woods, to the quiet, if you need to talk. Just keep me in mind.

I will.

How is Mercedes? I assume she’s with you since you’re with Tage.

Porschia answered, but it wasn’t what I expected
. I attacked her. She’s not doing well.

Did she hurt you?
That was what Pierce wanted. He sent her as a weapon, one he assumed he could wield against her.

No. The poison made me hallucinate and I thought she was going to hurt Ford, so I...

It’s okay. She’ll be fine.

Nothing will ever be fine or normal again, Saul.

I love you. That won’t change.
I wished I was with her to hold her close and kiss away her tears. I knew she was breaking down. She was crumbling. Her entire world was imploding. First her sister and then Meg. Her mother’s insanity. Being turned. My fall to the Infected. Her brother and dad starving. She was losing it, and I was afraid that if she did, I would lose her forever.

We need to go. It’s almost dawn. The Elders will be waiting for the meat. Everything is changing.

Not everything.
It’s still the same in some ways, too.

Goodnight, Saul. I hope you’re feeling okay.

Better than I expected to.

Good,
she said.

Goodnight, Porschia.

Silence.

A heavy shroud lay over me. I tried to move my arms but couldn’t. My toes. I couldn’t wiggle them or my fingers. My breathing was steady. I could feel my ribs expand with each breath. I was warm, so warm. It was like I was inside a cocoon. My eyelids were heavy and my tongue felt too big for my mouth and far too dry.

With every ounce of strength I could muster, I raised my head. It was only for a second, but I did it. The back of my skull thumped against something soft as it crashed back down. Gravity was a bastard. So was cottonmouth.

Finally, I managed to move my right forefinger and thumb. Then the big toe on my left foot. Slowly, I managed to move them all. Every digit awakened. I opened one eyelid and then the other, rolling my head to the side. A small shaft of sunlight spilled into the room, dust motes swimming through the warm rays like a happy school of fish.

The bars that caged me reminded me where I was. Roman’s basement. But the snores from across the room weren’t foreign. It wasn’t Roman who guarded me. It was my baby brother.

Ford looked too long for the chair he had somehow gotten comfortable in – too long by a mile. He was tall and lanky and far too skinny. This spring and summer would help matters, but not soon enough. I wanted to tell him how sorry I was. I shouldn’t have volunteered for the rotation. If I’d stayed at home, put my pride away and offered to do chores or simply ask neighbors for help, none of this would have happened. I wouldn’t have fallen. Mother wouldn’t be in the city with Pierce, and Porschia wouldn’t be half Infected and half night-walker. She wouldn’t have shot or bit me. She would still love me.

I tried to raise up but couldn’t find the strength. I tried to cry but my tears were dried up. Like so much of me, there was nothing good left.

Someone was rustling around upstairs. Porschia maybe? My muscles felt tight and I was hot and uncomfortable. Frustration poured from my throat in an agitated groan; a groan that sounded more human than I had in months. I opened my mouth and tilted my head toward Ford, who was startled awake at the sound. He rushed to the cell, fumbling with the key in the lock. Dropping them on the ground, he tried again. “Was that you?”

I nodded.

“That sound came from you?”

I nodded again, my mouth wide in disbelief.

He threw the door open and rushed to help me sit up. “Make it again!”

“F---”

“Holy shit! Father, get down here! Fast!”

“F-f-f--” I tried. Oh my God. I was actually forming sounds.

Father ran down the steps, his hands sliding down the drywall. “What is it? Is she okay?” His eyes widened when he found me sitting up, Ford supporting my back.

“Fo-r--d” I said, a huge smile splitting my face.

I motioned like I was drinking something. “Father, sit with her. I’ll get her some water from the well.”

Father sat next to me, helping me sit up. His mouth was so wide, flies could go in and out at their leisure. “How is this possible?” he asked himself in a whisper. “I thought Porschia’s bite had killed you.”

Ford rushed back in the house and down the steps. There was more water soaking his wool pants than in the cup, but it was perfect. Cold and fresh. I gulped greedily. “S-sa--ved m-me.”

“What saved you?” Ford asked, out of breath.

“Porschia,” Dad replied in awe. He pulled my head to his chest and cried. “The bite of a night-walker can heal the Infected. My God.”

Tage carried the bear across the tree trunk, then the two deer, one on each shoulder. I kept the squirrels hidden beneath my jacket. Just as Tage suspected, Elders Beckett and Yankee were waiting on the opposite bank, flanked by six strong young men. Jonah, Meg’s fiancé, and Noah, whom Mercedes loved, were among them. The others were their friends, but I didn’t know them by name. I’d never spoken to them. Mercedes would know. She would know them by name, family, and home. She would know their siblings and gossip about them. She would know what to say. I said nothing.

They watched me and I watched back, all of us afraid to cross the invisible, incredibly fragile line that lay between us. “Is this all you could get?” Yankee asked.

Tage put his hands on his hips and smiled, a telltale sign that he was about to punch the old man in the face. “Seriously? We did this without your help and you still complain?”

“With two night-walkers in the forest, you would have thought we’d have a feast,” Yankee continued.

“You no longer have famine. You should be thankful,” I retorted, rushing across the tree trunk to stand beside Tage.

Beckett’s eyes narrowed. “I see you’re doing well, Miss Grant.”

“I am, thank you.” His rheumy eyes raked down my modern clothes and I watched as his lip curled in distaste. It was probably the exact mirror image of my own. I didn’t like what I saw when I looked at him, either.

“I trust that we can count on the pair of you to provide us with meat for the next month, until the early spring plants can produce,” Yankee butted in.

Tage snorted. “What about your precious treaty?”

“The treaty was broken by your kind. We will not honor it.”

“Then we will not feed you,” I told him. Tage grabbed my hand and squeezed like a proud papa.

Yankee smiled. “Then we will not return Roman to you.”

Tage’s eyes narrowed. “Good. Keep him,” he smarted.

The flab of flesh beneath Beckett’s chin began to quiver. “Well, I never.”

“No!” I shouted. “You never! You order people around like slaves, but you NEVER hunt. You never help garden. You never
provide
.”

Yankee’s face turned bright red as he pointed his finger at me. “We provide everything! Food, shelter, sanctuary. And we even provide it to
your
kind.”

“I was ‘your kind’ just months ago! I turned because I had no other choice. You would have done the same thing. Given the choice between becoming Infected or becoming a night-walker, you would have used the ring!”