The Marked (19 page)

“Back to Mr. Fritz’s trail,” I said.

Xavier and I started running again. I held my arm against my chest because the pain from its bouncing was starting to make me sick. Xavier moved confidently along the trail. When I heard a noise or thought I saw something, I’d elbow him, and we’d take refuge in a cluster of trees or behind a stump. My experience with the paintball that hit me had raised the stakes a few notches, and my nerves were on edge. I kept turning around, expecting Alisha or Cam to appear.

We followed the trail for another fifteen minutes without further incident, running up and down a few wrong paths before finding a spot under a big fern where the earth had recently been disturbed. I kept watch while Xavier dug around in the dirt. He exclaimed happily when he found the small cylinder of glass.

He held it up in front of me, but I pushed it away. “Just stow it and let’s get out of here,” I said.

“Where should we go? To the cabin?”

I hesitated. “Not yet. I don’t want to get ambushed when we’re only a few feet from the end. I think we should go to the base we found earlier and check for Anna.” I pulled out my compass doubtfully. “I guess we go…west?”

“I can backtrack us,” Xavier said. “We aren’t that far. I just wish I wasn’t so damned tired already. When we’re done with this, I’m not running again for a month.”

He sounded so sincere I couldn’t help laughing. I sobered abruptly as a wave of pain hit. “Lead on, tough guy,” I said. “Let’s get this over with.”

We started toward the base; I was slow and clumsy, thanks to my hurt shoulder and the growing nausea, and Xavier started gasping for air almost immediately. I guess it shouldn’t have been a surprise when we saw Alisha hurtling through the woods, weaving back and forth between the trees. My gun hung against my back, but I didn’t bother pulling it out. My whole arm was tingling, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to grip anything very well.

We were in a small clearing surrounded by a few spreading vine maples. The small, thin trees provided no cover. The only thing we could hide behind was an overturned log. With a quick nod, we jumped over it and crouched. Mud smeared across my knees and caked my palms.

“Keep watch for Cam,” I said. “If he comes I’ll try to hold them off while you run for the cabin.”

I could feel Xavier’s rapid breath hot and fast on my neck as we waited. He popped up and took aim at Alisha, but she was impossible to track. She kept moving from tree to tree, taking aim when she could and sending paintballs slamming into the ground in front of us. I wished I could have just thrown her somewhere, but I was fuzzy and tired because of the pain, and she moved too fast for me to get a grip on the black ribbons that trailed from every side of her.

Finally, she got close enough for me to get her in focus. I took her up in the air, but she squeezed off a rapid volley of paintballs, and when I instinctively ducked down and closed my eyes, she dropped to the ground. When I realized she’d fallen, I pushed her back up, but I was scared of hurting her, especially with my control wavering. There was no nearby tree to stick her in, so I let her tumble down, still gripping her gun. She rolled in a somersault onto her shoulder, and that’s when we caught a break, because the contact with the ground knocked her mask sideways, and she had to pause to adjust it.

Xavier grabbed the opportunity, and one of his paint-balls caught her in the arm. She darted into the woods, using her good arm to fix her goggles as she ran. At the edge of the clearing, she turned and fired, but she must have been unsteady due to the pain from getting hit; her shot went wild, and she only ended up exposing herself even more fully than before.

Xavier didn’t hesitate, this time catching her in the thigh and stomach. She shrieked and fell to the ground. We waited for her to get up, carefully looking around for Cam to emerge from the woods.

Muffled sobs came from Alisha as she writhed on the ground.

“Must be a trick,” Xavier muttered. “Leave her there.”

I nodded uneasily. “Let’s head for the cabin. I don’t like this game anymore.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah. Alisha and Molly are both out. We’ve just got to watch for Cam.”

The thought that we were finally in the homestretch provided us with a final burst of energy. I could see the green roof, then the clearing and the van parked beside it. We ran side by side, and I was almost ready to declare victory when I heard the pop of a gun.

Cam had found us.

The ball made a little buzzing sound as it passed through the air, and I had just enough time to throw myself in front of Xavier. Unfortunately, that meant taking the shot right in the face. My goggles cracked down the middle, sending hard plastic into my nose. A fresh wave of pain started in my forehead and rippled through the rest of my head.

Another shot came from behind me, this one aimed at Cam.

I dropped to the ground, too tired and hurt to care that I was now a sitting duck. I pried the goggles off my face, noticing dimly that they were dripping with a mixture of blood and sweat, and fought a wave of dizziness as the firefight continued over my head.

“Run, Xavier!” I heard Anna yell. She was behind us somewhere, peppering the area with shots to hold off any enemies.

Xavier didn’t need any encouragement. He ran with all he had, and I held my breath as he approached the little red flags that indicated safety. Anna and Cam continued their cross fire. Cam stepped into view when Xavier was a few feet from the line. Anna came out as well, and she and Cam each landed a shot on the other. Cam hit her in the chest, and she got him in the arm, then again on the shin.

I was staring at him, of course, so I saw him react to the pain. He whipped around to his left as the ball hit him on the arm, and then to the right as it caught him in the leg. He grunted, then hopped awkwardly on his right leg as he continued to load and shoot.

Mr. Fritz and Mr. Judan were both there, smiling when Xavier ran across the line, but their smiles faded when it became apparent that something about their game had gone horribly wrong. I heard Xavier telling them about Alisha, who might still have been writhing around on the ground for all we knew. Cam hopped awkwardly toward Anna, who was lying on the ground. I let my head come to rest in the dirt, wondering why the world looked so fuzzy, and whether we got extra credit for winning the game.

THE EXTENT
of our injuries became evident as we loaded into the van. Cam couldn’t put any weight on his left leg, which had a huge lump on the shin. Anna had taken a hit right in the chest. Luckily, she’d had her vest on, which absorbed some of the blow. She wouldn’t have much more than a big bruise. Alisha wasn’t so lucky. She had taken a shot to the stomach just below the edge of her vest. Everyone was worried she’d suffered some internal injuries, because she was found exactly where we’d left her, still and white, clutching her stomach.

Xavier was completely unhurt, so he helped the teachers track down Molly, who had remained stuck in the tree. She had a broken hand and hadn’t been able to get more than a little way down it.

Other than Alisha, I was probably the worst off. My head was still spinning (Mr. Fritz thought I might have a concussion), my forehead kept dripping blood, and I couldn’t move my arm because of the pain in my shoulder. A bump had emerged along my collarbone, and I felt a grinding sensation when I tried to lift my arm. There was wide speculation by the teachers and students that the impact of the ball had broken the bone.

Anna apparently thought her role as team captain meant she had some responsibility for me, because she stuck by my side, helping me off the ground so they could look at my shoulder, and running to get me water and a cool bandanna when I thought I might pass out. She called Xavier over before we left and told us how proud she was of the job we had done. She said our strategy had worked perfectly—she and Cam had spent most of the time running around shooting at each other, which had freed me and Xavier up to find the vial and take care of Molly and Alisha. We couldn’t help feeling a little happy that our plan had been so successful even though the game had gotten so brutal.

The balls, of course, weren’t ordinary paintballs. Instead of being plastic shells filled with liquid paint, they felt as solid as rocks. You could scrape off the outer layer and use it like a big, round crayon. No one was under any illusion that this was simply a manufacturing flaw.

Xavier mentioned that he’d found tracks in the woods—seemingly left by three or four people he didn’t recognize, headed toward the cabin. It didn’t take long for someone to mention the Irin. And it was only a few more seconds before someone said, “
Jack
.” He could turn liquids to solids, after all. It wasn’t much of a stretch to connect him with what had happened. Cam didn’t see any talent marks, but that hardly mattered. They could have changed them anywhere and replaced our paintballs with their modified ones, though it seemed most likely he had done it at the cabin, after they were loaded into the guns, so that we wouldn’t notice the difference in weight.

I couldn’t believe Jack would have done anything that he knew might hurt me. Then again, I wasn’t supposed to be there. Barrett had said in the past that these exercises were just for juniors. How could Jack have known they would bring me along?

My head hurt too much to analyze things further. I crawled into the van, holding my arm tight across my chest so it wouldn’t bounce. A mixture of dirt, sweat, and blood left my skin feeling hot and tight. Cam helped me into a seat between him and Anna and then buckled the belt across me. Fury radiated from him in hot waves. I suppose part of his anger was at himself, as it always was when it came to Jack. But most of it was for the Irin. If I hadn’t been wearing goggles, Cam might have killed me. As it was, he’d probably given me a serious concussion. I could practically hear the thoughts running through his head. This wasn’t a prank, but something far more serious.

We pulled away from the cabin, leaving the gear and the guns in a jumble on the front porch. “Don’t worry about those things,” Mr. Judan said. “We need to get you all back to school.”

I kept falling asleep in the van, my head dropping sideways for just a second before I’d feel Cam squeezing my hand. “Stay with me, Dancia,” he’d whisper in my ear. “Stay with me.” They said that if I had a concussion I shouldn’t go to sleep, and Cam was taking no chances.

Normally, I would have loved the attention, but everything hurt too much to appreciate it. I didn’t even have it in me to resent Anna. Not when she’d brought me water and held my hand after I got in the van, and looked at me with honest concern. Sometimes, like at this moment, Anna looked almost angelic, even with a smear of dirt on her forehead and a trail of sweat across her temple.

We were about halfway back to school when I saw a black car hurtle around a corner a mile or so away. It was moving fast, and it looked as if it were in our lane.

“What are you doing? Get back in your own lane,” Mr. Fritz said, shaking his head.

At first I assumed the driver had been passing, or was distracted for a moment. I waited, expecting to see them swerve back or to see a tractor that they were passing. But there was nothing.

“Are they…?” Cam’s question faded away. There was no need to respond.

He nudged me. “Dancia,” he whispered. “Dancia, do something.”

I was tired and probably still in shock, so it took me a moment to understand that he wanted me—out of all the people in the car—to save us. Me.

I focused with an effort on the car. Ever since I’d been hit, my vision had been distorted by wavy lines and shadows hovering around the edges, and it only got worse when I squinted to see more clearly. I tried to summon my power, but nothing happened. My body stayed limp. No energy crackled through me the way I had come to expect.

“Jesus,” Anna breathed. “Look at the front seat.”

I forced my eyes to focus, still trying to draw on the energy around me. The blackness around the edges of my vision only grew larger. “I can’t do it,” I croaked. “I’m sorry, I—”

“It’s him,” Cam said.

“Him?” I struggled back to an upright position. The car was headed right for us; I caught sight of black hair and dark sunglasses in the passenger seat. But my eyes couldn’t quite focus, and the faces were blurry.

“Jack,” Anna said impatiently. “Can’t you see him? He’s right there, in the front seat.”

“Dancia, focus,” Mr. Judan said, his voice deep and compelling. “Move that car.”

I desperately wanted to do what he said. Every fiber of my being concentrated on moving that car away from us. Up or down, left or right, nothing mattered but that it moved out of the way.

“Move the car,” Mr. Judan said again.

Fresh pain stabbed my head, and I cried out. I could see him now, in his red bandanna. He seemed to be looking right at me, though surely that was just a coincidence. How could he look at me so calmly while the driver of his car was trying to run us off the road?

Mr. Fritz swore. “Hold on, everyone!”

They could only have been five or ten feet away when Mr. Fritz jerked the wheel to the right. We swerved, continuing forward at an angle for a few feet before the van tipped sideways into a drainage ditch. I flinched and instinctively threw my good arm over my head. We rolled upside down, seat belts locking to hold us tightly in place, water bottles and backpacks flying. Then, slowly, in a moment of eerie silence, we came to rest.