The Watch (The Red Series Book 1) (7 page)

Instructor
Rafe’s
gaze
flickered. It was the slightest of movements, almost imperceptible, but I saw
it.

“Perhaps you didn’t steal the pills,” the voice
said. “Perhaps someone
gave
them to
you. Who was it,
Rafe
? One of the physicians?”

Instructor
Rafe
shook
his head, and I could have sworn the tension around his eyes eased. “No,” he
said, his voice loud and firm. “There was no one. I only bear the blame.”

As he spoke, three black-clothed wardens marched
through the prison door and out to the center of the circle. One was carrying
handcuffs. He gestured to
Rafe
—I think he was
telling him to turn around—but
Rafe
stared past
him blankly and didn’t move. The other two wardens carried handguns.

Guns?

Not stunners, but real guns. I registered this
fact as the Voice again spoke: “Cancer
Rafe
, your
sentence is death.”

The crowd inhaled sharply and then everything
happened very fast.
Rafe
moved. He swung at the
nearest warden and brought him down hard, the man’s head hitting the pavement
with a sickening crack. The fallen warden convulsed once and lay still as
Rafe
turned toward two other wardens rushing in, and I was
rushing forward too, not realizing I was moving until I was almost there, but
just before I reached
Rafe
an arm went around my
throat, choking me, pulling me back.
Rafe’s
fist
flashed out. The pressure on my throat vanished and everyone was shouting and
the warden who had grabbed me was clutching at his own throat, and
Rafe
looked me in the face and yelled something over the
chaos and shoved me away, toward the rows of people on the steps.

Another warden was circling around toward me,
his gun pointed at
Rafe
, trying to get a clear shot,
and now more wardens were running toward us from the prison, and I would have
rushed in again, not because I could help but because I couldn’t stand there
and do nothing, but someone caught me and pulled me against him, burying my
face in his chest, hiding my eyes, covering my head with his arms.

I knew it was Farrell Dean but I didn’t care
that it was him, didn’t care that he was trying to protect me. I fought him but
he held me too close and I couldn’t get free though I struggled and kicked and
bit.

Rafe’s
voice, sounding strangled, called out the same indistinguishable words he’d
shouted before. A shot rang out. Farrell Dean’s arms around me tightened.

Behind me, with a dull thud, a body struck the ground.

“Thus ends the first city meeting,” said the voice, and the
spotlight went dark.

In the chaos and darkness Farrell
Dean yanked me away, pulling me out of the throng of bodies and into the long
silent streets.

“No,” I said, still struggling, trying to dig in my heels,
trying to stay. He was hurting me, or I was hurting myself trying to get free.
“We have to go back, we have to help him.”

“There’s nothing we can do,” Farrell Dean said. “He’s dead.”

But people fell down and got up all the time, that was what
they did, and physicians could fix all sorts of things. Just because
Rafe
had fallen didn’t mean he was dead.

“Don’t say it,” I told Farrell Dean. “Don’t say it again.”

He didn’t say it again but he didn’t let go of me, either.
He kept pulling me away from the city circle, toward my dorm, and as the noise
of the crowd receded so did hope. The Watchers had wanted to kill
Rafe
; they’d make sure the job was properly done.

Rafe
was
dead.

Farrell Dean’s arms went from restraining to supporting, or
else I would have sat down right there on the rough pavement, unable to walk,
unable to think. He got me to the dormitory steps and up them, and at the top
he looked warily around before pushing open the door and guiding me over the
threshold.

“Stay here,” he said. “Don’t come out again, not tonight.
Please.” In the moonlight his face was unnaturally pale.

“I’ll stay,” I said faintly, one hand on the doorframe for
support. My mind was wandering in the darkness—back to the glaring
spotlight, the blood and the shouting.

“I hurt you,” Farrell Dean said, touching my arm where he
had gripped me, where new bruises would join the ones from the scarred warden.
“I’m sorry.” His voice brought me back to the present, to the cold concrete
steps, and I understood that he would stand there with me all night unless I
released him. His eyes were bleak, too much like my own, and I couldn’t remember
any words worth saying, so I reached out, brushed his hand with my fingertips,
and went inside.

I was the first one back. I climbed straight up onto my bed
and was reaching to pull the gray wool blanket over me when I caught
sight of my feet. I had stepped in blood.

I don’t remember the next few minutes, only that
I was staring at a meaningless point on the ceiling when the other sisters
began to arrive. They
moved quietly, talking in hushed voices. I heard one or two
crying.

My bunkmate, Kari, came in. I heard her footsteps on the
narrow aisle beside our bunk, heard her stop, then leave. After a few moments
she came back. She didn’t speak—she never spoke—and I flinched when
the warm wet rag touched my foot. She left to rinse the cloth and came back
again, then did it two or three times more. Finally she dried my feet and
pulled the covers over me, and the bed shifted as she settled into her bunk
below.

Soon afterwards the lights went out, and I lay there in the
darkness, stunned and disbelieving. Gradually, the knot in my chest loosened
and I began to cry, hard but silently, soaking my pillow with hot tears.

Around midnight, exhausted, I drifted into a restless sleep,
full of dark dreams, the only light a harsh light that picked out my red hair
and followed me only among the people milling around, tracking me wherever I
turned.
I wanted to hide the color, but all I had to
dye it with was
Rafe’s
blood. Then
Meritt
was standing in the city meeting circle. I was
terrified, but he was laughing, and
Cynda
watched him
laughing and then shrugged. “What will be, will be,” she said, and taking a
pair
of scissors, cut off my hair.

* * *
*

I awoke the next morning numb, and fumbled through the
motions of my usual routine. I dressed in clean clothes, brushed my hair, washed
my face, brushed my teeth, feeling all the while somehow distant from my body,
which dragged itself along while the real me hovered somewhere off to the side,
incapable of believing that
Rafe
was gone—
Rafe
, the closest thing to a father I’d ever known.

I didn’t want breakfast, but my feet followed habit and took
me to the cafeteria. There the big room, crowded, hummed with upset voices as
threatening as angry bees. I collected a tray and wandered vaguely up and down
the rows of tables, and when I came to an empty spot I sat down. A nanny
mother, two mechanics, a laundress, and three women I recognized but didn’t
know were already sitting at the table. When I pulled out the chair and sat
down, not one of them met my eyes. The laundress across from me looked almost
terrified. It took me a second to realize she was terrified of
me.

I was baffled. Then it hit me: I’d tried to defend the
traitor.

I looked around the room, searching for a friendly face. Two
of my old people, Estelle and
Mariella
, had finished eating
and were making their slow, careful way out of the cafeteria. My handful of
other friends—the few people who didn’t much care what color my hair
was—were sitting at crowded tables without empty chairs. So I shrugged to
myself and reached for my spoon.

It was as if I’d flipped a switch. The people on either side
of me, and the terrified laundress directly across, all got up and left. In a
crowded dining hall there were three seats vacant around me.

I was a pariah.

Blood pounded in my ears. I felt as if the whole room were
staring at me. They weren’t, of course—I glanced around to be certain.
No. No one was looking at me. They were very carefully
not
looking at me.

But no one was coming to sit with me, either. A few people
were actually eating leaning against a wall rather than be seen associating
with me. When I glanced their way they averted their eyes.

My face hot, I forced myself to stay put, to eat, knowing I
couldn’t afford to walk out and lose the calories. Fainting from hunger out in
the field would definitely bring unwanted attention.

I was estimating the number of bites I had left, trying to
get it all down quickly but without choking, when someone plunked a tray on the
table beside me and slid into the chair. From the corner of my eye I could tell
it was someone dark skinned. Cautiously I cast a sidelong glance and saw that
it was
Ezzie
.

That surprised me. He’d always been polite, but we weren’t
exactly friends. When he caught my eye he nodded and then turned his attention
to his bowl of applesauce.

Just a few seconds later I stood to go, and he stood as
well. The people around us shot suspicious glances his way.

“You’re not doing yourself any favors,” I said under my
breath.

Ezzie
shrugged. “You’ve got more support than you think. A bunch of the guys wish
they’d done something last night.” He winked at me. “Instead, we let a girl
show us up.”

He meant well, but I couldn’t muster a smile.

We were halfway to the door when my heart leapt before my
brain even realized what my eyes were seeing. It was
Meritt
,
just coming in.

He had a black eye, which merely served to underscore his
usual rakish air; other than that he looked healthy and whole. He was listening
to Genetic Counselor Roy, and as usual drawing the eyes of everyone in his
vicinity. He had an odd sort of presence,
Meritt
did,
simultaneously self-contained and high-energy. The combination tended to make
people watch him, just in case he did something brilliant and unexpected.

I couldn’t speak to him with so many people around, not when
associating with me could get him in trouble. I wasn’t even sure he’d see me,
focused as he was on his conversation. But as we passed each other his eyes met
mine. He lifted his chin slightly, gesturing toward the door, even as he
answered some question the genetic counselor had posed.

He’d meet me later, he was saying. The usual place, I
assumed, at the usual time.

“Keep moving,”
Ezzie
said under
his breath. “Warden alert.”

He was sitting at a table with a full tray in front of him.
The people at his table were angled away from him, eating hurriedly, silently.
I was careful not to look him in the face, but I felt his flat cold stare
follow me all the way to the door.

* * *
*

At lunch that day, Garry came lumbering over to me while I
stood in line at the cafeteria truck. He’d worked hard that morning, and maybe
I should have been pleased, but all I felt was disgusted. Sure, he’d work
now—now that he was afraid of being put in the city meeting
circle—just not when we were facing a slow death by starvation.

“Hey freak,” Garry said, jostling past a couple of people to
get to me. He had yet another complaint, no doubt, and as usual it would be
about something I could do absolutely nothing to remedy.

Hiding my dislike, I presented a blank face to him. Though
the day was chilly he was sweating heavily, and his face, always red, looked
almost purple.

“So tell me,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest.
“What did
Rafe
say to you last night?”

I mastered the urge to take a step away from him. “I don’t
know what you mean,” I said, and I didn’t.

He snorted. “He said something just before they shot him,
and you were right there. What was it?”

I didn’t want to think about
Rafe
getting shot. I’d been trying all day to think about something else, not about
Rafe
. But now that Garry mentioned it, I realized he was
right.
Rafe
had called out something, just a couple
of words, while Farrell Dean was pulling me away.

Felix sidled up. “You just had to get involved, didn’t you?”
he said to me, his whiny voice spiteful. “Why don’t you just paint a bull’s eye
on your back and be done with it?” He’d been keeping his distance from me all
morning, pointedly separating himself from whatever contagion I carried. Well,
he’d be free of me soon enough. It was almost time for the field workers to be redistributed
for winter jobs.

“Don’t interrupt,” Garry told Felix, then stuck out an arm
when I tried to walk away.

“I’m talking to you,” he said. “Are you deaf?”

 
The people in
line at the cafeteria truck glanced over and, when they saw Garry’s belligerent
stance, edged prudently away. “
Rafe
was talking right
to you,” Garry said, pointing at me with an accusing finger. “I saw it with my
own eyes. Soon as he knew he was going to die he started twisting away from
that warden, shouting something to you. I want to know what it was.”

I was willing myself to sound calm and probably
failing miserably. “I couldn’t hear him over all the yelling,” I said, and then
gave Garry’s shoulder an exaggerated pat. “But don’t worry. If I get in trouble
the first thing I’ll tell them is,
Garry
had nothing to do with it
.”

Garry’s face, if possible, turned an even darker
purple. He was taking a deep breath, like he was about to start yelling at me,
when a quiet voice spoke from up ahead. “If she didn’t hear it, she didn’t hear
it. And I’m about to close the lunch truck, so if you intend to eat, you’d
better get moving.”

Garry wheeled around to see who’d dare to cross
him. It was the older cafeteria worker, Marta. She had a thin, angular face and
a lot of straight gray hair, and while I wouldn’t have thought she could stare
down Garry, lo and behold she did just that. He snatched up his tray,
spluttered something—I didn’t exactly catch it, but I was pretty sure he
was cussing at us both—and stalked heavily away.

I was alone now, except for the three cafeteria
truck workers. The two younger women had their backs to me—whether
intentionally or not, I didn’t know.

“Thanks,” I said to Marta as she handed me a
plate.

She nodded briskly and put one hand on her hip.
“Hold on,” she said. “Lena, Terri—do we have more ham sandwiches?”

“No,” one said sadly, eyeing my food. “That’s
the last one.”

“Maybe B Truck has extras. Why don’t you two go
see?”

The two girls vanished instantly.

Marta watched them go, then leaned across the
truck counter toward me. “I couldn’t hear what
Rafe
said either,” she said. “But like that idiot Garry, I’m pretty sure
Rafe
was trying to tell you something. You or the boy.”

“I can hear him call out, in my mind,” I said.
“But it’s just sound. It isn’t words.”

“I understand. Don’t worry about
it.
But—” she lowered her voice, tucked a strand of gray hair behind her ear.
“There might be another way.”

I waited, not understanding.

“
Rafe
knew anything was possible,
once the city meeting was announced,” she said. “He would never put all his
eggs in one basket.”

I stared at her. “You think maybe he left a message?”

Marta gave the smallest of nods and ran a wet rag over the
counter.