“So he hasn’t been taken into a child assimilation program?”
Breaking from his embrace, I swerve to lock eyes. “Of course not. I’m his family. He belongs with me.”
Genuine surprise darts from Cassius’s eyes, like needles to my skin. “I only meant that I’m sure it’s hard to take care of a-what is he now, four? — year-old on your own.”
I back away on uncertain legs. “Mrs. Bledsoe helps out during my shift at the library. We don’t need any outsiders.” My heart gallops. I lean against the partition to steady myself.
Cassius moves closer, arms open wide. “But the Establishment’s child care programs are a valuable-”
“I’m not going to give Cole to strangers, Cass. He’s lost Mom and Dad. He’s not going to lose me, too.” A fog shrouds my brain.
Cassius reaches me and draws me close, a beacon in the mist. “I wasn’t trying to offend you, Lucky.”
Bringing my fingers to my temples, I try to massage away the throbbing. “It’s just that-”
“Here! I know what you need!” He smiles, takes hold of my hand, and leads me to a table nestled in a small alcove. In its center rests a covered silver tray. Even before he lifts the lid, a mixed aroma of fresh sweetness and cooked meat overpowers my nostrils. My stomach growls. Saliva floods my mouth.
He raises the cover. “I thought you might be hun-”
I pounce on the tray. Grabbing the meat with my bare hands, I tear into it with my teeth, hardly savoring each morsel as it slides down my gullet. Then I’m stuffing cheese and fruits into my mouth, frenzied by the new tastes assaulting my tongue as I try to devour them all before someone steals them away.
When I finally look up, a monstrous beast stares back at me, teeth bared, a distorted face smeared with the blood of its latest kill. Then I realize it’s my own face, reflected on the tray’s silver cover. Disgust and shame overwhelm me.
“It’s going to be all right, Lucky.” Cassius leads me to one of the plush sofas, sets me down, and wipes my face with a handkerchief. We sit there in silence, his arm around me, my face buried in his shoulder. I’m not sure how much time passes before I find my voice again.
“Cole … he’s … he’s all I have left. That’s why I risked coming here today-allowed myself to be taken into custody-it was the only way I could think of to see you face-to-face and ask you to protect him in case I get recruited.”
“You took a big chance. If I hadn’t seen your name on the prisoner roster … ” His arm squeezes me close.
I look into his eyes. “The Recruitment. Now that I’m sixteen, there’s a chance I could be selected.” My hands grab both of his. “You have to promise me that if that happens, you’ll do whatever you can to keep Cole from being one of the Incentives. I’ll never choose to … I’ll never choose him … and you know what will happen.”
He purses his lips. “You’ll both be shelved.”
“That’s right, we’ll be murdered, only they’ll make Cole watch me get killed first. You were the one who told me how it worked, remember? How they make you choose between the people you love … what happened to your father … ”
He brings my hands to his lips. “That’s not going to happen to you and Cole. I’d never let it.”
I scoot closer. “So you’ll help us then?”
His arms envelop me. “Do you even have to ask? There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you.” He pulls away. “But Lucky, there’s something you need to explain to me first.” He springs from the couch and strides over to his desk.
When he turns back to me, he’s holding up Digory’s unfurled poster.
Seven
I can barely swallow. I clamber from my seat and limp over to him. “Cass, it isn’t mine. I swear it. I … I picked it up near the sewer. I’d never seen it before today.” I look away. I hate the idea of dancing around the truth with Cass. But he wouldn’t understand about Digory, would he? And the thought of Digory being slaughtered the way that guy in the alley was …
Cassius nods. “I believe you. The Parish is going to be a real challenge for a new Prefect to administer. I’m going to need your help, your support, if I’m going to pull this off.”
Gripping the edge of the desk, I brace myself against the cold granite. “What can I do to help you?”
He raises the poster higher. “This rebellion. It’s got to be crushed. If it isn’t, everyone loses.”
“I don’t know much about it, but … ” The stone edge of the desk digs into my lower back. “Is it so wrong for people to want a better life … something to look forward to?” My throat gulps dryness. “I know that’s what I want for Cole. Does that mean I should be crushed, too?” I stand as straight as I can, forcing him to look up into my eyes.
He waves my question away. “It’s not the same. You and Cole are different.” The poster crumples in his grip. “You’re not like these leeches who want to drain the government of its resources. Ingrates, all of them.” He flings the banner on the floor, where it rolls up against the foot of the sofa.
My jaw plunges. “Leeches? Ingrates? It wasn’t so long ago you used words like that to describe the Establishment, not its citizens.”
His eyes dim. “I was young then. I didn’t understand.” He shakes his head. “Without order, civilizations whither and die. The Establishment’s learned from the mistakes our ancestors made.”
“And it’s making even bigger ones.” I stare into his eyes. “What’s gotten into you? How can you think the Establishment cares about the good of all its people? I just saw someone not much older than we are get mauled to death by a Canid patrol. Have you taken a good look around you? Taken a good look at me ?” I tug open the top of my robe, exposing the blue and purple blotches that contrast with my pasty flesh. Lacerations weave across my chest like the fancy lace pattern on his lapels, swirling downward to wrap around my jutting ribs.
He wraps me in his arms. “The guards who did this to you will be punished, I promise,” he whispers.
I break the hug. “Don’t you see? It’s not about the guards or revenge. It’s about having your dreams smothered, day after day, until there’s nothing left.”
“I used to think the same way.” Taking my hand, he leads me out onto the balcony and points to the pockets of gatherers slowly filling the Square below. “The people need someone to look after their interests. They can’t do it themselves.” He turns the finger on himself. “We give them structure … a purpose.”
I pull my arm free. “And just what is that purpose, Cass? Huh?” My hand sweeps the path leading from the onlookers up to the dais. “To be cattle in the slaughterhouse just waiting for their turn in the meat grinder? That’s not living. You of all people should know that. Think of what happened to your family.”
Hurt flickers in his emerald eyes. “But it’s not going to happen to me, and it doesn’t have to happen to you.” He turns away and storms back inside, heading toward an elaborate wooden cabinet built into the alcove wall.
I’m at his heels, like a Canid at its master’s side. “You say that, yet you serve the very government that recruited you and destroyed your family in the process.”
Unlatching the cabinet doors, he pulls out a decanter of blood-red wine, sets it on the shelf beneath, and digs out two crystal goblets, handing me one.
I examine the glass, staring at him through a prism of haze before shaking my head and setting it down on the shelf. “These past few years I’ve told myself you were only doing what you had to do to survive, to come back to … the Parish. But now it sounds like-”
His thumb flicks the carafe’s stopper off with a loud pop. “Like what?” His brows arch. “Like I’ve been brainwashed-is that what you’re thinking?” Sighing, Cassius watches dark crimson gush from the carafe as he tilts it over his goblet. “I assure you I haven’t been.”