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SHE WAS FILLING WATER bottles and carrying them two at a time inside the snow cave in hopes they would stay defrosted in there, when, with a sense she couldn’t name, she realized they weren’t alone. A second later, she heard a strange voice. “Drop the knife,” it said. A man.
Coral hadn’t realized she had the big knife in her hand. It had been an unconscious move to grab it, made the instant she had felt the presence of someone else.
“And you, fella, don’t go near that rifle I see over there—or any other weapon.”
Coral risked a glance at Benjamin, who had dropped the backpack he had been prepping for his day’s hunting. He put his hands up and to the sides. Coral stood up and did the same, taking a step toward Benjamin without thinking, wanting the security of having him by her side.
“Stop right there, miss,” the voice said.
Alarmed, Coral looked toward the voice and had a surprise that gave her a momentary flash of relief. It was not a military guy, as she had been half-expecting, but a tall gaunt man, his chin and head covered in a scarf, in a slate blue cape over a jacket.
“Alva, you see any others?” the man called over his shoulder, not taking his eyes off her.
A voice sounded from several feet away, on the far side of a tumble of big rocks. “Just these two.”
“Be careful,” the man said to Alva. He turned his attention to Benjamin. “What’s your name, sir?”
“Benjamin.”
“And the woman?”
“Coral,” Benjamin said.
“You married?”
Benjamin hesitated.
“Living in sin?”
“No,” Coral said, the word squeaking past her tight throat. “We’re friends.”
“Speak when you’re spoken to,” the man snapped at her. His eyes were deep-set and unfriendly.
“It’s as she says,” Benjamin said. “We’re chance companions who realized we could survive better together than alone.”
“A grown man and a woman together will have sex one day,” he said. “You are saying that day hasn’t yet come?”
“It hasn’t,” said Benjamin.
She wanted to speak up but knew not to, at least not when she had no gun and the man’s was held so competently in his hands.
“Then,” said the man. “We may have found you in time.”
For what?
Benjamin spoke again. “Sir, we didn’t realize we were trespassing on your territory. We’ll just pack up—”
“You will not,” said the man. “My name is Calex. And you’ll be coming back home with us. Tithing will decide what is to become of you.”
Tithing? Like...they were going to cut 10% of her away and eat it, and that’d decide her fate? Coral would rather break into a run and dive into the half-frozen lake, push herself under, and die that way. It would only hurt for a short time.
“He’ll know what’s best,” said the man.
After a confused moment, Coral realized a man’s name must be Tithing. She risked another glance to Benjamin.
A tiny shake of his head she read as, “Say nothing. Do nothing.”
If she could think of anything useful to do, she would do it anyway, no matter what he signaled. Problem was, she couldn’t think of a thing. They were outgunned. The rifle was too far away to lunge for it. Her bow and arrows were still on the sled.
In a half hour, under the direction of the men, they had their things packed. Benjamin’s rifle was in Calex’s possession. Her pocket knife was still in her jeans pocket. Despite them having searched Benjamin, they hadn’t touched her—not yet.
The longest blade on her pocket knife was not very long. If she had a chance, and only one man guarded her, she could jab the blade or the corkscrew into his eye, and that might allow them a chance to escape. But with more than one man, the pocket knife was no help.
As they walked, Benjamin in harness, Coral ahead of him, following the tracks their capturers had left on the way here, the other man introduced himself as Alva and said, “I’m sure you’ll be glad to see some other ladies again.” He was short, dressed in many layers for warmth, and wore one of those drugstore paper masks, once white, now stained gray with ash.
Coral said cautiously, “That’d be nice.”
“I’m sure they’ll be able to find a dress you can wear.”
A dress in this freezing weather? They’d have to hold her down and force it on her first.
“I wonder,” said Coral, trying to sound deferential. “If you know what happened back in June.”
“A day of reckoning,” said the man. And he sounded happy about it. “And a day of great change.”
Coral said, “I see.”
“You probably don’t,” said Alva. “But you will.”
That sounded like a threat to Coral, a threat that he’d make her agree with his version of what had happened, whether or not she wished to. She wondered. As hungry and tired as she was, as pessimistic as she felt about ever seeing her family or anything approaching the normal world again...maybe she could be brainwashed. Wasn’t that how it happened? First you broke the person down, and then they would believe anything. They’d confess to anything, change a lifetime of values and beliefs. They’d break.
The Event had broken her most of the way already. Yes, she had gained survival skills, and she had proven to be tougher than she ever knew she could be. But hunger, exhaustion, grief, and fear had left her vulnerable. She knew that she had to reach inside herself and prepare for whatever happened next. She made herself a solemn vow to stay strong, no matter what they tried to do to her mind...or to her body.
They traveled all morning, following a frozen stream, until they came to the outskirt of a settlement. She stopped dead when she saw a barbwire pen with a goat—no, two goats. An answering honking in the distance noise made her jump.
“Don’t worry. That’s our donkey,” said Alva. “Jubilee is his name. He’ll be out hauling supplies for us.”
“How did the animals survive the fire? And the heat?”
“In a cave.”
“Me, too.”
“Well then, that proves it. You were meant to find us.”
They moved down a well-beaten path in the snow to a clearing with three small stone buildings, and a small brick structure that she realized, as they passed it, was a barbecue pit. A fourth, larger building was set back from the others.
Alva pointed to a woman coming toward them. “There’s Brynn now. She’ll get you settled.”
Calex went to speak quietly with the woman, who stared at Coral the whole time.
When he returned, he and Alva led Benjamin away, and Coral started to follow.
“Girl, get back where you belong,” said Calex.
Coral stopped, confused. She didn’t want to let Benjamin out of her sight. Suddenly, she realized that no one was within twenty yards of her, though the woman was headed this way.
Should she run? No. She couldn’t leave Benjamin. She’d risk a bullet in the back to get away, if she were alone. But she wouldn’t leave him.
And who knew what this place might have to offer? Animals, for one thing, so they might have food. Was that worth the risk of staying here? If the two of them were fed well, staying a few days might be okay. But she worried that getting away might not be that easy.
The woman walked up to her. She was white, middle aged, had unruly eyebrows and a firm expression. She was wearing a long patchwork skirt. “I’m Miz Duhalde. Brynn.”
“Coral,” she said.
“Are you chosen?”
She had no idea how to answer. “I suppose it depends on who does the choosing.”
The woman gave her a sharp look. “I don’t want any smart aleck answers.”
“I wasn’t being smart,” she said. “Though I’m going to take a guess that your group and I don’t share a belief system.”
“You’re here now.” The message was clear. Forget your ways. You’ll believe ours now.
I am here, she thought—and I really don’t want to be stuck here. Let me make that clear. “We appreciate your hosting us for the night.” She emphasized the last words.
“You come on over into the sisterhouse, and I’ll get you something to wear.”
Coral glanced at herself. She was filthy, which she’d grown used to over the weeks, but she’d spend a day being polite in exchange for a bath and a couple of solid meals. “Do you have soap?” she asked.
“Baths on Saturday night,” said the woman. “You can wash up today.”
“And what day is it today?”
“Why wouldn’t you know? Are you touched in the head?”
“I’ve been too busy surviving to keep a diary.”
“I don’t need you to be smart with me, I said.”
“Was that smart? Probably exhaustion is what you’re hearing. And hunger. Calex drove us like cattle getting here, and I haven’t eaten much for several days.” She corrected herself. “Several weeks.”
“Let’s get you presentable, first,” the woman said. “Dinner’s in a few hours.”
Brynn pointed to one of the smaller stone buildings.
As Coral neared it, she could see it wasn’t an old building, as she had assumed from a distance, but a new one. The stones were piled up to form walls thick at the base and thinner at the top. The stones were not mortared. She wondered if it were safe to enter. “Is one of you a stone mason?” she asked, hoping the answer would be “yes.”
“Polly,” the woman called, ignoring the question. “Come on out here.”
A girl, twelve or so, emerged from the stone cabin, wearing a faded denim dress under a jacket two or three sizes too large for her. The lower part of her calves was covered with thick socks, two or three layers of them, by the looks of it.
“Zip that jacket all the way up,” said Brynn to the girl, “and go get a pitcher of wash water for this woman.”
The door was only a wool blanket tacked over the open doorway. Coral pushed through it into a single room, smelling faintly of urine and human sweat. There was no heat source, so it was as cold as the outdoors, but at least she was protected from the wind.
“Take off your jacket, let me see your size,” said Brynn.
Coral hugged it to her. “I’m cold.”
“You’ll get it back.” When Coral didn’t move, she said, “I promise.”
Reluctantly, Coral peeled off her outer wear. Long bolts had been inserted between the stones during the building process and stuck out of the walls to be used as pegs, and a sweater and a dress were already hung there. She started to hang her jacket, but Brynn gestured for it, looked it over, then tossed it aside on a cot.
Brynn handed her a sleeveless shift, made of burlap or some other rough material, attached at the shoulders and down the sides, the simplest of garments. “This should fit you.”
“I’d be too cold.”
“Put your sweater on over it. But we can’t have you looking like a man, in those dungarees.”
“That makes no sense. You’d rather have a woman trip over a skirt, or get frostbite on her legs?”
“One more word,” she said, leaving the thought unfinished. But her pinched lips and narrowed eyes were eloquent.
Coral thought about the implied threat. Would she be slapped, beaten, punched? Killed for refusing? She didn’t want to find out. She’d put on the dress for a day just to shut the woman up. She stripped off her boots and undid her jeans, letting them drop to her ankles and stepping out.
“Heavens!” said the woman. “You don’t have any underthings!”
“They fell apart from being worn every day,” Coral explained. She was cold and she was embarrassed—and mad at herself for feeling embarrassed. Survival didn’t leave a lot of time for fashion considerations. Upon reflection, she was happy she didn’t have her panties any longer, for their skimpy cut would have surely drawn the wrath of the woman even more than their absence.
“We don’t have extra. Maybe we can cut down those jeans and—”
“No!” said Coral. “These keep me warm!” She couldn’t risk having her clothes cut up. She needed them for when she left. And the sooner that happened, she was thinking, the better.
“I suppose one of the men might fit into them, after we wash them repeatedly.”
Well, screw you, lady. Coral thought, giving her jeans a sharp shake and thrusting one foot in. She felt the lump of her knife still in the pocket. Good.
As she was tugging her jeans up over her knees, the girl walked in, carrying a pitcher of water. She gasped. “Sister Brynn, she has no underwear on!”
“Put down the water and get out, Polly.” Brynn got in Coral’s face. “And you, hand over those men’s pants so I can give you your dress.”
“I think I’ll leave, thank you anyway,” said Coral, leaning back from the woman’s warm, meaty breath.
“You’ll leave when Tithing tells you to leave, and not a moment before.”
“Yeah? Stop me,” said Coral, pulling up the jeans and buttoning them. She grabbed her jacket in one hand and snatched her boots with the other.
She pushed past the blanket door, transferring her jacket to her mouth to hold, then hopping on one foot while she yanked one boot on. She paused for a second as she jammed the second foot into the other boot. Her socks were shoved into the boots’ toes, and the laces were untied, but she still managed to jog the way the men had gone, past the girl Polly, who stared at her, openmouthed. Working her arms through her jacket sleeves, Coral slowed down to a fast walk when she realized that woman Brynn wasn’t chasing her. At the other end of the clearing, beyond another stone cabin, three men were unpacking the sled while Calex still held a rifle pointed generally in Benjamin’s direction. There was Alva working at unloading, and two other men.
“We’re leaving, Benjamin,” said Coral, loudly.
He glanced at her then at Calex, and he shook his head. Well screw him and screw all of them. She didn’t want a bunch of crazy people talking about underwear and mandatory dresses without so much as a “hey, how are you, how’s it been going these past awful months”—and she knew that what she’d seen so far wasn’t the tip of the iceberg of craziness here. If she acted as if it were her right to leave—and it was!—she might be able to bull her way past them, rifle or no rifle. A voice inside was telling her that she wasn’t being rational, but she couldn’t seem to help herself. This place felt bad, these people scared her, and fear was driving her past sensible behavior.
A blond man dropped her hatchet—hers!—back onto the sled and strode over to her.
She stood her ground and stared defiantly at him as he approached, pointing at the sled. “That’s my ha—”
His hand came around so fast, she barely caught sight of it as a blur. His palm connected with her cheek, and she staggered. She felt her jacket being pulled as she was yanked forward. He held on to her jacket while he hit her on the other side of the face with the back of his hand.
The one called Alva made a sound of protest.
She had never been slapped before. It didn’t just sting—it hurt! And her brains felt rattled. Tears blurred her vision. “Screw you,” she snarled at the blond man.
And then he hit her again, with a fist to the mouth, and her knees gave out. She sat down. The world swam. The outer edges of her vision blurred, disappeared, and the black collapsed. Everything turned to darkness.
* * *
SHE WOKE IN THE SAME cabin as before, lying on a cot, her own sleeping bag covering her. The girl Polly was sitting on another cot, sewing. Coral tried to sit up, and her vision swam. She dropped back down and shut her eyes. Her second concussion in four months, possibly—and that couldn’t be good. She was going to end up with that, oh, whadyacallit. That she couldn’t remember the name was a bad sign, and might mean she actually did have the.... Thing. Condition. Concussion-something. Damn, what was the name of it?
The girl, breaking into her thoughts, said, “I’ll get Brother Tithing now.”
Coral could hear her get up and push through the blanket doorway with a whisper of cloth. She really did not want to open her eyes, but she forced herself to ease one set of eyelids apart. She was alone in the cabin. She struggled halfway up, but the dizziness came back. She wasn’t going to be running away in the next few minutes.
Closing her eyes again, she pushed herself up quickly and sagged back against the wall, her feet hanging off the middle of the cot. The world was still spinning, despite that her eyes were closed. Her feet were cold. Her boots had been removed again. She pulled her legs back into a lotus position and pulled her bag up around her neck against the cold. Against her back, the cold of the bumpy stones leached into her.
She might not be in any shape to run right this moment, but she needed to make a plan to escape as soon as she could.
First, she needed to know, where were they keeping Benjamin? Under guard? Tied up? Or what? She opened one eye again, and the room was no longer spinning, so she risked opening the second. Everything looked strange, like she was looking through a wide-angle camera lens. Her head was well and truly messed up.
A different man brushed through the door. That made five men she knew about in the group, and every one counted was worse and worse news for her and Benjamin, especially if they had a rifle for every one. This one was fairly tall, with narrow shoulders, thinning hair, and a shaved face. He was the only beardless man she’d seen since The Event...not that she’d seen many men at all.
“I’m sorry about Pratt,” he said.
“Who’s Pratt? Who are you?” Coral said. “And what is this place?”
“It’s the farm,” he said. “I’m Tithing. And Brother Pratt is the gentleman who hit you. I apologize for him, and he’ll apologize himself later today.”
“Uhuh,” she said. “That’s okay. I don’t need an apology. Only my—and my friend’s—freedom.”
He spread his arms and inclined his head. “You have it.”
“Great.” She pushed to the front of the cot, but he bent and his hand stopped her.
“You should rest for a bit first. You’re free to go, but the things you had on the sled, those are now ours, I’m afraid. As is the sled, your man’s rifle, the fishing gear—he said that was yours?”
She nodded.
“I think you might find it difficult to survive out there without all of your things.” His expression was sympathetic. “You look like you had a difficult time even with all of it.”
Coral said nothing.
“We’re willing to feed you and clothe you—”
“I have clothes.”
He went on as if she hadn’t spoken. “And help you prepare.”
For what? Being cooked for dinner?
“You can certainly go if you’d like, but first, I’d like the chance to know if you are of the chosen or not.”
She really did not want to hear a religious lecture right now, not on top of everything else. “I doubt it.”
He held a finger up. “You might be but not yet know it. I’m experienced in this. It has been given me to know these things. Let me decide.”
“And you’ll be testing me somehow to decide?”
“In a sense,” he said, with a smile. It looked sincere, his face a mask of kindness.
Coral didn’t trust it one little bit. A pleasant mask could hide an evil heart. “Does this testing involve torture or rape?”
He physically recoiled from her, and his simper was replaced by a look of distaste that she thought was spontaneous—and real. “No, no. Nothing like that.”
“So it’s about punching me when I disagree with you or refuse to put on a dress. Are those parts of your test?”
“I’m sorry about Pratt, truly sorry. I don’t hold with corporal punishment, but Pratt has problems controlling his temper. I’ve told him, you can’t possibly be ready until that’s under control, and the time is growing short, but still he struggles. I only hope....” He trailed off. “But that’s not important to you. I wanted to welcome you to the farm and tell you that you’ll be safe, and fed, and ask you if you needed anything.”
“My gear and Benjamin, and not getting shot in the back as I leave. That’s all I need. Unless you can throw in some food, too.”
He gave her another practiced smile and stood. “I’ll see you at dinner, then. Tomorrow, you’ll be given a work assignment. But today, you should rest. You look like you need a good nap. I’ll have Brynn fetch you your own cot before night, but for now, you can rest where you are.”
In a moment, he had moved quietly out the door, and Coral was left staring after him, sniffing the air, trying to figure out what she was smelling. Then it hit her—the scent of aftershave. What a strange thing to take time to do in the new world, to shave and put on cologne.
A farm, he had said? Yeah, right. What was this place really, and who were these people? Like some kind of weird offshoot simple-living Christians, like Amish with a bad attitude?
She leaned to the side and patted her jeans pocket. The knife was still there. While she was alone, and in case she couldn’t keep from surrendering her jeans, she should hide it. Shedding the sleeping bag, she climbed off the cot and dropped to her knees, looking beneath it at the construction of the thing. There was a place down by the foot of it where a bracket attached to metal tubing. She tucked her knife in there, climbed back up, and lay back, dragging the bag back over her.
She wanted to lie there and make an escape plan, but she was bone-tired. The cot was the softest bed she’d felt since Benjamin’s house. Before she could make any plan at all, it lulled her to sleep.
* * *
“WAKE UP,” A REEDY VOICE said.
Coral opened her eyes, disoriented at first by the stone walls and wooden roof overhead. Then she remembered: capture, concussion, cabin.
“It’s time to make dinner.” It was the girl Polly.
“Bathroom,” she croaked.
“Brynn says to show you, then to the kitchen with you.” She pointed. “Your boots are by the door. And your coat.”
Coral struggled out of her stupor, sat up, and was relieved to find that she wasn’t dizzy now. She stood, put on her boots and jacket, and waited for the girl to push through the door. Coral followed her.
The girl took her down a long path of trampled snow to an outhouse, an actual wooden structure. “Where’d you get the wood?” Had the cabin had wood flooring? She realized it had. “It’s a lot of wood.”
“We had it,” the girl said. “Hurry. You don’t want to get Brynn mad.”
Coral used the outhouse. There was a stack of brown paper towels for toilet paper, a luxury she hadn’t had for months. The girl led her back and to the biggest of the cabins. Unlike the women’s cabin, this one had an actual door, with hinges, and two windows, shuttered.
Where had they gotten all these supplies? How had they survived the fire and heat? She thumped on the door as she went through it. No scorching, and it felt solid. There was a knob with a keyhole. Surely it had to have been built after the fires. She eased the door back open and looked at the strike plate. It all looked so normal. And normal—the normal of the old world—was bizarre, now.
Inside, there was a dining table with seven seats around it—a couple folding metal chairs, one wooden chair, and the rest wooden crates. There was a narrow folding metal table pushed against one wall. An interior door opposite that Polly pulled open, motioning Coral ahead of her.
Coral walked over, still looking around, keeping an eye out for rifles or other potential weapons. She stepped through the door, saw Brynn working at a counter with another woman, and came to a shocked halt when she saw what was visible in a room, or more of an alcove, behind them. On the far wall, there was a metal desk holding a radio—an old-fashioned short-wave radio, she realized, like she’d seen in old movies, a black boxy microphone attached with to it by a spiral cord.
“Does it work?” she asked, pointing to it. It was modern technology, communication, contact with the outside world. Perhaps she could find out about her home town, and about what happened back in June. The longing to know if her family was all okay returned to her in a rush.
Brynn said, “Never mind that. Get over here and wash these potatoes.”
Another wave of wonder swept over her as she looked to the counter, a normal counter with a normal sink. Actual potatoes were lined up next to the sink—not canned ones, brown potatoes in their skins—laid out in a beautiful row. Twenty or so of them.
“How’d—”
“There’s a pitcher of water right there,” said Brynn. “Use it sparingly. But get ‘em clean. And wash your hands first.” She motioned with her elbow to a bottle on the sink.
Coral stepped forward, noticing the other woman watching her out of the corner of her eye, and looked at the bottle. It was disinfecting hand wash, the kind you rub in and let evaporate. She cleaned her hands and then hefted the pitcher. In the sink was a metal bowl. She poured a couple inches of water in and took a potato, dipped it in, and, seeing no scrub brush, used her fingertips to scrub off the dirt. She was moving in a sort of hypnotic state, she realized, caused by the scene of old normalcy around her.
The other woman—slight, dark-haired, maybe in her thirties—was opening cans of green beans and corn and stirring them into a salad. There was a plastic bottle of salad dressing on the counter, the white mayonnaise-substitute stuff. Brynn was cutting some thin carrots—more fresh veggies!—into chunks and dumping the cut pieces into another metal bowl. A smaller pile of parsnips sat to the side. Polly was taking a stack of plates and walked them through the door, no doubt to set the table.
It all felt surrealistic, dream-like, impossible. Coral washed another potato and set it aside. Soon, the water grew dirty. “Do I dump it down the sink? Like normal?”
“Outside.” said Brynn, and the unnamed woman took the bowl away to dump the water. “And move faster. I’m ready for the potatoes.”
Coral shook her daze off and started washing the potatoes faster after that. As fast as she finished one, Brynn cut it smartly into neat slices, dumped those on top of the cut carrots, and held her hand out for the next. Coral could barely keep up with her through the potatoes and parsnips. When Brynn had filled one bowl with cut vegetables, she efficiently pared the last parsnips, scraped the last of the vegetables into a second bowl and told Coral to follow her outside.
Yet another woman was standing at the barbecue pit. She nodded in greeting at Coral as she moved back. A cast iron pot was on the boil and a smaller, covered one was nestled down into red coals. Brynn dumped her bowl of veggies into the water and held her hand out for Coral’s. Coral handed it over as she made eye contact with the other woman—maybe in her early twenties, petite, with a clean white mask on her face. Coral realized her own bandana had slipped down over her neck, pulled it up over her mouth and nose and said, “I’m Coral.”
“I know,” she said. “I’m Mondra.” Her eyes were pale blue and watery. She was smiling beneath her mask and Coral managed to smile back.
“Come along,” said Brynn, and she handed the bowls to Coral and marched back to the big cabin.
Coral smiled one last time at Mondra and trailed Brynn back. In the kitchen, Brynn put all the paring knives away, pointed at Coral with a frown and said, “Leave them be.”
Coral nodded to indicate that the message was received, but she also made a note of which drawer held the knives. Polly took a double handful of eating utensils out to the main room, and Brynn handed Coral a rag and told her to clean up.
As she wiped the counters, she took every chance to look in the back alcove. The radio was attached by wires to a box which was itself attached by thicker black insulated wires to a stationary bike. It must be set up so that the bike generated electricity and that ran the radio. She’d tell Benjamin about it and ask if he knew how it worked. Could she get in here, pedal the bike, and contact the world?
She glanced at Brynn and thought she’d never be given permission to. But she could sneak in here at night, maybe, and try it. If only she knew how to work it. Or maybe you needed two people—one to pedal and one to talk on the radio, so she’d need Benjamin with her. Where were they keeping him? In another of the small cabins, she supposed, probably shared with men. It’d be hard for both of them to sneak out at the same time. She was afraid they’d both be watched carefully.
Maybe the thing to do was not to run at first opportunity, but to pretend to agree with everything, get along with people, and get them to put their guard down. Then one night, get to the radio, try to contact people elsewhere, maybe learn about what was happening in Boise, or back east. Then, when they had quit worrying about her, gear up and escape.
How long might it take to lull these people into that lack of suspicion? What would she have to do to pass their tests? She glanced at the other woman, who had left and returned. “Hey. I’m Coral.”
“I know,” said the woman. “I’m Calex’s wife, Joli.”
Okay. Coral decided to be direct. “I don’t think your husband liked me very much.”
The woman said nothing, only stepped to the cabinets and put away a metal canister.
“What were you making?” asked Coral, trying to make her voice friendly.
“Biscuits.”
“You seem to eat well.”
“We were prepared.”
“That’s smart,” said Coral. The other woman didn’t answer again, and Coral gave herself a mental shake. She had to be better at this, at ingratiating herself. Her fear was that she was showing, in her tone or body language, that she did not trust these people, that she wanted to get away from them. She needed to convince them that her friendliness was real, not feigned. And it was smart, or at least fortuitous, that they had stowed away food and supplies: that much, at least, was true.
Coral tried again. “Alva said something about a cave?”
“Did he?” Joli asked.
Coral tried a smile, but the other woman’s expression didn’t get any friendlier. Maybe offering to help would thaw her. “I’m done cleaning up. What do you want me to do next?”
Brynn entered and said, “It will be a bit before we serve dinner, so come with me.”
Coral gave a little wave to the stone-faced Joli and went through the main room again.
Brynn said, “I wanted you in a dress before dinner, but Tithing says to let you keep your pants on under it.” She didn’t sound pleased about it.
“That’s nice of him,” Coral forced herself to say. She followed Brynn back to the cabin, the “sisterhouse,” and walked in on Alva, setting up a third cot.
“That was fast,” said Brynn to him.
“Hadn’t taken them back to the cave yet,” he said, turning to Coral. “Try it out, miss.”
“Coral, please,” she said. This time when she smiled, she received an answering smile. She sat gingerly on the cot and it held her. “It feels great,” she told him.
Brynn pulled the sleeping bag off the other cot and dumped it at the foot of this one. “Now leave us, Alva. We have private things to do.”
“Yes’m,” he said, and he backed out of the door.
Coral took the burlap shift Brynn handed her and slipped it on over her jeans and shirt without protest. She put the sweater and jacket over the dress and walked across the small cabin and back. The skirt would keep her from running, but it’d be easy enough to yank it up and stuff the ends into her jeans, should she need to. She stopped in front of Brynn and held her arms out. “Okay?” she asked.
The woman grimaced, clearly less than pleased at the compromise over clothing. “I’ll be keeping my eye on you. For now, go out to the fire and help Mondra, and don’t get any ideas about running away. Let me know when the potatoes are tender.”
Coral felt she was being released from prison—or at least let out into the prison yard. Not that she’d run without Benjamin, or without any supplies. And to be honest, not that she’d run with fresh food cooking up. If they were willing to feed her, she was willing to eat.
Mondra was leaning against the barbecue pit, probably soaking up the heat seeping through the bricks. She glanced up as Coral walked toward her, and then her eyes slid away to follow Brynn walking into the big cabin. There didn’t seem to be anyone else guarding Coral or making sure she didn’t escape. But why should they bother? The cold and the coming night were guard enough.
She’d try and make friends with Mondra, who seemed the most likely of the women so far to befriend, or at least the only one who’d given her a smile. If she was going to recover the gear and get away, the more she knew about these people and their habits, the better.
“How’s it going?” she said as she approached the woman. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
“Thank you, no. I’m waiting on the vegetables to get tender, is all.”
Coral leaned into the steam rising from the pot and breathed it in. “Smells good.”
“It’s simple food.”
“Any food is good food these days. I haven’t seen fresh in months.”
“You been hungry a lot since the Reaping?”
The Event, Coral supposed she meant. She’d have to figure out their take on it. “We’ve had fish, and a couple rabbits. We found some canned soup but lost it to stronger people.”
“That’s been the way of the world.”
Coral had to force herself not to give the woman an indignant glare. Didn’t she realize that’s exactly what had happened today, that she and Benjamin had lost their gear to better-armed people? Mondra didn’t seem to see it like that, though. Probably saw her own group as innocent, or justified.
“But it won’t be the way of the world much longer.” She glanced curiously at Coral. “You met Tithing?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m his wife.” There was pride in the statement.
“Really? You look about my age.”
“I’m seventeen. What are you?”
Coral tried to school her expression. Seventeen and married to a—what, a 40-year-old man? “I’m nineteen.”
“You’d be closer in age to me than anyone here. Polly is only twelve. Ellie is twenty-eight.”
“Did you get married after the—” she tried to remember their word for it. “The Reaping?”
“Oh no, we’ve been married for two years.”
Coral glanced away. That was seriously effed up. Married at fifteen to a middle-aged man? “And your mother and father are fine with this?”
“Oh, yes, they’re proud Tithing chose me. They’re at an Oregon farm.”
“Ahh.” Coral knew to leave the child-bride discussion alone for now. “What do they farm?”
Mondra giggled. “Not a farm. The Farm.”
Coral heard the capital letter that time. “I see.” There was some sort of extended metaphor they had going. Farm, Reaping. Something else she’d heard also fit the pattern. What was it?
The girl broke into her attempt to remember. “There’s a meeting day after tomorrow.”
“A community meeting, like a city council? Or you mean like a church service?”
“Churches are corrupt,” she said, her pleasant smile somehow incongruous.
“I suppose many are,” said Coral.
“All,” said the girl with a decisive nod. “But Jesus was seed. A flower. And so was Buddha. Maybe Mohammed, too.”
Coral nodded as if that made perfect sense to her. She reworked it in her mind. So, these were terms they used in their religion, which she had assumed at first was some sect of Christianity. Now she no longer thought so. Think of the terms as having capital letters. Jesus was Seed, but so were they. A Flower. The Farm. The Reaping. She said, doubtful that she was getting it right, “And you’re Seed? A Flower?”
Mondra smiled and shook her head. “No, I’m a Grain. Tithing is a Flower.” She spoke with exaggerated patience, as if to a child.
“Okay,” said Coral. “Tithing said he’d figure out if I was one of the, um, select, was it? That means a Seed?”
“The Chosen,” she said. She looked intently at Coral, leaning forward to study her more closely. “Did he think you are?”
“He said he’d know.”
“He’ll know.” She sounded confident. She took a towel and lifted the lid of the first pot. “Beans tonight,” she said, stirring them.
Coral hoped that she meant they were actual beans and not Beans in some metaphorical sense, like people who had failed Tithing’s tests. They looked like beans at any rate, and much more than Mondra looked like a grain. Or a Grain, rather. It was going to take a while to piece together their belief system and memorize all the lingo. “And will I learn more about this at the meeting?”
“Oh, yes,” the girl said with an angelic smile.
“Great.” With any luck, she and Benjamin would be gone before then. “So Alva says you all survived the Reaping in a cave. I was in a cave, too.”
Until the potatoes were cooked, they traded survival stories. Coral found out more useful information. Their cave, less than a mile from here, was on their property and had been stocked with supplies. They were expecting something bad to happen, and they had been entirely prepared. The real estate of the Farm was chosen, in part, for the cave. Sacks of flour, beans, rice, canned food, salt—all were stowed away for the catastrophe they knew was coming. The fresh food was root vegetables from their vast garden, dug after the fire had swept through and the great heat had ended.
And, Coral thought, as she carried the heavy pot of cooked root vegetables into the dining cabin, they had, after all, been right about being prepared for a major disaster. About all this other stuff—Reaping and Flowers and whatnot, entirely wrong, needless to say. She had been worried about getting brainwashed, but she thought she was going to be safe from that danger...unless there was sleep deprivation or some other torture to come that would weaken her, but none of that seemed imminent. On its merits alone, there was nothing about this religion that was going to convince her to convert, no matter how hungry and tired she was. It was clearly loony.
Still, she might have to pretend to convert, so she needed to pay attention and learn all their beliefs as quickly as she could. They entered the main cabin. The heat of the pot was creeping through the towel she had been given and her gloves, starting to burn her, so she hurried inside to set it down on the table next to where Mondra put the bean pot.
She did what Brynn told her to get the meal ready to serve, and then Brynn stepped outside and blew a high-pitched whistle. One by one, the men drifted in. Tithing took the head of the table and the biggest chair. Calex sat to one side of him, and a man whose name she didn’t know to the other. Alva, Pratt, and three others arrayed themselves around the table in what seemed to be regular seats for each. The group included an older black man, and he led Benjamin in. Benjamin didn’t look her way but sat without fuss on a box indicated. She hoped they hadn’t been mistreating him, but what she could see of him looked perfectly fine—physically, at least. The men filled all but two seats. Coral stood with the women, next to Mondra against the far wall, waiting to see what came next.
Tithing said, “It looks delicious, Brynn.”
It was a dismissal. Brynn jerked her head at the door to the kitchen, and the women all filed into that room. Coral, surprised, trailed after them. Apparently the men ate alone...and first.
The women—six of them including Polly and Coral—all stood in silence, waiting. Polly was the only child. The youngest male was about Coral’s age. Coral shifted from foot to foot, bored with waiting, but at a sharp glance from Brynn, she made herself stand still.
The men didn’t talk much. They must be busy eating. The occasional noise of a fork hitting a plate came through the wall. After a quarter-hour, she could hear the scraping of chairs and boxes. Brynn waited until the dining room fell silent then glanced into the room, pushed through, and the women all walked into the dining room behind her. Plates were gathered, stacked in the kitchen, and new plates and utensils put out.
The women ate as quietly as the men, their breath steaming in the cold air. The big pot had held the heat well, so the food was still warm. Coral had to exert self-control to keep from asking more questions, but she managed to mimic the women around her: quiet, meek, obedient. That was so unlike her, the thought of her ineptness at keeping up the act for long drew an involuntary smile. Joli saw it and frowned, and Coral lifted her spoon, mouthed the word “good,” as if pleasure at the food was the source of her smile. And the food was good, and hotter than anything she’d eaten in a over a month. The men had made such a dent in what they’d cooked, there wasn’t enough for the women to have seconds, but the edge was off her hunger by the time the serving spoons were clicking on the bottom of the pots.
She helped clean up after dinner and met the last female member of the group, a sad-faced woman named Ellie who looked ten years older than the twenty-eight Mondra had said she was. Coral helped her upend the water from cooking the vegetables into a crock. It was to be saved to make the next batch of beans or rice, Ellie explained. “There are vitamins in there,” she said, and again Coral had the sense that she was being spoken to like a child.
“Do you have beans every dinner?”
“Beans, or lentils, or sometimes brown rice. That’s four days each week. Carved meat once a week, with boiled or roasted potatoes, and stew or soup with the leftover meat the two days after that.”
“Wow. You must have stored up a lot of food. Fifteen people, for all these months.”
“More at the start.” She looked even sadder than before.
“I’m sorry,” Coral said. “You lost someone?”
“We all did.” She glanced quickly at Brynn. “But we’ll meet them again.” And then she excused herself and left to dump wash water.
She’d have to get to know Ellie better, if she were allowed. Joli was unfriendly, Mondra was married to the leader, Brynn also was in power here, and Polly was a child, but maybe this woman could be an ally—or at least a source of information.
The day was still light when the women emerged from the big cabin. Brynn waved Coral to go with her and Polly, and they returned to the cabin. The others moved off toward another cabin. The men were nowhere to be seen.
Inside the cabin, Brynn lit two candles and handed Coral a small shirt, too small for anyone she’d seen here. “Know how to tear out a seam?”
“I’m sure I can manage.” She took the needle Brynn offered and held up the shirt. It was woven cotton, light blue, small. The buttons were on the right, so a boy’s shirt. “Do you want me to take off the buttons?”
“I’ll do that. You just get the seams.”
Coral set to work. As she did, her thoughts turned to Benjamin. He had been in her thoughts all day, of course, but interacting with the other women had kept her from dwelling on him. Now, in the quiet of the cabin, she began to fret. Was he being treated okay? Was he worried about her? At least he’d seen her in the dining room, so he knew she was alive and wasn’t being mistreated.
Merely kept against her will and robbed of her survival gear, same as him.
She grimaced, feeling a twinge in her jaw where she’d been punched. It wasn’t broken—she had been able to chew her food—but she could still feel the punch. Nor had she heard the promised apology from Pratt, the man who had hit her. Not that it was important to her to hear one. Forced by the leader, it wouldn’t be sincere, and what good did an apology ever do anyway? It didn’t erase the act or the bruise or the memory of the violence.
Thinking about getting hit was bringing her headache on stronger. She’d felt only a mild throbbing through dinner. Now the pain was coming back.
“You don’t have any aspirin, do you?” she asked Brynn, who was working at sewing.
“For emergencies. Fevers and the like.”
“Makes sense,” said Coral. She could bear the headache.
“Do you need one?” Brynn asked. Her tone was resentful, and it was clear she didn’t want to hand one over.
Coral wondered where they were kept. Was one of the cabins a supply cabin? Or were drugs in the pantry area? In the cave? There wasn’t a lot of storage in here. One metal trunk was shoved against a wall, and a crate held the clothing they were working on. She’d like to know where the first-aid supplies were so that, when she and Benjamin escaped, she could take whatever she needed. “I can get it, if you tell me where it is.” Coral would like to get a look at the medical supplies.
But it was not to be. “Polly can get it.” Brynn looked to the girl, who put down her sewing and slipped from the cabin.
“Thanks,” said Coral. “I’ll sleep better for it.”
“We rise at dawn around here,” Brynn said.
“So do we,” Coral said, as pleasantly as she could manage. “Though we haven’t had the luxury of candles or lamps in a long while.”
“You should have prepared better.” She sounded smug.
“Maybe so,” said Coral.
They sewed in silence until Polly returned with one aspirin and a metal cup. “She’ll need a cup, right?” she said, and showed it to Brynn, who nodded. Polly gave Coral the cup and aspirin and pointed to the pitcher she had brought in earlier.
Coral rose, poured herself water from the pitcher, and glanced at Brynn, who was staring at her. She thought to pocket the aspirin, but she couldn’t while she was being watched. She swallowed it and drained the cup of water. “I guess I’ll need to use the facilities soon.”
Brynn said, “I’ll go over with you. Before we go to bed.”
“Thank you for the aspirin,” Coral said, sitting and tucking the cup under her cot. She picked up the sewing and finished ripping out the second sleeve.
Light was nearly gone by the time they walked to the outhouse, further from the cabins than Coral might have placed it, were this her home. The freezing weather kept the smell down. She took in all of the compound she could see as she trailed Brynn. But there wasn’t much to see, just the four cabins, the barbecue pit, and three paths. One, they had been brought in on, past the animals. This path went to the outhouse. The last path must go to the cave.
“Where do the married people sleep?” she asked Brynn.
“In the couple-house.”
“All of them?”
“Yes, three couples now.”
How awkward. “And that furthest one is the men’s cabin?”
“The brotherhouse, yes.”
Benjamin must be there. “That must be crowded.”
“It is. But it’s temporary.”
“Oh?” Another stab of worry for Benjamin pierced her.
But Brynn didn’t say any more on that subject, or any other. They walked back to the cabin and Polly took a trip to the outhouse alone. When she returned, Brynn told Coral to climb into her sleeping bag. The candles were put out, and Coral lay back in the dark and thought. Tomorrow, she’d pay stricter attention to everything around her. She needed to make an escape plan, so she needed to know where their gear was, the group’s other supplies, where any weapons were. She’d seen three rifles and suspected there were more. But where were they kept? Either she’d have to take them, hide them, or disable them.
Tomorrow, she’d see if the work they assigned her left her any chance to talk privately with Benjamin. She’d have to coordinate any escape plan with him, too. And he might have seen things she wouldn’t be allowed access to as a woman.
She hated to admit it to herself, but it might take a few days to make this happen. At least she’d get fed while she made her plans. If she were fed enough, she’d be stronger, better able to run, and better able to fight when she left. Shivering in the cabin, far colder than their snug snow caves, and missing the warmth of Benjamin’s body next to hers, she curled up tighter and managed to fall asleep.
