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WHEN SHE BELIEVED IT must be nearing sunrise, she set the radio dials back the way they had been, made sure she had disturbed nothing else, and went back into the kitchen. She untied her dish towel shawl, smoothing each rumpled piece of material out on the edge of the counter, folding each as it had been before, and returning the towels to their place. When the shawl was gone, she felt the bitter cold seep into her head and neck.
Turning off the lamp was hard for her. It was harder still because of her emotional state. But she couldn’t risk their knowing she had been awake or using the radio. She was so damned hungry, she risked taking two carrots from the carrot bin. Then she turned off the light and, by feel, made her way back into the dining room.
She shut the door and sat down to work at the lock. A clicking sound told her something in there had moved. She tried the knob, and it didn’t turn. Maybe it wasn’t normally locked, but it should fool them. And if she had broken something in there, they might not suspect her of having unlocked it.
Standing on legs beginning to ache from all the biking, she shuffled over to the table, and sat on the first seat she bumped into. Every night outside had been dark, with no moon or stars visible to light the landscape. But because the wildfire had burned everything away, there wasn’t much to bump into. It seemed darker in here than out there.
And then, she had had Benjamin beside her, too.
She ate her carrots, the crunching noise loud in the empty room. Her hands and ears and face were getting stiff from the cold. She pulled the turtleneck half over her shaved head so it covered her ears, too. Then she pulled her arms in through the sleeves and put her hands under the opposite armpits, hugging herself against the cold.
Thoughts of Benjamin haunted her. She remembered being up on the roof with him. She remembered rescuing him, the look of his battered face. Arguing with him. Eating across from a smoldering fire with him. The sound of his breathing at night.
She couldn’t help but think how awful life would be without him.
If he had turned, become a cultist, she didn’t know how she could go on. If he told them of her escape plans, they’d stop her. She wouldn’t be able to stand that. She’d make herself go crazy, one of those sorts of crazy where she dissociated entirely, became numb to the world. Catatonia, that was the word.
Maybe she could will it to happen.
* * *
THE DAWN CAME, GRAY light appearing at the edges of the shutters. She had been trying for many minutes to let herself give up, let herself drift into catatonia, retreat from the physical Coral, hide her mind and soul. Then they could use her body how they wanted, but she would not be there. She’d be off in a dark corner of her brain, cut off, safe, unaware of being raped, never having to look directly at the loss of Benjamin to this cult, if that’s what had in fact happened.
But in those last minutes before dawn, she had discovered something about herself. It was impossible for her to hide like that, impossible for her to break.
She possessed a terrible strength.
It was a strength that would keep her alive, and aware, and fighting, and sane, beyond a point where surrender or craziness would be a smarter choice. She could not retreat into catatonia, no more than she could retreat into complacency.
She would escape this place, or die trying, and in two days, on the night she had planned. If Benjamin met her at midnight, she’d be thrilled to have been wrong in her fears about him. If he did not come along but kept her secret out of a sense of loyalty, she’d be grateful. If he told them of her plans, she’d be devastated, heartbroken. But her mind, her will: those would not be broken, not ever.
It felt not like a relief to understand this about herself but like learning of a horrible curse. She was cursed to fight to stay alive right up to the instant of her death.
So be it.
The cold had stiffened her muscles. She stood and began pacing around the room, shaking out the stiffness, and then she started to jog, around and around the dining table. After a few minutes, she was panting. She sped up, going as fast as she could without banging into the table. When she escaped, she might need to run. A single practice session wouldn’t help much in making her fit enough to run for miles...but it wouldn’t hurt either.
When the door opened, and Brynn stood there in the morning light, holding her jacket, Coral drew to a stop, panting like a horse, steam billowing out from her face. “Morning!” she said with a cheery smile.
Brynn stared, gaping. She had probably expected to find Coral in much worse shape—maybe even dead from the cold.
“Beautiful morning, isn’t it?” Coral said. She bared her teeth in a facsimile of a smile. “Cheer up, Brynn. It’s a new day.”
Brynn accompanied her outside, where Mondra was lighting a fire. “I’m going to get you into a dress. And no argument this time.”
Her knife. And the paper. Both were in her jeans pocket. She couldn’t lose those. “I really have to pee first.”
Brynn gave a weary sigh. “No nonsense.”
“I need a quick trip to the outhouse. I haven’t been since yesterday afternoon.”
“I hope you’ve learned your lesson.”
“Oh, I have,” said Coral. She was already thinking about the layout of the outhouse. The writing paper, she could tuck inside the stack of toilet paper, toward the bottom of the pile. But where to stash the knife so that no one could see it?
When they reached the little building, Coral went inside and closed the door. She only needed time enough to find a space, four or five inches long, not visible from the seat. As she used the toilet, she looked all around. The building was well made. She had been hoping for a crack between boards, maybe at the side of the seat. But everything fit perfectly. She tucked the writing paper away.
Brynn knocked on the door. “Don’t dawdle.”
“Half a second,” Coral called, looking around desperately. Over the door, there was a tiny ledge, only an inch wide. There was every possibility that a hard slam of the door would knock her knife off, but she could see nowhere else to put it. No way was she throwing it into the toilet, and putting it under the stack of toilet paper didn’t seem like a safe hiding place. She stood on the lip of wood in front of the toilet seat and leaned forward, catching the top of the door with her fingertips. She tucked the knife onto the ledge and, taking care to make no suspicious noise, pushed back and sat down. She could see the edge of the knife, but then she knew it was there.
If she was lucky, no one else would notice it. The light was dim in here, even at high noon. And it was only a day and a half until she escaped. Leaving the knife here was the best she could do for now.
She opened the door and joined Brynn, following her back to the women’s cabin, wondering how she’d be able to escape in a stupid dress, and how she’d be able to hike without freezing to death in one. Hmm—maybe that’s why they kept the women in skirts, to keep them from considering escaping, should one would-be bride think better of her servitude.
Expecting to be forced to stay in her burlap shift, she was surprised when Brynn handed her a new garment. “I made this for you. Put it on. Take your jeans off.”
Coral stripped naked, surprised to feel not a moment of self-consciousness. She couldn’t feel embarrassed in front of Brynn, for sometime during the night, she had stopped seeing any of them as people. They were obstacles, is all, and she’d go around them or through them the night of her escape, whichever was easiest.
Brynn folded the jeans and laid them on the bed. Coral was relieved that she’d hidden the pocket knife.
The cabin was cold, but she’d made it through the night in hardly any clothes and could bear a minute of this. Naked, she shook out the dress, which was a patchwork thing, made from discarded shirts of many colors and patterns. Brynn, knowing it was for Coral, had no doubt taken pleasure in putting the most clashing colors next to each other. It had a simple rounded neck, barely big enough to push her head through, elastic on half-length sleeves, and was far too thin for the weather. Coral slipped it on. It fell nearly to her ankles, with a wide enough skirt that she could walk and work in it.
Brynn followed it up with a pair of white men’s jockey shorts. “And these.”
Coral slipped them on under the skirt and pulled them up. She hoped they’d been washed before whoever had donated them to her.
“Tithing says to let you keep your jeans, to sleep in until I have time to make you a nightgown. But put them under your covers, where I don’t have to look at them all the time.”
Coral felt a warm wash of relief at that. She’d be dressed for the escape. Just grab her jacket and boots, sling her sleeping bag around her shoulders, and she could be out the door in seconds.
She either needed to find a pack, or to find rope or twine, some way to tie up items inside her sleeping bag and rig it around her shoulders. She added it to her mental list: meat and cheese if she could find that, a weapon, and rope. If she could find their old supplies—backpacks, fishing gear, hatchet, tools, drugs—she’d take as much as she could carry. If the sled was still intact...but no, she dismissed the thought. Probably she could move faster with only a backpack, so she’d have to limit her supplies to what she could safely grab and was lightweight. Food and a rifle would be worth their cost in weight, but beyond that, she’d have to be selective.
“Wait here,” said Brynn, “until Mondra comes for you.”
Coral put on her turtleneck over the dress, her sweater, and finally her jacket. She touched her bald scalp, then pulled out her scarf and wrapped it tightly around her head. She had a lot to plan today, but they’d be watching her pretty closely. Still, they couldn’t stop her eyes from searching out every possible aid to her escape.
All day long she kept her senses sharp. She watched every cult member’s movements, and by the end of the day, she was certain both the cave and the construction site were down the third path. The women never went out that way on errands. They stayed on the path to the outhouse and animal pen, or in the clearing. The men went to what she could only suppose was their alien landing site project.
She only saw Benjamin once in the morning, and only the back of him as he walked away. That was too little information for her to decide if he’d been lost to the cult or not. Part of her refused to believe it of him. He was too level-headed, and they’d been captive only a week. In a month, maybe he’d have been turned. Hell, maybe she would, too. But the seed of doubt had been planted, and she couldn’t help but worry.
Benjamin’s situation was out of her control for now. She went back to focusing on what she could control, today.
For dinner, Brynn split the remaining cooked meat into a larger and a smaller portion. The larger went into the night’s stew. The smaller portion was set aside for soup. It’d get used up the next night—the night of the escape—so if Coral wanted meat or cheese, she’d have to find the cave.
And as she’d never been there, she’d need a light.
To make sure she could get to the outhouse without a light, if need be, she closed her eyes the next time she walked there, Mondra walking behind as her guard. Immediately, she could feel there was a u-shaped path worn into the snow, from the daily tread of many boots. If she focused, she could feel herself straying up the side of it.
A rock tripped her. Her eyes flew open, and she tried to get her feet under her but failed. Her hands flew out to break her fall, but she couldn’t afford a broken wrist now, and she turned her body at the last second so that she hit on ribs and underarms. The breath was knocked out of her, but she kept her relatively fragile hands from hitting the ground.
“Why so clumsy?” Mondra said.
She sucked in air. “Little tired. I didn’t sleep well last night.”
“Your own fault. Love the hair, by the way.”
Coral reached up. Her scarf and hood had been knocked off in the fall, her bald head exposed to the cold. She rolled over, sat up, and rearranged her scarf to cover her head. She felt along her ribs, which had taken the fall well. A broken rib would have been disastrous—but nothing could keep her from escaping tomorrow, not even that.
The stupid skirt had gotten twisted around her legs, and it took her some edging back and forth to untangle herself. She clambered to her feet and brushed snow off, rearranged her jacket, and marched on down the path.
At least she knew she could navigate this path in the dark—at least get far enough away so that a light wouldn’t be seen from the clearing when she turned it on.
As she helped fix dinner, she continued looking at the details of the main cabin as she hadn’t before. There was a pile of burlap sacks that the vegetables were hauled in. They were in a neat stack on the floor, and all of them had rough ties of maybe jute. There was her rope. It was too crowded right now, but maybe later, or maybe tomorrow, she’d have a half a minute alone with the bags and could yank out the ties or cut them off, whichever, and tie them together as straps for her sleeping bag, turning it into a backpack. Or would it be better to take the whole sack? She could sling it over her shoulder for now, fill it with supplies, and rig up something better for hiking later. If she got a chance late tomorrow, she’d steal one.
As the men trooped into the main cabin for dinner, Brynn pulled away Coral’s scarf and hood to expose her bald head to the view of all of them. Benjamin looked briefly at her, but his expression was unreadable. She didn’t pay attention to the rest of them. They were nothing to her.
Coral was shunned at dinner by the other women, though she caught sight of Ellie throwing her a sympathetic glance as she sat down. She was happy to have the privacy of her own thoughts, as she ate quickly, trying to be the first to get seconds and make up for the calories missed the previous day.
After dishes were done, she accompanied Brynn to the women’s cabin but immediately said she needed to go to the outhouse. Brynn made a sound of irritation, but she gave a sharp nod and motioned her back outside. Coral took the opportunity to count her own footsteps. Trailing her hand along the cabin’s stone walls, she began counting right footfalls. Call it a thirty-degree turn from the corner of the cabin, then at forty-one steps, a sharp turn, not quite ninety degrees, to get on the path to the outhouse. At two hundred paces, she glanced back. No, she should go further before risking a light. She looked all around, thinking it through. If she drifted off path, soon enough the deeper snow would tell her. Best to hold off on the light until she reached the outhouse itself.
Twice more before dark she asked to go to the outhouse. When Brynn complained, she said, “Upset stomach. Stress of last night.”
The lie that she was stressed about the previous night seemed to mollify Brynn, and Coral realized it provided her with another opportunity. She’d go out to the outhouse again, alone, in the middle of the night, on a dry run, and have the built-in excuse if someone discovered her. Brynn would have to back up her claims that she was sick.
She managed two trips to the outhouse that night. The first time, neither Brynn nor Polly woke at her departure or return. The second time, she took a candle and matches, and risked lighting them halfway along the path. No one else was out, but tomorrow, anyone could be, of course, legitimately out to use the facilities. They hadn’t set a guard, though.
She returned to the women’s cabin to finish the night’s sleep. Brynn stirred as she was peeling off her jacket, and she crawled into the cot, boots and all, going perfectly still. Brynn made a noise, turned over, and fell back to sleep. Coral quietly untied her boots and eased them onto the floor, and she lay back, feeling satisfied with her night’s rehearsals. Tomorrow was the day, so she needed to sleep the rest of this night through.
* * *
SHE WOKE TO POLLY SHAKING her.
“You need to hurry up,” the girl said. “Or Brynn will be mad.”
“I’m up, I’m up,” said Coral. As Polly swept through the door, she could see that dawn had arrived. It was the last day—either of her captivity or her life.
She was set to the task of stirring oatmeal. There was plenty left for the women, so she stuffed herself with seconds and thirds. Had to be well-fueled for tonight’s activity. After dishes were cleaned up, she was assigned cleaning duty for the main cabin, scrubbing floors, with Ellie. They finished the kitchen and dining room floors, but they still needed to scrub the tables and countertops.
“I need to dump the water and get fresh,” said Ellie.
“I can do it.”
“No, I’m not supposed to let you out alone. Stay here.”
That was fine by Coral. She waited until the woman was gone, and then she went back into the kitchen and began opening every drawer and cabinet there, checking their contents. She had to climb on the counter to reach the highest shelves. She wasn’t really expecting anything good, but there, on the left-hand side of the uppermost cabinet, were pills: generic aspirin, Benadryl, and Immodium. Nothing strong, nothing prescription, but life-savers, all the same.
The front door opened, and Coral shut the cabinet door and slid down to the floor, closing the open drawers as quickly and quietly as she could.
“Coral?”
“Coming,” she said.
“Oh. Okay, let’s finish in here and then do the kitchen last.”
“Sounds good,” Coral said. Her mind was on the pills. Could she risk taking them now? Risk taking a few from every bottle? Wait until before dinner, after dinner? Would she get another chance at them?
It might be best to wait until night and try her lock-picking skills at the front door here. Going for the pills would be a risk, though.
As she finished scrubbing the kitchen counters, she tried to keep herself from glancing up at the top cabinets. She wanted those drugs.
And if she broke in here to get the drugs, she could grab the biggest knives they had. That wouldn’t do any good against rifles, but it could be useful later. And something metal—saucepan, a large metal cup—to cook in. She had that metal cup in the cabin, but it wasn’t more than twelve ounces.
Damn. Water bottles. How were they going to replace those? Even a couple of empty twenty-ounce bottles, or a canteen for each of them would be necessary if they were to stay on the move. She hadn’t seen anything like that in the kitchen.
The more she thought about trying to replace even a fraction of their old gear, the more despair she felt. They needed gear to survive in this harsh environment, and yet without the sled, they could only carry so much. If Benjamin didn’t come, and were Coral escaping alone, she wasn’t sure she could carry a big enough load to keep herself alive.
Anything is better than staying here. The thought calmed her. She’d take what she could, and if she died out there, insufficiently supplied, it’d still be better than what awaited her here.
“Coral!” It was Ellie, breaking into her thoughts.
“Sorry. Drifted off. I’m sleepy.” She wondered if she said it enough to everyone today, if they’d let her nap in the afternoon. It’d keep her more alert tonight if she could catch an hour of sleep today. She let out an exaggerated yawn. “Are we done?”
Ellie handed her off to the next woman, and that one to the next, and no one she worked with that day expressed sympathy when she said that she needed a nap. Though Coral kept an eye out all day, she didn’t come across any other potential supplies for travel. The cave must be the repository for most of it. The rifles, she never saw. Either they were in the men’s cabin—though she couldn’t imagine they were just sitting there, where Benjamin could get to them—or they were stored elsewhere.
She found herself back in the kitchen in late afternoon, peeling root vegetables for stew. There was still so much she didn’t have, and so much she didn’t know—the worst of her ignorance being Benjamin’s mental state—but in eight or nine hours, she was leaving here anyway.
After dinner she said, “I’ll do dishes.”
Brynn shot a look at her.
Coral tried to put on an innocent, repentant face.
After a minute, Brynn gave a sharp nod. “Fine. Mondra is with you.”
Not the stupidest of the women. Though when a bunch of people believed a load of nonsense like these did, it was hard to pick out the smart ones. Mondra had grown unfriendly since the fight and head-shaving.
Though Coral looked for an opportunity to snatch the drugs before they all retired to the cabins, none presented itself. Mondra was more vigilant than ever, and they did dishes together and dumped water together, never giving Coral a moment alone in the kitchen.
Mondra escorted her to the cabin through a light snow and, when Coral said, “good night,” she did not return the sentiment. No matter. It’d be the best night ever for Coral, good wishes or not. Tonight, one way or the other, she would be free.
She sewed as instructed, making sure she drank all the water there was in the cabin’s pitcher. She was going to try to sleep for three or four hours, and a full bladder would wake her up in time to meet Benjamin. Before lights-out, she carefully noted the location of candle and matches on the crate, and she pushed her boots to a spot where her hand would easily reach from bed.
But when the lights were out, she was far from sleep. She lay in bed and went over and over her plan of action in her mind. Candle, boots, sleeping bag, pick the main cabin’s lock—shit. No, she needed her knife for that. So to the outhouse, see if Benjamin was there. If not, grab the knife and come back and get the drugs, a sack, and the biggest kitchen knives.
She rehearsed the actions in her mind over and over, until she was sure she’d know what to do. If she made it that far, to the outhouse, everything else depended on if Benjamin showed up or not.
She turned over and took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. A couple hours of sleep was still possible, and the more she could get now, the longer she’d be able to run without rest once she got away.
Fitfully dozing, she tried to stay aware of the time, but without clock or moonlight or any other marker, it was hard to guess the hour. She finally decided to rise when she had been wide awake for what she judged to be nearly an hour, and she could stand waiting no longer. Her nervousness was making her want to toss and turn, and that might wake Polly or Brynn. Whatever time it was, she should get up now.
She took her boots in one hand, grabbed her sleeping bag in the other, and tiptoed to the door. She eased them to the ground just outside the blanket door. Then she turned back to get her jacket and the candle and matches.
Brynn snorted and turned over in her cot.
Coral froze, her hand still clasping the matches. She waited, but Brynn made no more noise. Coral stood in place, counting to a hundred, listening hard to the sound of breathing from Brynn’s cot. When she heard a low sound from the woman’s throat, it sounded normal, relaxed, the almost-snoring of a sleeping person.
Shoving the candle and matches into her pocket, she padded as quietly as she could to the door and pushed out quickly, not wanting a gust of cold air to waken the sleepers. She sat on the cold packed snow and put on her jacket and gloves, pulled on her boots, tied them tightly, and then felt around for her sleeping bag. She rolled it up and used the attached laces to tie it into a manageable roll.
Holding her breath, she sat for a moment, listening. Nothing stirred. With all the animal life dead, all the trees gone, there were none of the soft night sounds you could hear pre-Event. The world was dead, the nights silent as a grave.
She was alone.
Good. She trailed her hand against the cabin until the corner, made the turn toward the path to the outhouse, and walked on. When her toe hit a soft patch of snow, she knew she was off track. She took three steps back, yanked off her glove, reached down, and felt the snow. It was packed down here, so she was on the trail. She adjusted her direction a few degrees left and took slow steps, feeling for the slope of the worn path. When she thought she had it, she sped up. A few minutes later, once again, her boot came down in soft snow. She repeated the procedure of getting back on track and when she next stumbled, this time over a rock, she risked a light.
She struck a match, the sound piercing in the quiet night, and looked ahead. She was on the path to the outhouse, and further along it than she had hoped. A few snowflakes danced in the matchlight. She hurried on, lit by the tiny flame only, until it burned out. Then she kept on in the dark until she thought she must be getting close. She lit another match, and there was the outhouse, not twenty feet ahead. She pulled out the candle and lit it.
Treading as lightly as she could, she approached the little building. Benjamin was nowhere to be seen. She went in, used the toilet, and then climbed up and felt the ledge for her knife. Her fingers hit it and knocked it to the ground. She jumped down and grabbed it.
Now, back to the main cabin and get the drugs. She’d come back here, and if Benjamin wasn’t here, she’d hide behind the outhouse and wait for him. If he wasn’t here in what she judged to be an hour, she’d have to convince herself to go on without him.
She blew out the candle, opened the door to the outhouse and hard arms grabbed her. Gasping, she pulled away, bracing for a fight.
