Prized

“No!” Gaia called, but her voice was lost in the commotion.

As she ran, the declining path dropped below the sight-line over the fence, hiding the crims from her and her from the crims. She could see the gate now and two guards standing outside it. She clutched at her hat and skirt, still running full force.

“Let me in!” she said, gasping for breath. “I have to get in! My friend Leon is in there!”

The first guard appeared amused. “This is a prison, Mlass. You can’t go in. Visits aren’t until next Tuesday.”

“This isn’t a visit!” she said. She stepped back to project her voice over the top of the wooden doors. “Leon!”

She couldn’t hear any specific reply, just the continued rumble of the disturbance inside.

“Let me in!” she repeated, grabbing at the heavy beam in the brackets that held the doors shut.

“Back up, Mlass,” the second guard said, setting his hand on top of the beam. “You can’t go in.”

“But I have to! An innocent man’s in there!”

The guard didn’t budge. “You’ll have to take that up with the Matrarc.”

“Leon!” she yelled again. “Are you there? Can you hear me?”

Gaia listened for an answer, and then turned to run back up the path again. By the time she could see into the prison yard again, Leon and Malachai were gone, and the other crims were filing into orderly groups.

Gaia hurried back down to the prison gate.

“How long has Leon Grey been here? The new man from the Enclave?” she demanded.

The two guards looked at each other and she almost died of impatience.

“I guess they brought in a new man a couple days ago,” the first guard said slowly.

Gaia balled her hands in fists. She wasn’t going to get any information out of these idiots. She had to see the Matrarc.

“Give a message to Leon Grey,” she said. “Tell him Gaia says she’ll get him out. Okay?”

They nodded, but their ready agreement only made her suspicious that they wouldn’t. They didn’t care. Their job was to guard the door, and that’s all they were doing.

She spun on her heel and ran up the road, but she had to stop far too soon. She hated not being strong. Did Leon have the acclimation sickness yet? she wondered. How would she help him through that?

Then another thought struck her: if he hadn’t had the sickness yet, he could still leave.

Mlady Roxanne met her on the veranda of the lodge. “Where’ve you been? We’ve been looking for you. The Matrarc wants to talk to you.”

“I want to talk to her, too,” Gaia said. Murderous rage had overtaken her frustration. “Where is she?”

“She’s in your room.”

Good, Gaia thought, pulling open the screen door and charging in. She stormed past the mlasses who looked up from their books, down the hall past the kitchen where Norris worked, and into her little room.

The Matrarc stood before Gaia’s barred window, facing outward, as if she could sense the light, and her red cane was angled rigidly to the floor.

“How long has Leon been here? Why didn’t you tell me he’d come?” Gaia demanded.

The Matrarc turned. Her expression was furious. “Close the door,” she said with ominous calm.

Rage and confusion warred in Gaia’s heart, but the Matrarc’s unyielding, steely eyes penetrated into her with uncanny precision, commanding. Gaia turned to close the door, even managing to do it without a slam.

“I need you to release him. Immediately,” Gaia said.

“And I need you to explain that.” The Matrarc pointed to Gaia’s desk, where a dirty box was set. It was a wooden box, with neatly dovetailed corners and a lid, the sort of box made with care to last, and which might be used to deliver a gift or hold keepsakes. With no distinguishing marks, it could belong to any one of a thousand people.

“I’ve never seen it before,” Gaia said.

“Look inside.”

Gaia’s heart beat strangely, and as she stared again at the dirt, the significance became clear to her: a box with dirt upon it had been dug up, which meant it first had been buried. The Matrarc was waiting, listening. Gaia stepped to the desk and lifted the lid. Inside was a neatly folded pile of rags, darkened with absorbed blood, now dried. On top lay a stem of blue cornflowers, dainty and just beginning to wilt. She gasped, stepping back.

“One of the boys, Sawyer, found it in the garden this morning. He thought it was odd to see fresh dirt under the apple tree,” the Matrarc said.

Gaia felt the blood drain from her face.

“Explain,” the Matrarc said.

“You’ve obviously reached the only conclusion,” Gaia said. “Someone had a miscarriage and buried the remains.”

“Who was it?”

“You can’t think I’d tell you if I knew,” Gaia said.

The Matrarc slammed her cane against the floor so hard that Gaia jumped.

“Don’t fool with me. I asked you a question.”

Gaia backed up, bumping against the rocker. “And I’m not answering.”

“You mixed something in the kitchen last night,” the Matrarc said. “The smell still lingered this morning, but Norris didn’t think anything of it until I asked him to account for it. I can’t make any sense of the pantry. That’s all put away. But obviously you’ve started your medicines there, and it’s more than likely you prepared something toxic last night.”

“It’s my job to prepare medicines,” Gaia reminded her. “You asked me to take care of the pregnant women of Sylum. That’s what I’m doing.”

“Did you help someone have a miscarriage? Was it a girl in the lodge?”

“If someone wants to talk to me about a medical concern in private, it’s a completely confidential matter,” Gaia said.

The Matrarc clenched her jaw. “I will not have this.”

“You told me to take care of the pregnant women. You must have known it would include this,” Gaia said. “Why didn’t you tell me Leon was here?”

“We’re not done discussing this miscarriage.”

“I’m done. I need to get back down to him. I have to find out if he’s had the acclimation sickness yet.”

“He hasn’t.”

“Have you talked to him?” Gaia asked.

“Of course I have. I talk to every newcomer who arrives here.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me? I don’t get it. He looked like he didn’t even realize I was here.”

“He knows that you’re here. He came on purpose to find you.”

Gaia was more confused than ever. “You should have told me!”

“You were bedridden and half out of your mind. He was violent and dangerous. I expected him to leave.”

“What?” Gaia said. “Are we talking about the same person, Leon Grey?”

“The newcomer said his name was Vlatir. He said he was raised in the Enclave but that he’d become friends with you. I found it impossible to trust anything he said. He tried to attack me.”

Gaia couldn’t believe it. “It must be a misunderstanding. He really is my friend. ‘Vlatir’ was his biological father’s name, from outside the wall.” He must have taken that name instead.

“Let me be clear about this,” the Matrarc said. “I don’t know why you left Wharfton with your baby sister because you’ve never given me a straight answer. But I was willing to give you a chance here because you seemed willing to try, and you have skills we need. Vlatir is another matter entirely. He’s clearly some sort of escaped prisoner. He’s a liability, or worse.”

“You can’t keep him in the prison,” Gaia said. “He’s done nothing wrong.”

“Except threaten my life.”

Gaia couldn’t believe that. “He must have been seriously provoked.”

The Matrarc frowned and slowly circled her cane in her fingers. “He matters to you, then?”

“Yes. Of course,” Gaia said.

The Matrarc nodded and turned toward the window again. She reached out to touch a pane of glass, then glided her fingers downward, to the bottom of the sash, to hold her hand in the gap where the fresh air came in. Her silence made Gaia uneasy.

“You’ve inadvertently given me a very important tool,” the Matrarc said softly.

Alarm flared up in Gaia. “You can’t do anything to him,” she said. “You’ve already taken Maya away from me.”

The Matrarc turned her hand slowly in the open space. “I’ve been trying to think what to do with you. I’ve never known such a deceitful, lying girl.”

“I am not,” Gaia said, affronted.

“I know what you did in the morteur’s barn,” the Matrarc said.

Gaia was amazed. The only way the Matrarc could know was if Will had told her himself, but why would he?

“Chardo Will came to me,” the Matrarc said. “He wanted to quit his job. He said he didn’t want to deal with bodies or burials anymore. So, naturally, I asked him why. He’s done an exceptional job for three years now. And you know what he told me?”

“I can’t guess. I hardly know him.”

“He wants to raise horses.”

Gaia was so surprised she almost laughed. “I bet he’d be good at that.”

The Matrarc turned to face in Gaia’s direction. “He takes full responsibility for the autopsy. He wanted me to know about Jones Benny’s uterus, but more than that, he wants you to have access to cadavers, with no secrecy, right out in the open, so if anyone wants to donate their body to your medical education or the study of the expools when they die, they can do it.”

Gaia was amazed. “He said all that?”

The Matrarc folded her arms across her chest. “What did you do to him?”

“Me?” Gaia asked, taken aback.

“He’s a good man. He’d never do this on his own. Do you know what would happen if this autopsy became commonly known? Everyone would wonder if Chardo Will has been doing secret autopsies on the people they love. It would break their hearts. What were you thinking?”

She seemed to think it was all Gaia’s idea, despite what Will had said. “I wanted to help him,” Gaia said. “That’s all. And we discovered something important.”

“It’s useless. Unless you’re planning to get the expools pregnant.”

Gaia shook her head, part shocked, part disgusted. “Of course not.”

“Did you even think where this might lead?”

“No,” Gaia said, her voice low.

“You don’t think much, do you?”

Gaia was stung. “I’ll tell Will I’m sorry, all right?”

“You’ll leave the poor man alone.” The Matrarc’s features settled into hard lines. “You’ve tied my hands in strange ways. I can’t punish you for performing an autopsy or inducing a miscarriage without bringing these unsavory issues to light.”

“So leave them in the dark.”

“Sawyer won’t be able to resist starting rumors,” the Matrarc said. “That’s why I need to act quickly. You need to tell me who you treated.”

“Why? So you can make her a libby? An example to the other girls?”

“Yes.”

“So what I did was illegal?” Gaia asked.

“What she chose was wrong, every part of it, from the fornication to the miscarriage, and she knows it. Her body would have betrayed her soon enough if you hadn’t intervened.”

“And then her pregnancy would have been her punishment? And giving up her child and her future? Who gave you the right to decide about that?”