The Orphan Army (4 page)

This girl, though, didn't look like she ever spent a summer afternoon playing make-the-rules-up-as-you-go goofball, or plotting evil master plans for breaking into the food cart to steal some pies, or catching frogs among the reeds down on the riverbank.

“I didn't know this place was even here,” he said. “My pod is out on a scavenger hunt. We were told there was a wreck and we came to find it.”

“Pod?” she asked, clearly confused. “Were you grown from a seed, boy? Are you an elemental?”

“Um . . . no?” he said, and mentally added “
weirdo
.
”
“I'm talking about my training pod. You know, twelve kids and a pod-leader? That's how everyone does it.”

She shook her head. “You don't make any sense.”

“Neither do you.”

She looked him up and down. “Is that your aspect?”

“My what?”

“Never mind.”

“You know, you don't make much sense, either. People ever tell you that?”

When she didn't answer, Milo pointed to the blackened clearing where the wreckage lay amid tangles of withered grass. “Did you see it come down?”

She didn't answer. Instead she wrapped her arms around her chest as if there were a cold wind.

“Did you—?” Milo pressed.

“You should not be here,” she said, repeating her earlier comment but this time spacing her words out in a clear warning.

“I know. We already agreed on that. Why do you keep saying it?”

She took a couple steps to the left, moving toward the very edge of the debris field to where the broken pyramid stood. At first her eyes seemed dreamy and distant and there was the smallest hint of a smile on her lips. Like someone about to see an old friend. Milo turned with her, and he saw the exact moment when she spotted the pyramid.

She froze as if she'd hit a wall. Her eyes flared so wide he could see the whites all around the irises. Her pale skin went dead white, and a small cry burst from her throat.

“Oh no . . . ,” she breathed. “Spirits of Night . . . how?
Noooo!
”

“That?” Milo pointed. “That wasn't me. It was like that when I got here. I swear.”

Tears filled the girl's eyes and began pouring down her cheeks as the first heavy sobs broke in her chest.

“What is it?” asked Milo, taking a tentative step toward her. “Are you all right?”

The girl wheeled on him, eyes blazing with sudden heat, lips pulling back from her white teeth. Her hands came up, fingers curled like claws. For a moment Milo was certain she was going to attack him.

“What . . . have . . . you . . .
done
?” she snarled, and in that moment, she did not sound like a girl. Or even a girl trying to talk like an adult.

For just a moment her voice was much lower. Rougher.

Infinitely stranger.

Milo took several stumbling backward steps, all the way to the edge of the woods, ready to turn and flee. He was immediately and completely terrified.

Of a girl?

Yes.

Of this girl.

“I didn't do anything,” he protested, holding his hands up, palms out. “Believe me, I didn't do anything.”

The girl continued to glare at him. Then she whirled and rushed to the pyramid, brushing the stones with her fingertips, searching it with her eyes, looking at the fallen pieces. Then she screamed.

She screamed so loud the birds leaped from the surrounding trees and fled into the eastern sky.

The girl staggered back from the pyramid.

“It's gone!” she wailed. “Shadows save us all, it's
gone
!”

“What's gone?” asked Milo. He wanted to go over to her but didn't dare. She was visibly trembling, and he was afraid that if he moved at all, she'd spook and bolt.

“The Heart! Sacred Spirits of Night, the
Heart of Darkness
is gone.”

“What's that?”

Once more she faced him, teeth bared like an animal, fists balled, eyes burning like molten silver. “What have you
done
?”

The movement was so powerful, so threatening, that Milo stumbled backward and tore the slingshot from his belt.

“I told you,” he yelled. “I didn't do—”

“Oakenayl!” she said sharply. “Bind him.”

That fast Milo was grabbed from behind.

Powerful hands clamped around his ankles and knees, wrists and elbows, and a thick, bony arm wrapped around his throat and squeezed. The speed and force of the attack was terrifying. He couldn't move, couldn't breathe. He tried to scream, but the arm around his throat squeezed tighter and cut off all breath, all sound.

He felt someone lean close, felt lips as hard and rough as tree bark brush against his ear as a voice spoke in a dangerous whisper. “Try anything, boy, and I'll crush you like a bug.”

The voice sounded like a boy's, but the strength of that grip was greater than anything Milo had ever experienced. Even the biggest soldiers in the camp could not be this strong. The breath on his cheek was as cold as dirt and smelled of soil and moss.

The girl hurried over to Milo, eyes blazing, her teeth still bared. She knotted her fingers in his hair and gave his head a violent shake.

“Where is it?” she snarled in a voice that was no longer that of a little girl. This was a guttural voice that was like the growl of a hungry animal.

Milo's mouth worked, but he could not force a single word out.

“Tell me!” she demanded.

Milo squirmed and tried to kick and elbow whoever was holding him. There had to be more than one person because there was an arm around his throat and hands were pinning his arms and legs. He couldn't punch or kick or use any of the survival skills he'd been taught.

He was totally helpless.

The girl cupped his chin in her other hand, thumbnail pressing into one cheek, fingernails digging into the other so hard his gums hurt. She stood on her toes and bent close so that their faces were less than an inch apart.

“I will eat your heart and leave your bones for the crows,” she said.

In a world of horror and monsters, this was the most frightening thing anyone had ever said to him. It was like something out of nightmares. It was the kind of thing a monster would say.

M
ilo tried to speak. He really tried. But he could not. He couldn't even breathe. The world began to smear and blur around him. Black flowers of pain seemed to blossom in his eyes as he drifted on the edges of consciousness.

The girl stared into his eyes.

Deep.

So deep.

Into the very center of him.

“Why did you take the Heart of Darkness?” she asked again and again, hammering him with questions and accusations. “Where is it?
How
did you break the enchantments? What did you do with it?”

Then it seemed to occur to her that he was trying to answer but couldn't.

Annoyance flickered on her face. “Oakenayl, let him speak.”

The stricture around his throat eased, though only slightly. Milo spat out the stale breath in his lungs and gulped in fresh air.

“Let . . . me . . . go . . . ,” he gasped weakly.

“Tell me,” repeated the girl. “What did you do to the Heart of Darkness?”

“It wasn't me,” insisted Milo. “I didn't take
anything
.”

“I can make him talk,” whispered Oakenayl. “Let me pull off an arm or two. He'll tell us.”

The girl chewed her lip like she was considering it.

Actually considering it.

Milo's knees began to tremble, and if he hadn't been held so firmly he would have collapsed.

“I didn't do it!” he cried. “Whatever it was, I didn't do it. It wasn't me.”

“This boy is lying,” said Oakenayl. “His kind always lie. It's all they ever do.”

“I'm not lying—and stop calling me
boy
! I don't even know what you're talking about. What's this Heart thing? I didn't touch it. I just got here. . . .”

The girl studied his eyes. Her gaze flicked back and forth to the unseen face of Oakenayl.

“He's lying,” insisted the brute who held Milo. “Don't let him cast a spell of doubt on you.”

“I'm not lying,” Milo seethed. “If you don't believe me, check my pockets. I don't have anything of yours. Go on—check.”

The girl did check. First she upended his pouch and let all the stones drop to the damp ground. She gasped when his lucky black stone fell out, but after picking it up and peering at it, she growled in annoyance and let it fall. Then she removed everything from Milo's pockets, glanced briefly at them, and dropped each one on the ground. His slingshot, his knife—a Swiss Army knife that had everything from a spork to a pair of wire cutters—his compass, and a first-aid kit. The girl looked at it without interest and let it fall. She dug deeper into his pockets and found vari­ous bits of tech; a few pieces of beef jerky; a signal flare; his microtool kit, which he used to dis­mantle scavenged tech; a plastic photo holder with a picture of his parents and a five-year-old Milo taken a month before the Swarm arrived; and a spool of string.

As she searched, Oakenayl continually and quietly began tightening his hold again. The girl apparently did not notice this, which was clearly what Oakenayl intended. He was slowly choking Milo again, shutting off the air once more.

The girl removed the last item from Milo's pockets—a tiny metal tube in which was a coiled fishing line and hook—tossed it away, and flicked her eyes back to lock on Milo's. He saw expressions come and go on her face. First hatred and intense anger, then growing uncertainty as each item she found proved to be something other than what she expected to find. Then doubt. Finally, the lights in her eyes faded into the dullness of confusion and despair. That was an emotion Milo knew very well. One that he saw in the eyes of refugees when they first came to the EA camp. One that he saw in the eyes of soldiers who came back from patrol with too many of their comrades missing.

She staggered backward from him as if pushed. Her heel caught on a broken rock and the girl fell. Tears sprang into her eyes and rolled down her flushed cheeks.

“It's not here,” she gasped. “Not here . . .”

Her voice trailed off as she dropped the last item.

“Then he's hidden it,” said Oakenayl.

“No. There was no time for that. Whoever he is, he did not do this.”

“Then he knows who did,” insisted her companion. “I will make him tell us.”

The powerful arm around Milo's throat tightened even more. The world began turning dark. He managed to force out one strangled wordless croak before Oakenayl cut off the last of his air.

That croak, though, was enough.

The girl suddenly looked at him as if she'd never seen him before. It took several seconds for the blunt shock in her eyes to come into focus with what was happening.

“Oakenayl,” she said, waving her hand. “Let the boy go.”

“I'll let him go when he tells us where it is.”

“It wasn't him. He is not the one we need to kill. Let him go.” She was sobbing as she said it.

For a moment the hands and arms restraining Milo tightened, and Milo thought he was really going to die. Right there and then.

“You live this time, boy,” whispered Oakenayl. “What a shame.”

Then suddenly he was free.

Staggering forward. Unbound and unfettered.

Falling to hands and knees.

Hanging his head like a dog.

Coughing, choking, gagging.

Gulping and gasping in air. Filling his lungs with life. Feeling the blackness recede, seeing the dark flowers fade like sparks.

He was free, but far from safe.

T
he girl sniffed back her tears and straightened, regaining some of her composure—or at least pretending to. She wiped her cheeks and took a deep breath, held it, and sighed it out. Milo could see this from where he lay, but he was too hurt and dazed to even look over his shoulder at the people who'd grabbed him.