“We should go now, then,” Glass said firmly. “There’s no point in waiting for an announcement. By then, it’ll be too late. All the spots will be taken.”
“I’ll just get my things,” Sonja said, her eyes darting around the room as she took inventory of her scant possessions.
“There’s no time,” Luke said, taking Glass’s mother by the arm and leading her toward the door. “Nothing is worth losing our chance at getting to Earth.” Sonja nodded, her eyes flickering with fear, and followed Luke through the door.
The closer they got to the launch deck, the more crowded the halls became—filled with anxious Phoenicians, some laden with bags and children, others carrying nothing but the clothes on their backs.
Luke grabbed Glass with one hand and Sonja with the other, guiding them through the crowd toward the stairwell. Glass tried not to make eye contact with any of the people she passed. She didn’t want to remember their faces when she thought about the dead.
CHAPTER 18
Clarke
“It’s not serious,” Clarke told Sasha as she finished cleaning the cut on her neck and turned to rummage through their dwindling bandage supply. She reached into the box, then hesitated, unsure whether to use one of the remaining bandages. While Sasha’s wound wasn’t deep and would certainly heal on its own, it’d feel good to be able to do something.
“You’re going to be fine,” Clarke said, wishing the same were true for the girl lying on the far side of the cabin, her poor, disfigured face covered with a blanket no one would want to remove. Clarke had asked to examine Priya’s body one more time before they buried her, to see if there was any important evidence she and Wells had missed in their shock and horror.
Wells nodded at her from where he was standing guard at the doorway, and Clarke followed him outside.
“Bellamy’s gone insane,” he whispered to Clarke, and explained what Bellamy had done, how he’d tried to force Sasha to give him information she didn’t have. “You need to talk to him.”
Clarke winced. There was no doubt in her mind that she’d driven him to do it; telling Bellamy about Lilly had pushed him over the edge. But she couldn’t imagine filling Wells in on what had happened in the woods. “He’s not going to listen to me,” she said, glancing around the clearing, somehow both relieved and disappointed not to see Bellamy anywhere.
“I’ll go look for him,” Wells said wearily. “Will you stay here and keep an eye on Sasha? If Bellamy comes back and finds her gone, he’ll murder all of us.” He grimaced at his choice of words, then closed his eyes and rubbed his temples.
Clarke’s hand extended out of habit, trained to ruffle Wells’s hair whenever stress prompted this uncanny imitation of his father. She caught herself just in time, and placed her hand on his shoulder instead. “You know none of this is your fault, right?”
“Yes, I know.” It came out sharper than he’d evidently meant, because he sighed and shook his head. “Sorry. I mean, thank you.”
Clarke nodded, then glanced over her shoulder at the infirmary cabin. “Does she really need to stay in there? It seems cruel to make her sit so near—” She cut herself off before she said the body. “Priya.”
Wells shuddered, then looked over at the other side of the clearing where a mutinous-looking Graham was standing with his friends. They were too far away to hear, but their heads swiveled back and forth between the grave Eric was digging, and the infirmary cabin behind Wells and Clarke. “I think it’s best to keep her away from the others for now. We can’t risk angering the Earthborns if something happens to her. Look what they’ve done already, unprovoked.”
He was speaking calmly, logically, in the same tone he’d use to talk about water shifts and firewood duty, but there was something in Wells’s expression that made Clarke wonder if perhaps he had another reason for wanting to keep Sasha safe.
“Okay,” Clarke agreed. After Wells left, she took a deep breath and walked back into the cabin. Sasha sat cross-legged on a cot, running her finger along the bandage on her neck.
“Try not to touch it,” Clarke said, sitting down on the edge of her own cot. “The bandage is sterile, but your hands aren’t.”
Sasha’s hand dropped to her lap as she shot a glance at Priya. “I’m so sorry,” she said quietly. “I can’t believe they did that to her.”
“Thank you,” Clarke said stiffly, unsure how to respond. But when she saw that the pain in Sasha’s face was real, she softened slightly. “I’m sorry we brought her here with you. It’ll just be for a little while.”
“It’s okay. You should take your time. It’s important to spend time with the dead. We always wait until the third sunset to bury anyone.”
Clarke stared at her. “You mean, you leave the body out?”
Sasha nodded. “People grieve differently. It’s important to give everyone time to say good-bye in their own way.” She paused and surveyed Clarke thoughtfully. “I suppose it’s different on the Colony. Death is rarer there, isn’t it? You have medicine for everything?” Her voice was frayed by a mix of wonder and longing that made Clarke wonder what kind of supplies the Earthborns had, and how many people they’d lost from a lack thereof.
“A lot of things. But not everything. A friend of mine lost his mother a few years ago. It was terrible. She’d been in the hospital for months, but in the end, there was nothing they could do.”
Sasha drew her knees up to her chest. She’d removed her black leather boots, revealing thick socks that stretched all the way up her calves. “It was Wells’s mother, wasn’t it?” she asked.
Clarke blinked at her in surprise. “Did he tell you?” she asked.
Sasha turned away and began fiddling with the edge of her scraggly black sweater. “No, I just can tell he’s suffered a lot. You can see it in his eyes.”
“Well, he’s caused quite a bit of suffering himself,” Clarke said, slightly more harshly than she’d meant to.
Sasha raised her head and stared at Clarke with an expression that was more curious than hurt. “Haven’t we all? You know, it’s funny. When I thought about kids on the Colony, I imagined you all as totally carefree. After all, what could you have to worry about? You had robot servants, medicine that allowed everyone to live to a hundred and fifty, and you spent all day surrounded by stars.”
“Robot servants?” Clarke repeated, feeling her brow furrow. “Where’d you hear that?”
“Just from stories people told. We knew most of it probably wasn’t true, but it was fun to think about.” She paused and looked sheepish, then started to slip her feet back inside her boots. “Come on, I have something to show you.”
Clarke stood up slowly. “I told Wells we’d stay here.”
“So he’s in charge?”
It was an innocent question, but it still rankled Clarke. Yes, Wells had been working hard to keep the camp from dissolving into chaos, but that didn’t mean he got to order everyone around. “He’s not in charge of me,” Clarke said. “So where are we going?”
“It’s a surprise.” Seeing Clarke’s hesitation, Sasha sighed. “Don’t you trust me by now?”
Clarke considered the question. “I suppose I trust you as much as I trust anyone here. After all, you aren’t on Earth because you committed a crime.”
Sasha looked at her in confusion, but before she had time to ask a question, Clarke turned to quickly check on her patients. Molly and Felix were unchanged, but there was something odd about the Walden girl’s lip. It seemed to be stained with something—was it blood? Clarke suppressed a gasp as she thought back to Lilly’s final days, when her gums bled so badly, it became difficult to talk. But when Clarke grabbed a scrap of cloth to wipe the blood from the girl’s mouth, it came away easily, almost as if it were…
“Are you ready?” Sasha asked.
Clarke turned with a sigh and nodded. Perhaps Sasha could show her some medicinal plants the Earthborns used. At this point, she was ready to try anything.