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“That’s smart,” I said. “It’s impossible to know if they survived the siege or not. By the time you did run out of supplies, it might be too late to collect them. ” My eyes fell for a moment on Pip and Ruby. They were further along than I was, by at least two months—maybe more.
Across the room, the girls sat in front of the fire, more comfortable now that they’d seen Silas and Benny. Helene, who seemed the least affected by their presence, explained her splint to Silas, taking it off so he could see the leg beneath. Beatrice ladled out the carrot soup into the plastic containers the boys had once used as cups. “Eve came back,” Benny said, carving into the mud floor with a twig, showing Bette and Sarah the words as he spoke them. I should’ve been relieved—that Leif wasn’t here, that my friends were alive and safe. But my gaze kept returning to Pip. She sat with her back against the wall, swirling the spoon around, her eyes fixed on the soup’s steaming surface.
They were both more than five months pregnant, but it had affected them so differently. Ruby looked healthier, her face filling out, her cheeks full and pink. Whenever she wasn’t talking, one hand found its way to her stomach, her palm resting on the tender spot below her belly button. Pip looked as though she were fighting off sickness, the color gone from her face. Her eyes were red rimmed and sad, and in the passing hour since I’d discovered them, she’d said only a few words to me, each one clipped and strange.
“And Arden never got pregnant—you’re certain?” I asked, keeping my voice low to avoid being heard.
Ruby nodded. “I’m certain. That’s part of the reason we left the compound when we did. ”
“When did you escape, then? How did Arden get you here?”
She glanced sideways, and for a moment Pip met her gaze, making some passing expression I didn’t recognize. Pip’s eyes were unfocused, as though she were in some other place and time. “About a month ago now,” Ruby said. “We’d been in the room next to her for weeks and she hadn’t said anything. And then one night she was there. Everyone else was sleeping. She opened her hand and there was the key. She said you gave it to her, and we had only this one chance to leave.
“She’d befriended one of the guards. Miriam, I think was the name. Arden sometimes helped with tasks around the building—sweeping, moving equipment, that sort of thing. She thought it would make them see she had changed, that she wasn’t a threat. If she was useful in the compound, she thought they wouldn’t make her train for the army—there were rumors about that, what would happen if she couldn’t get pregnant. We left that night with her—she’d stolen a security code from Miriam. And she swam us across the lake, one at a time. We were just south of the dugout, so we came here for supplies. That’s when we first heard about the siege. Within the week the boys left. They went to liberate the first labor camp with a group from a settlement up north. Arden went with them. ”
Pip didn’t lift her eyes from the floor. She worked at the mud with her nail, gouging out a shallow hole. “We’ve been taking care of Benny and Silas,” she said.
Ruby’s eyes were glassy in the firelight. “Arden had told us you were being held in the City,” she said. “I thought I’d never see you again. ”
She pressed her lips together, managing a tight smile. I hadn’t seen her cry at School. She had always comforted Pip and me, was always the hopelessly rational one who managed to see every side of every situation, whose presence automatically made you lower your voice, talk slower, not be as angry or sad. Ruby’s hand rubbed at the front of her stomach as she took a deep breath, willing the tears away.
“I’m glad we made it here,” I said. “I thought the same thing sometimes. ” I leaned in, about to hug her, but something in her face stopped me. She looked over my shoulder, her expression foreign and cold.
Pip noticed Ruby’s hesitation. “I never understood . . . why Arden?” she asked, each word spoken so carefully, as if she’d been waiting for days, weeks maybe, to say them to me. “You hated her at School. And then she comes to us, saying you’ve given her this key. She told us how you and her were together in the wild. She said you saved her. ” Pip swiped at her cheek, catching a tear before it fell. “I just don’t understand why you brought her and not us. ”
“I didn’t,” I said. I grabbed for Pip’s hands but she slid them out from under mine. “I didn’t bring her. I found her after I left—she was the one who told me about the building. I was forced to leave alone. ”
“Who?” Pip’s voice wavered. “Who forced you?”
“Teacher Florence,” I said. “I could leave only if I went alone. ”
“Then you shouldn’t have left at all. ” She raised her voice as she said it. Ruby placed her hand on her back, trying to calm her, but Pip continued. “Do you know that I waited for you? I sat in that room all day, and I argued with Headmistress that I couldn’t go to graduation, that something horrible must’ve happened. I could not imagine that you would actually leave School without me. How stupid was that? How stupid was I, thinking I’d be going to the City? Imagining my apartment, the architecture firm I’d work for there—imagining that we’d be together. ” She leaned in, her cheeks flushed. She was talking so loudly now that the girls turned, watching us. “I was staring at the lake as I walked over that bridge. I kept searching the water because I was so terrified you’d drowned. And the whole time you knew. You listened to me go on about my life in the City, and you knew. ”
My throat squeezed shut. I pressed my fingers to my eyes, trying to stop the tears, but my face was red, the whole room closing in on me. “I made a mistake,” I said, forcing each word out. “A really huge, irreversible mistake. And I still carry that. But I didn’t know until that night. I had only minutes to figure out what I was going to do. I wasn’t planning it. Of course I would’ve taken you if I knew. ”
Pip released a deep breath. The air felt heavier, the inches between us holding everything unspoken. “Now you’re the Princess. ” Pip let out a strange laugh. “After all this time, you were living in the Palace. ”
Ruby set her hand down on Pip’s and whispered something to her, the words so low I couldn’t make them out. “Why do you think I’m here?” I asked. “I’ve escaped the City. If we’re caught I’ll be killed. I might’ve lived in the Palace, but it wasn’t as if I forgot everything that happened before. ”
Behind us Clara and Beatrice stood, collecting some of the bowls scattered on the floor. “Let’s get everyone situated in their rooms—you could all use some rest,” Clara said. She helped Helene up, wrapping her arm around her side. Slowly the girls moved into the surrounding tunnels, their eyes lingering on us.
“Why did you bring them here?” Ruby asked. “What’s the point of this?”
I tried to steady my breaths. “We’re going to Califia. Arden must’ve told you about the settlement over the bridge. ”
“The women’s camp. ” Ruby nodded. As the fire dwindled down to the final, blackened logs, the room grew colder. “She said you’d had to leave there, that it wasn’t safe. ”